Content strategies for SEO

On page SEO is important – you need to get your keywords right and use headings and meta data to help search engines discover your data. But to develop your SEO further you need to know how to share your website content and details externally.

Blog regularly for SEO gains

Blogging is a great way of writing regularly about your business and using keywords can help with your discoverability. When thinking about sharing your content online blog posts are probably the easiest content to share, but you should also think about how to promote and link to all your content.

Using social media to boost your SEO

Many businesses are used to sharing content on social media, particularly on established platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Gaining more followers and subscribers and having your content shared can help build brand awareness, but social media is also valuable for SEO.

Social media and search rankings

In a 2014 video Google’s Matt Cutts surprised many marketers by saying that social media performance doesn’t directly influence search engine rankings in the way many people expected.Large numbers of Facebook or Twitter followers don’t necessarily lead to higher rankings. However, that doesn’t mean that social media doesn’t influence your search engine rankings.

Social media backlinks

Sharing your content on social media and having others share it too can help with your SEO. Marketing expert and CEO Brian Honigman writes about the importance of social media links , and that links on Facebook, Twitter,LinkedIn, YouTube and other social networks can help search engines understand what websites are credible and should rank more highly. Links that are shared many times will have a higher visibility.

Social media profiles rank in search engines

Writing for Search EngineWatch , Simon Ensor argues that social media presence can directly influence your search engine rankings , as social media profiles are returned in searches.

As the below image shows, Google has returned QuayClick’sTwitter and Facebook pages in its search listings:

Quality content drives social media shares

The most effective way to use social media to support yourSEO is to create content that people want to share and link to. The more people value your content the better it will serve you. Ron Dod, writing for Search Engine Journal maintains that if you create good content people will like it on social media and link to it which will boost your rankings.

Why ‘local’ still matters

Whilst more and more businesses operate internationally, local is still valued when it comes to commerce. Many web searches begin with the principle of finding local suppliers – customers are often more comfortable buying from somewhere they can meet with people and view products physically.For this reason it’s important to incorporate geography in to your SEO. As an Exeter web design agency, we want to be discovered by customers in Exeter and Devon, and so it's important this is reflected in our SEO.

Using listing sites to maximise your local SEO

As well as using locators such as ‘Exeter’, ‘Devon’ and ‘southwest’ in your content you can also improve your local SEO by using listing sites. These directory-style websites can help users find your business and also contribute to your web search rankings as an external link. In addition to contact details you can add a profile description of the services your company offers. Four of the most commonly used sites are Factual , Central Index , Foursquare and Thomson local ( Moz Local ). To find out more about using listing sites check out our blog post on maximising your local SEO .

Forums and social bookmarking sites

Another avenue for sharing your company details and blog posts is on forums and social bookmarking sites like Reddit . These provide opportunities to answer questions in your company’s area of expertise and create a backlink to a longer article or blog post on your website. For instance you may have written a great piece about planning a holiday in Exeter, Devon with links to places to visit and local activities to promote your holiday cottage. By identifying relevant travel forums you can seek to provide a useful response to people’s queries about the area whilst helping to promote your website and create a backlink.

All content needs a marketing plan

It’s important to remember that content creation is just the first step. For your SEO to really benefit from your content it needs to be followed up by a sharing strategy. A marketing plan will set out how to promote your content externally to increase traffic to your website.

Digital marketing and SEO support in Exeter

At QuayClick we specialise in digital marketing and can help businesses with creating and sharing quality content as part of an SEO strategy. To find how QuayClick could help your business please contact us in Exeter today.