Many web developers turn to SEO techniques to improve ranking in search engine results pages. While numerous factors can influence your final ranking, most developers choose to focus most of their efforts on tweaking the things that are directly under their control. Today, we will discuss which on-page SEO techniques for 2022 you should use to boost the visibility of your website.
What is on-page SEO?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) includes a set of techniques and design outlines that can make your website achieve a better rank in search engine results pages (SERPs). You can hire professionals to design or rework your website with SEO in mind to get you a good rank and thus more organic traffic. However, you should also keep in mind that search engine algorithms are very complex, and many factors go into determining which rank you will eventually receive.
The most important things that will influence your ranking are the technical aspects of your website and how well it performs. On-page SEO techniques include everything regarding your website and its pages and how they relate to your overall rank. These factors are entirely under your control, and you can perform tests and change your pages to see what gives better SEO results. Google places a high premium on catering to the end-user, so making sure your site provides a good user experience should be a top priority.
On the other hand, several factors can contribute to your website’s rank from outside sources other than your pages. For this reason, those factors fall under off-page SEO. These are things like your website mentions on other sites and the quality of your backlinks.
The most important on-page SEO techniques for 2022:
1. Create amazing content
One of the essential features of your website is what it has to offer to the average user. Sure, you might be selling unique products, but does your site hold any value to someone browsing the net? That is where content creation can help you. If your site has interesting and informative content, search engines will keep bringing you up on user searches. Here are a few guiding principles for SEO friendly content creation:
- Have well-researched articles. You need to deliver something to your users. Not just post empty filler articles as an excuse to fit in more keywords on your pages.
- Stick to long-form. Google prefers longer articles, so try to make most of your content exceed 1000 words.
- Link to authoritative sites. Citing authoritative sources can improve your on-page SEO. Therefore, you should include outgoing links on your pages.
- Use proper structure. Your content needs to be optimized for both users and search engine algorithms.
- Optimize the meta descriptions of your pages
One of the first things users will see about your page is the meta description in their search engine. Having an optimized meta description can drive many people to your page. Make sure your meta descriptions are well worded, catchy, and concise. The ideal length is between 120 and 160 characters, and anything longer than that won’t be fully displayed. Additionally, every page should have a unique meta description, so you can’t take shortcuts and duplicate the text for each one.
3. Use internal linking
This SEO technique includes liking relevant pages on your site to one another. This can be a great way to help your users find more information on a topic they are interested in. Internal links can provide a seamless browsing experience by easing navigation around your site. However, this on-page SEO technique has an added benefit since using internal links can help you boost your site’s authority. It also works to distribute page authority on your site, making crawling and indexing easier for Google.
4. Don’t hyper-optimize
When trying to achieve a better rank, it’s easy to get caught up in optimization and take it to the extreme. Search engine algorithms have gotten very clever, and they are adept at spotting optimization, which is only intended for the search engine and doesn’t bring value to the user. This is true for pretty much any SEO technique. If you design your website in an unnatural way that is hard to use – you aren’t going to be rewarded. This can include SEO techniques such as:
- Keyword stuffing. Don’t take this the wrong way; keyword research is an essential component of SEO, and you can use it as a guide for which topics are relevant. However, placing too many keywords just to get the search engine’s attention is counterproductive.
- Matching anchor text. It’s good to let the user know where clicking on a link can take them, but this doesn’t mean that you should exactly match the anchor text to the page you are linking to.
- Internal link orientation. Pointing all of the internal links on your site to the same two or three pages leads to a shallow link structure.
Any strategy that’s pushed too far and stops providing benefits to your users will probably bring you a negative SEO penalty.
5. Prioritize mobile users
Gone are the days when it was just recommended to have a mobile-friendly website. Smartphone users now perform most online searches, and if your website isn’t designed to be responsive and usable on smaller screens – you can say goodbye to a high rank. Design your website with SEO in mind, and improve the user experience for mobile users. This includes reducing load times and ensuring easy, single-button navigation.
In conclusion
If you want your website to rank high in SERPs, you should start by optimizing your pages with the most relevant on-page SEO techniques for 2022. You should see an immediate improvement in your organic traffic, which is always good for business.
Images used:
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