1. Keyword in Domain name
If you are interested in some specific field like SEO make sure you include keywords in your domain for example seotips.com.
2. Keyword in Post Url
Always change your post permalink if there is no keyword in Url, blogger, and WordPress by default add the title as the permalink. If you don’t see the title of the post in the Url, then you need to change your permalinks option.
www.retailcontrolsystems.com/top-10-seo-tips-for-2014/ is better than www.retailcontrolsystems.com/post99
3. Keywords in the Title tag, headings, meta description, and in Body
Use at least one keyword in the title tag, headings, and meta description. Don’t use too many keywords in the body, you can also use keywords in subheadings. If you are on a WordPress self-hosted blog you can use “WordPress SEO by Yoast” plugin to automate all the above tasks.
4. Optimize Images
Add alt tags and titles in all of your images and make sure to optimize the size to cut the server load. For WordPress, you can use Smush.it a plugin to automate this task and for other platforms, you can use standalone software like Gimp or XnConvert. Reducing the image size without compromising its quality is called lossless optimization and thus reduces the loading time of your website Since Google has incorporated site speed in the ranking of Search Results.
5. Interlinking
Interlink all your related posts, make sure your link contains keywords. Don’t link too deep and same keywords more than two times. If you are linking to another website (outbound links) always make sure that the site you are linking to is a “Good Site”, don’t link your website to spam sites.
6. Optimize your Website/blog
It is proven that decreasing the loading time of your website/blog directly affects the number of visitors/pageview. The best practice is to not exceed 100k page size and to reduce unnecessary scripts and meta tags from WebPage. You can use the Google Page Speed tool to check your website speed and it also suggests what action should be taken to optimize the website. To optimize your Website you can use W3 Total Cache WordPress Plugin.
Page Speed Score of Retail Control Systems is 84/100
7. Submit your website/blog to Search Engine/Directories
Create Google Webmaster and Analytics account submit your website including a sitemap, track your rankings, and other details. Submit your website/blog to Bing and other Search Engines like Baidu, Yandex, etc. Listing your website in Dmoz can take more than a year but if you succeed, then it will boost your overall ranking. If you can’t wait then go for Yahoo paid listing which charges around 299$. There are many web directories where you can list your website free of cost.
8. Easy Navigation
Make sure users can navigate your website without any problem, including two sitemaps one for visitors and the other for Search Engines. Use breadcrumbs for internal sitemaps and XML sitemaps for Search Engines.
9. Quality Contents
Provide quality content to your visitors, engage visitors and decrease the bounce rate of your website. Don’t copy others’ work, write fresh content, easy to read and primarily for your readers not for Search Engines.
Content is King But SEO is Queen
10. Social Network
Create Social Profile on various Social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, etc, and daily share your post/article’s on these Social networks. Make sure you put your domain name in Social Network Profiles.
Bonus Tips
11. Business Listing
Add your Business Website on Google Maps or FourSquare and make sure you update them regularly, this will improve your local SEO.
If you haven’t heard my pitch on using Positionly you should definitely attend our next Retailers Workshop
12. Contact Us
Have you added a Contact Us page on your Website, if not then add it, make sure you add your full address and mail id to the contact us page? Search Engine gives priority to websites with necessary pages like contact us, privacy policy, disclaimer, etc. Add same mail ID in contact us page which is given on domain Whois Info or email id which is used to register that domain.
13. Domain Registration
If you are serious about your website then register or extend the domain name for 5-10 years, it’s because Search Engine keeps track of domain registration length. Search Engines give priority to the domain name which is registered for long periods of time.
14. SSL
If you are having eCommerce site then adding an SSL Certificate will increase your site’s ranking as compared to other eCommerce sites without SSL. Search Engine gives priority to SSL-certified eCommerce sites.
