A well-optimized website contributes to great results on search engines, which helps ensure your brand’s success. Especially in today’s world, where there is a high reliance on mobile use and the internet for finding new businesses, it is important that your brand gets a high level of recognition through its search engine rankings. This article will review seven different ways to optimize your website for better search engine results.
What is website optimization?
Website optimization is the process of employing different tools, strategies and tactics in order to improve specific areas of a website with a goal to generate more leads and improve sales strategy. A well optimized website will also provide a better user experience by improving areas such as page speed, security, and mobile responsiveness. Website optimization is important because it helps improve the outcome for each visitor on your website by increasing their ability to find your business online as well as their likelihood to become a sales lead or future customer.
Optimization of a website for search engine can provide an outcome of:
- improved search rankings
- increased traffic
- increased conversion rate
- more sales and revenue
If website optimization is not taken into consideration, consumers might become frustrated with different areas of your website, such as if it loads too slowly or is not mobile responsive. An unoptimized website might also result in decreased search engine rankings, which in turn might lead potential customers to a competitor or similar website as yours that has better rankings or is more user friendly.
What is search engine optimization?
Search engine optimization is the process of generating more traffic to a website, as well as improving the quality of those visitors. This means that not only are more people able to search and find your business, but they are more likely to be qualified individuals that can lead to long term sales and provide growth for your business.
How Website Optimization and Search Engine Optimization Intertwine
By having a website that not only looks great, but is well optimized your business can actually improve its search engine rankings. Different search engines take a number of different factors into account when determining rankings, and most relate to user experience, which can be further improved upon through website optimization techniques.
Ways to Improve SEO through Website Optimization
So now that we understand how SEO and website optimization go hand in hand, we will now review some ways to improve search results through different optimization strategies.
Improving Website Performance
Performance is such an important factor when it comes to user experience. As mentioned above, performance plays a role in visitor engagement and whether or not someone is likely to remain browsing on your website. Any website that loads under 2 seconds is often seen as poor performing, so it is important to ensure that your website is well optimized for site speed. Load time for websites is so important, that even just a one second delay could result in a decrease of conversion rate by 7%. Website performance can be improved by choosing a hosting provider that has knowledge of the platform your website runs on, so they can provide great tools and have the knowledge on how to get your website performing well.
Page speed can be optimized by:
- improved hosting
- image optimization
- reducing redirects
- enabling compression
- improving server response time
Improving Security Features
Security is another key area that plays a role in your search engine rankings. Search engines tend to rank websites higher if they provide excellent security measures to ensure visitor data is protected and the website is viewed safe for browsing. Website security can be optimized by having an HTTPS certificate installed on your website to ensure secure communication over a computer network, and is actually considered a ranking signal by search engines. Having an HTTPs certificate also ensures to your visitors that your website is safe to browse. You may also want to consider having security checks and emergency support available to prevent any data theft or loss.
Mobile Optimization
Another important ranking signal by search engines is mobile optimization. A website that is not optimized for mobile use is frustrating for visitors, since they will have to zoom in and out on the page and certain links or buttons will not register properly on a mobile device. There are over 3.5 billion smartphone users worldwide, so there is a good chance that a decent percentage of your customers are coming from these types of devices. A website that is not optimized for mobile use will receive a lower search ranking because it doesn’t provide a great user experience. Competitors or similar organizations with a website that is mobile responsive will rank higher because it is well optimized for use across all devices
Increased Website Content
Another factor that plays a role in search rankings is the frequency that new content is generated on your website. Search engines generally will rank websites better based on the frequency that content is added to their website. New content shows the search engine that the website is updated on a regular basis and gives a better idea as to what the business is all about so it can rank accordingly to any related keywords. There are a number of different ways to supplement a website with content which could include:
- a blog
- case studies
- client testimonials or reviews
- resource section
- project galleries
- social media integration
Link Building and Site Mapping
For search engine optimization, link building is a website optimization strategy aimed at increasing the number of inbound links within a website. These extra links can help a search engine better understand the content of the website and in turn improve search rankings.
Much like link building, site mapping is aimed at increasing search engine rankings by providing almost like an outline that describes different pages on a website. A sitemap is a list of pages within a website domain. Inclusion of a site map also increases the likelihood of improved search engine rankings.
Keyword consistency
Keyword consistency is another way to optimize your website for search engine use. By having specific keywords that you want to rank well for dispersed consistently throughout your website content, it helps search engines identify which keywords relate to your business. Keyword consistency can be improved through increased production and updates to your website content, which could include some of the techniques mentioned above such as the inclusion of a blog or resource section on your website.
Analytics and Data Collection
Most importantly, before any types of optimization strategies are implemented it is important to understand what current visitors are doing on your website and how they are finding you, which is where analytics and data come into play. By having a third party access your website data to help identify visitor trends over a period of time, they can help you set measurable goals for improved growth through search engines over time through some of the website optimization techniques mentioned above.
Some metrics to include in your data analysis that relate to SEO might include:
- website market share and where your traffic sources come from
- search engine traffic and popular landing pages
- keyword ranking across competitors or similar organizations
Overall, by implementing a website optimization plan through different techniques such as improved performance and security, mobile optimization, backlink and sitemaps and keyword consistency and new content, your website can improve its search engine rankings and be able to generate more sales revenue through increased traffic and quality visitors.
Need Help With Your Website Optimization Strategy?
Alliance Interactive is a top Washington, DC based website design and development agency with over 17 years of experience building and supporting websites. We provide website optimization solutions that can offer great performance, keep your content secure and improve search engine rankings. Our website optimization services include:
- Hosting
- Performance Optimization
- Website Speed Optimization
- Website Security
- Website Maintenance
- Content creation and digital marketing
- Search engine optimization
- Research and Analytics
We help clients solve their toughest challenges and are rated as a top web design agency on Clutch. For a free proposal or evaluation of your website, you can click here.