SEO For Blogs: Blog Post Series Kickoff

SEO. It’s a term often thrown about very loosely by companies that make guarantees about astronomical boosts in your rankings for certain search terms that seem too good to be true.

And they are. 

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a complex technique that encompasses a great number of disciplines, practices, and strategies. In fact, many parts of your website may contribute to your search engine optimization (or lack thereof), including the time it takes for pages to load, the way your posts are constructed, and the positioning of key words within your titles and content.

In this brand new series, Blog What? Design Inc. will identify various ways to ensure that your website makes its way towards the top of search engine results without you falling victim to the SEO gimmicks and fluff clogging up the Internet and general blogosphere these days. SEO may sound like an intimidating mythical beast you can’t quite figure out how to defeat, so here, we’ll explain some fairly clear formulas that will help you improve your website’s search engine placement and identify techniques that might hurt it.

How Can SEO Help my Blog?

Search engine optimization should play a crucial role in your overall digital strategy no matter what type of website you have. For bloggers, however, there are a few overall key points to consider:

1. (Dynamic) Content is key.  As a blogger, you already have an advantage over the innumerable number of purely static websites that most likely exist within your niche.  The simple act of consistently updating your blog with information relevant to your select field will boost your rankings. Why? Because search engines believe (rightfully so) that by constantly updating, your website consistently has something to contribute to the topic at hand and is therefore a potential authority on the subject.
2. Always aim for great writing, not keyword stuffing. As a company that regularly profiles a variety of blogs, either through potential clients, clients’ competitors, or others, we find it quite unfortunate when a blog’s content quality falls just short of the beautiful designs they may boast. An engaging visual presence is certainly an important factor, but search engines ultimately do not consider the visual aspects of your design, no matter how aesthetically engaging. That’s because web crawlers are more concerned with what you’re saying, not the way it looks. As a result, it’s important to revise, revise, and revise again. Another set of eyes is always good! In the current age of smart phones and mobile devices, there is simply no excuse for shoddily written content that can be fact-checked and shared in less than a few seconds. Simply focusing on a number of select keywords present in a blog post may not only hurt your rankings, but keep away new and current readers, as well.
3. Don’t fall victim to SEO myths. Unfortunately a great number of SEO myths exist all over the internet and still misguide bloggers. For example, factors such as page rank are simply no longer as relevant as they may have been, or they’re completely obsolete in the case of meta keywords. Search Engine Land’s executive news editor Matt McGee recently explained to Net Magazine that Google page rank ”is still often seen as the number one factor in Google’s algorithm when it’s actually one of a couple of hundred factors. It’s a very visible symbol for a lot of webmasters and business owners, but the more time you spend in the search world, the sooner you realise it’s not the be-all and end-all.” We’ll be debunking the top five SEO myths for bloggers next week, so be sure to check back soon. 
4. At the end of the day, consider the overall “picture” your content paints. As we’ve explained before, content is key. Since keyword stuffing won’t get you anywhere, dynamic and high quality content is what will ensure that your blog works its way to the top of search engine result pages (SERPs). Content that is carefully crafted with a clear and concise argument or piece of information will ultimately win out over those posts that lack clear direction and context. So, take a step back during your next writing session to ensure that your content “makes sense” in the setting of a greater picture. As SEOmoz’ latest annual investigation entitled “Search Engine Ranking Factors” of 2011 and industry trendsetter reveals, factors like “analysis of a site/pages’ perceived value to users” and usage rates like bounce back rates to search engine result pages (SERPs) are now much more important than aspects such as paid links, anchor text, and the evermore useless meta keywords section of your document’s header.

The most interesting point to be made when considering SEO is that it is constantly evolving behind closed, proprietary doors like Google’s. As a result, the best we can do is observe, record, and hypothesize about the future of this field. Here are some thoughts from leading experts who have contributed to SEOmoz’ annual 2011 SEO investigation:

“Google’s future is moving toward modeling human opinion. PageRank was a voting system for websites by websites. Now we are moving to a popularity system. Power to the people.” — Julian Grainger

“In addition to these, I expect to see the importance of speed as a ranking factor increase even more over the next 12 months.” — Brian Ussery

So, how can Blog What? Design assist you with your SEO strategy? There are no gimmicks, just pure service provided by a team of experts.

Future Posts in This Series

Check back soon as we revisit many of these topics in further detail as part of our SEO for bloggers series. In the meantime, here are some future posts to look forward to:

• Google PageRank & Why it Matters for Bloggers (or not!)
• The Top 5 SEO Myths for Bloggers
• Robots.Txt: What Does it Mean for Your Blog?