{"id":4502,"date":"2022-06-17T14:44:19","date_gmt":"2022-06-17T13:44:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/?p=4502"},"modified":"2023-07-02T23:28:30","modified_gmt":"2023-07-02T22:28:30","slug":"golden-tips-for-seo-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/golden-tips-for-seo-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Golden tips for SEO"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
How do we know so much about SEO? We taught ourselves! From the moment we started Common Exception, we knew we wanted to design and build our own website \u2014 and part of this was understanding SEO. Then we were commissioned by our brand strategy<\/a> and coaching<\/a> clients to build sites for them too. And while there\u2019s a lot of mystery around SEO \u2014 because search engines, like Google, keep their algorithms private, and keep changing them \u2014 it\u2019s also relatively simple. Here are our top five golden SEO tactics we regularly use.\u00a0<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
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What is SEO?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

SEO means search engine optimisation. It\u2019s a way of helping search engines rank your website on their results pages. It helps search engines like Google rank your site on their results page. The sites that the search engine thinks are most relevant \u2014 the ones that they think have the most authority<\/em> \u2014 appear first. It\u2019s not rocket science, and while no one knows exactly how the algorithm works, it\u2019s about making sure your website has authority. And what does authority mean? It means that the search engine thinks your website is a match for the search. Think of it as a dating app.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It takes time<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Be patient with your ranking. It takes time for the search engines to index your site and recognise your authority. Depending on the keywords you\u2019re trying to rank for \u2014 this includes the name of your brand \u2014 it might take longer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tip 1. Have a good structure<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

This is the first thing we do when creating a website. A website should be easy to use and understand. Firstly, work out what your main pages are and make it easy to get to those pages in one or two clicks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tip 2. Good content and design are golden<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019re writing and designing your website for humans, so make sure this is your number one priority. Is it easy to navigate? Does it look good? Is your copy easy to understand? If it\u2019s a yes to all, you\u2019re doing well. We review our website design and content on a regular basis to make sure our onsite SEO is performing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tip 3. Use the right keywords<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Do you know what your audience is searching for? Like with social media, keywords help the algorithm know where to categorise your content. When you\u2019re first getting started, think about what words your audience will search for you. Make sure to use these in your page titles and content. If you\u2019re serious about improving your ranking, keyword research is a great way of finding other keywords that are easy to rank for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tip 4. Building up authority<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The best way to build up authority is to have other websites linking to your site \u2014 this is called backlinks<\/em>. The search engines see this as an indication of your authority. The more backlinks you have, the more authority you have. However, the quality of the backlink is important as websites with more authority are more valuable to your ranking. Of all the SEO tactics, this is probably the one that takes the most time but it can also be a lot of fun. Joining or building a community<\/a> is a good way of building backlinks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tip 5. Internal linking<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Probably the most underestimated SEO tactic \u2014 and the easiest \u2014 is internal linking. This works a little like backlinks, but you\u2019re linking to your own content<\/a>. Alongside making it easier for your audience to navigate your site, internal linking helps the search engine know which pages are the most important, which helps your ranking. So if you\u2019re writing a journal article, make sure you\u2019re also linking to something else on your site!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part one in our series of golden SEO tips for creative people<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4505,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[142,173],"tags":[15,141,110],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4502"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4502"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4502\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5945,"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4502\/revisions\/5945"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commonexception.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}