SEO—the very acronym might cause you to shudder.
Search engine optimization can seem overwhelming, with so many technical details in need of attention:
- What if I mess up my schema?
- What about so-called “helpful content updates?”
- How do I know what to write to get the algorithm to notice me?
But SEO doesn’t have to be intimidating. In fact, there’s a lot of common sense involved in writing SEO-optimized content.
In episode 15 of my podcast, Content Creators Unite!, I sat down with SEO expert and coach David Zimmerman to discuss SEO in plain language.
Understanding the Fundamentals of SEO
It turns out that good SEO is essentially just good marketing—no tricks or secret formulas required.
“We’re not trying to trick Google,” David told me. “We’re not trying to pull the wool [over their eyes] and find some ‘secret sauce.’ We’re just trying to do good marketing in a way that is predictable.”
Rather, the essence of good SEO is understanding what your potential clients or customers are looking for and writing content that addresses their needs.
In other words, when you can answer relevant questions and fulfill pressing needs, the SEO will take care of itself.
The Significance of Tracking and Analytics
This doesn’t obviate the need to track data, however. You still need to measure and analyze your website’s numbers using tools like Google Analytics.
“The first thing we do before we do any marketing—whether it’s SEO, email, or whatever—is we set up tracking,” says David. “Google Analytics is a free product that does it right, does it well, and is pretty easy to use.”
Analyzing the results of marketing efforts is key because it’s ultimately the data that will tell you how successful your campaigns are. But even here, you don’t have to go into the weeds.
Choosing a few key metrics to home in on, such as click-through rates or conversion rates, will help you understand the impact your content is having on your audience.
Explaining Keyword Research
“Keyword research” is a term you’ve probably heard before, but what does it actually mean?
“Because I’m an old SEO guy, [what] I call…keyword research [is] just the process of understanding how our customers might be searching for us,” explained David.
Put another way, keyword research involves going to a search engine, like Google, and investigating the actual words and phrases that real people are using when searching for answers to problems your business can solve.
Although many tools exist to automate this task, you can manually perform keyword research for free. Just visit Google, type in words and phrases related to your business, and review the information in the autocomplete drop-down and “people also ask” section of results pages.
This exercise will give you key phrases, questions, and ideas to consider writing about on your blog or in your marketing material—and you can use them to inform business decisions as well. David mentioned one client he worked with who realized they were selling the wrong product based on keyword research. They discovered their product wasn’t solving the actual problem people were experiencing!
Dive Deeper into SEO with David Zimmerman
Learning the basics of SEO isn’t hard when you have a good teacher. David Zimmerman fits the bill. His no-nonsense, jargon-free explanations of the fundamentals of good SEO, the importance of tracking and analytics, and the value of keyword research are well worth listening to and learning from.
If you’re interested in going even deeper and learning more about SEO strategies and tactics, you can listen to the entire episode below.
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