Nobody likes writing great content only for nobody to come across it and to find that it isn’t displaying in anyone’s search engine result pages. There are plenty of ways that you can get your content seen by hundreds, thousands, even millions, you just need to use the correct tools.

What is SEO?

Websites are set up with appropriate keywords that describe the content on their site so that it can match what somebody searches for. For example, if you wanted to find ‘top 30 songs in the 80s’ then Google would crawl different websites until it finds the top matches for this term.

Tips to increase website traffic

Do your keyword research

Before you sit down and create the content for your website, spend a few hours thinking about the relevant keywords which you should use. Find out what people are searching for by searching for a topic such as ‘top songs in the 80s’ and scrolling to the bottom of Google to find similar, current and relevant searches. Writing about these topics that people seem to be searching for will bring in some traffic.

Google’s Related Searches

Long-tail keywords – These are longer searches used by browsers who know exactly what they’re looking for. For example, ‘how many of the top songs in the 80s were pop?’ is a lot more specific and shows that someone wants to find out more information about 80s pop rather than just 80s music. While less people will be searching for this, there will also be less content surrounding this, meaning less competition.

Short-tail keywords– If you want to reach a larger audience, then this is the better option as it does the complete opposite; short tail keywords reach a larger audience but, due to high competition, you are less likely to show up on Google. If you search ‘80s music’ then there will be a lot more competition as more people are writing about it.

Build some backlinks

Building backlinks from external websites is important because it tells Google that you are writing great and trustworthy content. If another website uses your website as a source of information or recommends your site, it offers your site credibility and authority, therefore increasing the domain authority.

Please note: It is important that the anchor text of the website (the word that is used to link to your site) is relevant to the content on your site. Take a look at some of the different ways you can get quality backlinks straight to your website here.

Create relevant meta descriptions

When you search for something on Google, each website is supported by a description of around two or three lines. This is known as the meta description. It introduces a summary that the users can read at a glance before deciding to click through to your site or not.

Optimize all images that you use

Optimizing an image can enhance a website’s user experience and speeds up a page load time, as well as boosting the content ranking. Name your images using an ALT-tag.

While I personally think that Google is one of the brightest tools in the world right now, it can’t read images, so adding a name to it will help Google understand the relevancy of your content. For example, if you edit the ALT-tag of an image of Michael Jackson, then Google will assume it is an image of Michael Jackson and assume he is in the list of ‘top songs in the 80s’.

Share your content on social media

Once you share your content on social media, it instantly is out to billions of people. If your followers like your content, they will share it to their followers and so on. It is important that you are sharing your content at the times that people are most active – usually 8.30am and 6pm, before people go to work and once they finish. Use appropriate hashtags to share links too. For example, #Music #MusicSite #80sMusic.

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