You’ve been publishing new blog posts on your site for several months now, but for some reason, the traffic just won’t grow.
Don’t get too stressed, as this is a very common situation that many bloggers face in their beginning stages.
Likely, the problem isn’t that you don’t have awesome, informative posts to offer your readers. Instead, the problem is that your potential readers are having trouble finding your posts because you’re not incorporating the proper SEO techniques.
SEO for blog posts is very important if you want to grow traffic to your site and grow your regular readership. Yet, many bloggers neglect to incorporate SEO into their blog posts.
This is a huge mistake. As due to the large number of blogs out there, using the proper SEO techniques is the only way to stay ahead of the competition.
In this article, we’ll discuss the top secrets of SEO for blog posts!
1. Select the Right Keywords
Your work to create the best SEO for blog posts begins even before you start writing. First, you need to select the right keywords.
For each post you write, you are going to want to identify and incorporate one primary keyword phrase. In order to find the right keyword, consider the following:
Closely Related Keywords
First, choose a word or phrase that is closely related to the main theme of your post. It should be a word or phrase that you can naturally incorporate into your posts without sounding awkward or forceful.
Popular with Users
Once you have a word or phrase selected, choose a variation of it that is popular with users. For example, your phrase may be “AI assistant”, but you may find that more people are searching for “virtual assistant”.
Low Competition
Lastly, you’ll want to find a variation of the keyword that has a competition level that you are capable of competing with. This will give you a higher chance of success, as you won’t have to worry about competing with big blogs twice or more your size.
Typically, long-tail keywords, those that are three words are more, are a good bet.
2. Write for Readers, Not Search Engines
Once you’ve selected your keyword, it’s time to start crafting your post.
But keep in mind as you’re writing, that your ultimate goal is to write something for humans, not for search engines. Therefore, you should never make changes solely for the sake of improving SEO. Any changes you make should always be based on improving user experience, which will in turn help improve your SEO.
When writing your content, keep the following in mind:
Word Count
For search engines to garner enough information to rank your content and for users to get a full understanding of your topic, your word count should be at least 300 words.
However, studies have shown that long-form content ranks better, so don’t be afraid to create posts that are a few thousand words long.
Natural Keyword Usage
Stuffing your content with as many keywords as possible may seem like a good idea, but it’s a huge red flag to search engines.
Instead, aim for a keyword density of about 2 percent. In other words, use the keyword a couple times every one hundred words or so.
8th Grade Reading Level
A lot of your readers will probably have a reading comprehension level above the 8th grade. However, people don’t come to the internet to read complicated posts.
They come to read information that is easy to consume. Therefore, avoid complex terms and write short sentences and paragraphs that are easy to read. You can use the Hemingway Editor to make sure your posts are at an 8th-grade level of reading.
Doing these things will indicate to search engines that you’re writing your blog posts with user experience in mind.
3. Keyword Placement
There is a bit of an art to keyword placement, and it goes beyond just placing a keyword every one hundred words and avoiding stuffing.
You need to make sure you are placing your keywords in the appropriate places throughout the text. This makes your posts easy for the reader to pick up the theme of your content, and it makes it easy for search engines to rank your content accordingly.
Here are a few secrets for keywords when it comes to SEO for blog posts:
Use a Secondary Keyword
A secondary keyword can provide additional context for your posts and can make it easier for search engines to categorize your content.
Use the Primary Keyword in the First Paragraph
As long as it sounds natural, use the primary keyword in the first paragraph or at least towards the top of the page.
Use the Primary Keyword in Subheadings
Aim to use your primary keyword in one or two subheadings.
Use the Primary Keyword at the End of the Page
Using the primary keyword at the end of the page helps bring the article full-circle and also makes it easier for search engines to find your content.
4. Break Up Your Content
Like we said earlier, rarely does anyone search for something on the internet that is complicated to read.
So, to make your blog posts as easy-to-read and as SEO-friendly as possible, make sure you are breaking up your text. Your posts should always include a heading at the top, followed by subheadings below.
You should use Heading 2, Heading 3, and Heading 4 formatting each time you create a subheading within another subheading.
Also, try not to exceed more than three sentences per paragraph. You should also aim to break your content up with bullet points, lists, images, and other forms of multimedia.
5. Link It Up
SEO for blog posts isn’t complete without linking.
There are two types of links you need to focus on incorporating in your posts. These include:
Inbound Links
Inbound links are links that go to other pages on your site. These links may go to another blog post, a contact page, or a testimonial page. Inbound links help guide users to additional information, and they help search engines understand your pages.
When placing an inbound link, make sure the anchor text is related to the keyword on the page you are linking to.
Outbound Links
Outbound links are linked to pages of another website. These links validate the information you provide in your content as well as provide readers with additional resources.
Linking to high-quality websites shows search engines that your site is of the same caliber.
SEO for Blog Posts Wrap Up
With these SEO secrets, you’ll be well on your way to increasing the traffic to your blog, growing your audience, and growing your business.
But, we realize implementing these secrets and keeping track of them all can be a difficult task to tackle on your own. Therefore, it can be extremely beneficial to enlist in some professional help with your SEO efforts.
If you are looking for more guidance with your SEO efforts, please don’t hesitate to contact us today.