- June 30, 2023
- Posted by: Featured
- Categories: Blog, SEO
14 SEO Tips Straight From SEO Experts
To help marketing teams stay ahead in the ever-developing world of SEO, we reached out to top SEO leaders and professionals for their best advice. From targeting featured snippets to creating valuable, optimized content, here are 14 expert tips shared by CEOs, founders, and marketing specialists to elevate your SEO game.
- Target Featured Snippets
- Prioritize UX and Keywords
- Take Action and Focus on Progress
- Concentrate on Content Relevance
- Align Content With Search Intent
- Engage Actively Across Channels
- Improve Branding With Relatable Keywords
- Monitor and Analyze Performance
- Revitalize Historical Content
- Acquire High-Quality Backlinks
- Focus On User-Centric Content
- Combine SEO and CRO Strategies
- Emphasize Keyword Research
- Create Valuable and Optimized Content
Target Featured Snippets
Featured snippets are the answers that search engines choose to display at the top of the page, allowing users to find answers to specific questions quickly without having to browse through multiple pages. A featured snippet is one of the best answers and can affect organic search results.
That’s why it’s an excellent SEO tip to share with marketing teams: create posts that answer specific questions. Write the answers concisely and impressively to increase the chances of becoming featured snippets. The content in your featured snippet must be semantically relevant to the keywords users search for.
Marketing teams should organize and format their blog posts so that Google can easily find the answers and display them in the featured snippet. Teams should target featured snippets with consistently formatted sections.
Yogesh Kumar
Digital Marketing Manager, Technource
Prioritize UX and Keywords
As SEO leaders, our best tip for marketing teams is to prioritize user experience (UX) alongside keyword optimization. While keywords are crucial, delivering a seamless and engaging user experience is equally vital for long-term SEO success.
Studies show that 88% of online consumers are less likely to return to a website after a bad user experience. Therefore, the focus is on optimizing page load speed, mobile responsiveness, intuitive navigation, and interesting content. These factors not only improve SEO rankings but also enhance conversion rates and customer satisfaction.
A real-life example is Airbnb, which transformed its UX to prioritize ease of use and visual appeal. This resulted in increased organic traffic, higher engagement, and improved search rankings.
Himanshu Sharma
CEO and Founder, Academy of Digital Marketing
Take Action and Focus On Progress
My best tip is to focus on “doing” more than analyzing. Do more than just check analytics and rankings regularly. You want your marketing team to get meaningful results every day by getting new content written, old and new content optimized, and links built.
Only check your rankings and analytics once a week so you don’t stress over how little it changes from day to day. When you look at it from week to week, you’re going to see a bit more movement, especially if you have been making progress on the “doing” every day.
Boyd Norwood
VP of Marketing, Nozzle
Concentrate on Content Relevance
If I were to distill my experience in SEO down to a single piece of advice, it would be to prioritize content relevance above all else.
Search engines today reflect the needs and preferences of real users, and thus, they favor content that offers true value. Gone are the days when keyword stuffing and manipulative link schemes could guarantee high rankings. Now, your focus should be on delivering high-quality content that is informative, engaging, and satisfying for users.
Kevin Hall
Marketing Operations, Webserv
Align Content With Search Intent
Focus on creating content that aligns with search intent. Search intent is what a user is looking for when they type a particular query into Google. Are they looking for information? Are they trying to make a purchase? Are they comparing different options?
By understanding the search intent behind your target keywords, you can create content that better meets the needs of those users. For example, if someone is searching for “best running shoes,” they’re probably looking for a list of recommended shoes to choose from.
So instead of just creating a generic product page that talks about all the features of your shoes, create a blog post or article that highlights the top 10 running shoes and why they’re great.
This approach helps you rank higher in search results and improves the user experience by providing more relevant and helpful content.
Johannes Larsson
Founder and CEO, JohannesLarsson.com
Engage Actively Across Channels
SEO leadership matters in today’s digital marketing success. For leaders of SEO, one key tip to share with marketing teams is to maintain active engagement across all channels. Instead of having a single outbound marketing push, create multiple touchpoints with customers and prospects through engaging content, like blogs and videos, that attract users both organically and through advertising.
This approach creates more opportunities for customers to connect with your brand, leading to better conversions and ROI. As an uncommon example, consider creating interactive polls on major social media sites that allow you to collect feedback from followers quickly while also creating more user engagement.
Kate Duske
Editor-in-Chief, Escape Room Data
Improve Branding With Relatable Keywords
Sometimes, other marketers feel restricted by the use of keywords in articles and web pages “imposed” by SEOs, but keyword research actually teaches you a lot about your audience and allows you to talk to your audience in the exact terms they’re using to search for something you can help them with.
This can be especially helpful when your ideal customer uses different language when being on the phone with your customer support than when researching things in Google. So don’t see keywords as an unnatural thing to stuff into your content; see them as an aid in improving your brand’s voice and a way to speak to your audience in terms they’ll relate to.
Sofie Couwenbergh
Content Strategist and Writer, Let Me Write That Down for You
Monitor and Analyze Performance
Regularly monitor and analyze your website’s performance using SEO tools. This tip is crucial for SEO success. By leveraging SEO tools, you can track key metrics like organic traffic, rankings, backlinks, and user engagement.
Analyzing this data helps you identify areas for improvement, discover content gaps, and uncover optimization opportunities. It allows you to make data-driven decisions, refine your SEO strategies, and stay ahead of competitors.
By consistently monitoring and analyzing your website’s performance, you can adapt your approach, optimize for better results, and drive continuous improvement in your organic search visibility and overall SEO performance.
Ben Lau
Founder, Featured SEO Company
Revitalize Historical Content
Breathing new life into historical content is just as crucial as creating new material for driving organic growth. In fact, it’s an often overlooked strategy that can yield impressive results.
With content SEO, auditing your existing blog posts can be a significant change. Focus on examining and updating content to more accurately align with user intent, incorporate recent insights, or rectify obsolete information. This approach ensures that your content remains relevant, accurate, and valuable to your readers.
To uncover new directions for expanding or enhancing your blog post, use tools such as Google Search Console. It provides vital data about the keywords your page is currently ranking for, enabling you to fine-tune your content to better meet the search intent of your audience.
Remember, even minor improvements or rewrites can drastically transform old blog posts into formidable drivers of website traffic.
Edward Roberts
SEO Specialist, Page Not Found
Acquire High-Quality Backlinks
In the world of SEO, getting high-quality backlinks to your website is like striking digital gold. Think of these links as a vote of confidence for search engines, signaling that your website is valuable and trustworthy.
When reputable sites (especially those in your niche) link to yours, search engines like Google view it as an endorsement, boosting your chances of ranking higher in search results. The most important thing to remember here is that not all links are created equal. Quality outweighs quantity, so your core focus should win links from authoritative websites that apply to your industry.
Jess Rodley
Director of Operations, Dialed Labs
Focus On User-Centric Content
Never lose sight of the user being your target audience, not the search engines. Make sure the content on your site is coherent and provides answers to the queries the user may have about your product or service.
Answer their questions comprehensively with great content on the website (including videos and images if necessary). As a result, you will build the website’s authority in its niche while providing your users with an experience where the answers are only a mouse click away.
Steph Andrusjak
Freelance SEO Consultant, SEO Steph
Combine SEO and CRO Strategies
Alright, here’s an unpopular opinion.
SEO and Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) are no longer separate entities; they are symbiotic partners in the digital marketing ecosystem. When framing meta descriptions and doing keyword research, remember they serve dual purposes—attracting both search engine crawlers AND potential customers.
Therefore, balance your strategies to serve both.
User intent is key, so create content that ranks well and resonates with users, increasing the likelihood of converting.
And last, maintain a balance in your site’s design, ensuring it is neither too ‘sales-y’ nor too nuanced. Remember, intertwining SEO with CRO leads to:
- higher rankings
- more traffic
- improved conversion rate
- more sale
Ian Dukleth
Entrepreneur of SEO and Content Strategy, Ian Dukleth
Emphasize Keyword Research
Keyword research is essential for successful SEO. It allows you to understand what your target audience is searching for so you can create content that meets their needs.
Investing in thorough keyword research will provide insight into how competitive the keywords are, giving you a better understanding of how difficult it might be to rank for those terms.
Darryl Stevens
CEO, Digitech Web Design
Create Valuable, Optimized Content
Content is about delivering value to your audience. SEO best practices help content rank because they cater to signals that make content easier to read and understand. The frameworks are important, but the value you provide is far more important.
Rather than chase after “keyword opportunities,” look for content topics that resonate with your audience, address pain points, and reduce sales cycles. Create that content first and optimize it for search. You may not drive a ton of traffic, but you’ll convert a lot higher.
James De Roche
Managing Partner, Lead Comet
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