by shannon | Nov 6, 2020 | Baltimore SEO
On-Page, Off-Site, and Technical SEO
Online marketing and websites depend on search engine optimization or SEO. Many content creators know of SEO but fail to realize that there are different types. In short, there are 3 types of SEO: on-page SEO, technical SEO, and off-page SEO. All three SEO types are important and require a strategy to organize and execute your optimization plans.
To help you better understand all 3 types of SEO, we have created this brief overview. In this article, we review each SEO type and provide you with some strategies for mastering them. Let’s get started.
3 Types of SEO
On-Page SEO
On-page SEO is the most common form of SEO because it relates to the content on websites. The purpose of on-page SEO is to help search engines understand the topic of the pages and provide relevant pages as a resource for those using the search engine. Without on-page SEO, search engines will not know how to organize or list your content.
Types of on-page SEO include:
- Keyword research
- Content creation
- Keyword optimization
Mastering On-Page SEO
When creating pages, one of the most important steps, is mastering on-page SEO. Here are the best ways to enhance your on-page SEO:
- Perform keyword research
- Choose a primary keyword that is NOT the keyword of another piece of content on your website
- Use the primary keyword in one subheading
- Choose 5 related keywords and use in body
- Optimize title with primary keyword
- Wrap the title in an H1 tag
- Write more than 300 words
- Do not duplicate content
- Write for an eighth-grade level
- Create 2% to 3% density
- Use subheadings, bullet points, and bolded fonts
- Anchor links in relevant texts
- Only link to high-quality sites
- Set outbound links to open in a new page
- Add at least one image
- Add primary keyword to image alt tag
- Write URL that includes primary keyword
- Optimize meta title
- Optimize meta description
- Add social media sharing links
Technical SEO
Technical SEO relates to non-content aspects of a website, such as a site’s backend structure and foundation. The purpose of technical SEO is to improve the site’s readability and provide a better user experience. Without technical SEO, users and search engines will find your website difficult to use.
Types of technical SEO include:
- Site speed
- Indexing
- Mobile compatibility
- Crawlability
- Site architecture
- Security
- Structured data
Mastering Technical SEO
Mastering technical SEO can be difficult if you are not familiar with building or auditing a website. Never the less, here are the most crucial and basic ways to master technical SEO:
- Run an audit to find existing errors
- Revise site’s architecture to fix errors
- Use an XML sitemap
- Remove duplicate content
- Run pages through page speed auditors to improve page speed
- Clean up site code
- Compress images and videos
- Reduce scripts, plugins, and redirect chains
- Heighten website security
- Use mobile-friendly checkers
- Improve structured data
- Continue with ongoing optimizations
Off-Site SEO
Off-site SEO builds your site’s influence and relationship with other websites. The purpose of off-site SEO is to build the website’s reputation so that it is viewed as a reputable and trusted source. Without off-site SEO, your website will not be viewed as a credible site.
Types of off-site SEO includes:
- High-quality backlinks
- Other authoritative sites backlinking your site
Mastering Off-Site SEO
There are several ways that you can master off-site SEO. Here are the most important:
- Link to more authoritative site’s
- Only use links that are relevant to your brand and industry
- Anchor the link into the text
- Link to sites with large backlink profiles
Final Thoughts
In order to master SEO, you need to use all 3 types of SEO. If you only focus on one type, you may be missing out on crucial ranking points that the other forms of SEO provide. So, it is crucial to include all three SEO types in your plan.
Hire A Professional
Obviously, mastering all three forms of SEO can be difficult if you have never done it before. With this in mind, it is best to hire professionals to help. These professionals will help you to create and implement an intensive SEO strategy for your website.
Virtual Surge is a reputable, knowledgeable, and client-focused marketing agency. With their help, you will be able to create the best SEO content for your website and expect to gain more customers with little to no hassle.
To find out more about Virtual Surge, set up a free meeting to discuss online marketing opportunities with one of their world-class SEO optimizers.
by shannon | Oct 27, 2020 | Baltimore SEO, Local SEO
Off-Site SEO And How To Master It!
For your website to appear in the top search results, you need to utilize all forms of SEO, including on-page SEO, technical SEO, and off-site SEO. If you only focus on one approach to SEO, then your strategy will not be effective.
In this article, we look at off-site SEO specifically by explaining what off-site SEO is and providing tips on how to master off-site SEO techniques. Let’s get started.
What Is Off-Site SEO?
Off-site SEO is a technique that helps your website appear higher in the search rankings. Unlike on-page SEO that focuses on optimizing page content, off-site SEO increases your website’s authority and boosts its reputation. In other words, the purpose of off-site SEO is to boost the website’s credibility, making it appear as a trusted, reliable source for online searchers.
When a search engine comes across a site with good off-site SEO, the search engine interprets the website as a good search result for online searchers. In contrast, sites with bad off-site SEO will have lower search rankings because they do not appear relevant, credible, or trustworthy.
Off-Site SEO Analogy: Letters Of Recommendation
Imagine that your resume is on-page SEO: it tells the reader what the content is about, why it matters, and why they should read it. Off-site SEO, though, is more like letters of recommendation because it shows the credibility of your content. Just as you need both a resume and letters of recommendation to get hired for a job, you need both on-page SEO and off-site SEO to have a high search ranking.
Why You Need Off-Site SEO
Off-site SEO tells search engines and searchers that your website is a good and trustworthy site. In other words, it tells them that they should trust your content over another website’s content.
How To Master Off-Site SEO
As we have seen, having off-site SEO is crucial for maintaining good search rankings. The question remains: how do you master off-site SEO? Here are the most important steps to effective off-site SEO:
Focus On Your Links
Whenever you create online content, you should always provide links to other sources. These links show the search engine that you are pulling your information from other, fact-checked websites. To get the most out of your off-site SEO, it is crucial to incorporate link-building into your plan. With that being said, there are strategic ways to use links:
- Only link to sites with good authority or reputation
- Link to sites with large backlink profiles
- Use links on PageRank
- Make sure that the link is directly relevant to your page
- Use a diversity of link types
- Use contextual links
- Anchor the link into the text
Boost Your Accountability
Another important aspect of off-site SEO is your site’s accountability. Your site’s accountability will tell the search engine and potential searchers that your website is factual, reliable, and trustworthy. The last thing you want is for your website to be viewed as unreliable and faulty.
One way that you can build your accountability is by other websites linking to your page. In fact, this is probably the most important factor for off-site SEO. This shows the search engine that other websites are using your source as a means for information.
Build Social Media Presence
The third important aspect of off-site SEO is building a recognizable and relevant social media presence. The social media presence will boost your accountability, increase traffic to your site, and increase links to your domain.
Final Thoughts
Off-site SEO is crucial to gaining a high search ranking. Even if you have killer on-page SEO, your website will not rank high if you do not focus on off-site SEO as well. Without off-site SEO, the search engines and searchers will not think that your website is credible, trustworthy, or reliable.
The best ways to boost your off-site SEO is by focusing on your links, boosting your accountability, and building your social media presence. Of course, this is easier said than done.
Hire A Professional
Off-site SEO can be very tricky, especially if you are new to SEO in general. To make sure that you put your best foot forward in terms of your off-site SEO, consider hiring a professional.
Virtual Surge is a world-class marketing agency that can help you boost your site’s off-site SEO techniques, henceforth increasing your site’s search ranking. To find out more, set up a free meeting to discuss off-site SEO with one of their world-class SEO optimizers.
by shannon | Sep 21, 2020 | Baltimore SEO, Local SEO
Providing Reliable Local SEO Services
Do you own a local online business? Does your primary target audience include the local population? If yes, are you aware of the various ways that you can use to approach this audience? In case you don’t, one of these ways is using local SEO services.
If you are not familiar with this concept and want to know more, you’ve come to the right place. I am an SEO expert who will tell you everything that you need to know about local SEO.
What does Local SEO mean?
If you own an online business, you are probably already aware of your search engine ranking’s importance. The higher the ranking, the more chances you have of appearing on the top of the list when someone searches for relevant services. Applying local SEO techniques to your online platform or content ensures a higher ranking for the local audience.
It means that if your food business is in Baltimore, by using the right local SEO services, you’ll be the top recommendation by the search engine when a user searches for local food businesses in your area.
What are the components of Local SEO, and why is it important?
As discussed above, using local SEO services can help you get better visibility on the search engine results. But what is the magic ingredient that does all that?
Local Search engine optimization involves the usage of appropriate keywords and phrases. These keywords are specific to every business, content, and location, and their usage allows the browser to determine how suitable you are to show to the local community. For example, the more appropriately you use “Baltimore SEO” in your content, the more Google will realize you’re the best fit for Baltimore’s population.
The importance of using local SEO services depends on how much your business relies on the local audience. If you are a Baltimore business that supplies its products worldwide, you probably don’t need to optimize your content geographically and make it specific to a particular area. However, if your business solely depends on people that are about 300 meters from you, you must target them, or they won’t know you exist.
How does Local SEO benefit you?
When you travel to a new place, what’s the first thing you do? You look up local attractions to visit. You start searching for the best local businesses for food, entertainment, shopping, etc. When you do this, the chances are that you click on the top recommendations first and probably end up choosing one of those options.
Now, think of this scenario as a business person. The top recommendations you saw had applied the right local SEO techniques to make it to the top. You found them first, spent more time considering them, and ended up purchasing from them as well. The final result was a successful sale for the business. That’s how Local SEO benefits your business.
It attracts more local audience and brings traffic to the website. The right amount of traffic on your site can help you grow online and increase your rank in the search results.
The Problem
As a business owner, you probably have all the necessary and essential information about running your company. However, technical skills such as local Search engine optimization is not something they teach in business schools. It is an entirely different field and profession, which is why you need a Local SEO service provider to do the job for you in a professional way.
The Solution
Being an SEO expert myself, I have helped several different popular brands, growing companies, and small businesses with local SEO. I use my expertise, experience, and knowledge to understand what you need, where you lack, and how you and I can fix the problems together. After asking for your preferences and needs, I propose possible practical and effective solutions. Then, you can leave the local SEO to me and give your complete attention to your business.
Conclusion
Local SEO is an essential aspect of growing your business, and all business owners should be aware of this concept. However, being aware of a technique is not the same as knowing how to do it. Certain technicalities are involved, and not everyone can understand them, especially if they don’t get the time from managing their business. So, let me help you. Together, we can develop the best ways to target your particular audience and increase your online traffic and sales rate.
This article was originally posted at Virtual Surge.
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by shannon | Sep 15, 2020 | Baltimore SEO
What is an SEO Analysis
If you own a business online and have never heard of SEO analysis, then you are missing a lot of SEO opportunities! SEO analysis is an essential undertaking to monitor and identify your website’s potential growth and improvement areas. Naturally, it is one of the most important aspects of reaching your SEO goals and a sure way for your website to rank higher on search engine results.
As someone who has been in the SEO industry for a long time, I’ve seen considerable evidence, in my clients and various case studies, how it helped uncover strategies that increase a site’s ranking and expand its reach and acquire more traffic.
If you wish to educate yourself about this concept, its importance, and where you can get this service, keep on reading!
What is SEO Analysis?
SEO analysis is an in-depth review of a website’s structure, code, off-site authority, and content. It is a tool that allows business owners to determine how they can improve their website’s ranking on a search engine’s results.
Through this in-depth analysis, you can discover the faulty parts and aspects of your SEO strategy. You can also see obstacles and problems that are stopping you from reaching your SEO goals. This analysis is utilized by an SEO expert to figure out solutions to combat these problems. By pinpointing the issues and resolving them individually, a website’s rank will improve faster.
What does SEO Analysis involve?
Basically, during an analysis, an SEO expert like me will go through your website’s insights. These insights will include your SEO strategy, website audience, interactions, engagement, conversion rates, and other detailed information about your site.
After reviewing the information from the analysis thoroughly, the SEO expert will sit down with you and appropriately talk about the kind of audience you are attracting, what their behaviors are while on your site, and what factors are hindering your site from ranking well. Then, he or she will make suggestions and recommendations to remedy the problems.
For example, let’s say that you own a food blog. You used keywords with high monthly search volumes, produced high-quality content, had an SEO-optimized domain name, and had a secure mobile-friendly website. But despite these, you are not getting enough quality traffic.
To diagnose the problem, the SEO expert will do SEO analysis. Let’s assume that the low traffic problem is due to the wrong choice of keywords. Now that the problem was identified, the SEO expert will implement a new keyword strategy, which may involve writing more content relevant to the new keywords.
Why is an SEO Analysis necessary for a business?
When a website’s traffic hits a plateau or starts to decline, it is best to look deeper into the issue to identify the problems. An SEO analysis will do just that. This in-depth review will help you diagnose the problem and take the appropriate measures to fix it. Once you do this, your ranking on the search engine results will significantly improve.
For a small business website, an SEO analysis can be done every six months. If a website adds a lot of content every month, it is wise to do SEO analysis every quarter. Updating your SEO strategy ensures that you are solving existing technical, on-page, or off-site problems.
Why businesses forego SEO Analysis
Despite the many SEO analysis tools available on the internet, it usually takes the backseat in a business owner’s priorities. The reason? Reviewing a mound of site data is overwhelming for a business owner already inundated with urgent tasks. Without the time and proper training, the business owner usually saves the data in a folder that will never see the day’s light.
The only time he or she remembers to retrieve the data again is when his or her website is not giving enough leads and sales are going down.
If your business is essential to you, do not wait for this scenario to happen. Schedule and follow-through with the analysis to make sure you will continue to reap the benefits of a well-optimized website.
The Solution
If you need someone to do SEO analysis for your website, I am here to help you. With my years of experience, I can review your website’s performance to pinpoint issues to improve your ranking and outperform your competitors. I will help you upgrade and fix your SEO strategies, get better audience attention, improve your conversion rate, and make your website reach the top of the search results page!
Conclusion
Analyzing anything is the best way to track progress and figure out the flaws. Once these problems are apparent and out in the open, it is always much easier to find solutions. As an SEO expert, it is my job to understand your website or business’s needs and advise you on the right ideas, answers, and options. Together, we can fix any cracks on your website to help you reach your SEO success!
This article was originally posted at Virtual Surge.
by shannon | Aug 30, 2020 | Baltimore SEO, Digital Marketing
What Is Dynamic Content Optimization?
If your mama always said, “you get what you pay for,” then you will understand that sometimes it’s not a great idea to hire a low-cost Washington D.C. SEO service. While some companies that specialize in healthcare SEO may tell you that they understand the latest in digital marketing trends, ask how they plan to use dynamic content optimization, and see what they say.
Today, we would like to teach you about this all-important strategy. We will discuss the different types of Dynamic Content Optimization and tell you why it can help you increase traffic to your website.
What is Dynamic Content Optimization?
Dynamic content optimization is the ability to adjust part of an ad or content in response to the person viewing it. It’s every marketing person’s dream.
Types of Dynamic Content Optimization
There are several different ways this strategy can be utilized. Here are some examples.
Geography
If your company owns 25 nursing home facilities in Baltimore and throughout the northeast, you can have your company’s add change based on where the user is located. This enables a potential client to immediately see that there is a location nearby, instead of having to search through a website to see if there is a facility in their area.
Product Interest
Surely you have seen dynamic content optimization campaigns throughout your own experiences surfing the web. Perhaps you have researched the best fall monitors for your aging parent, and you suddenly see ads for related products appear in your searches.
Demographics
Do most of your clients or customers follow a specific profile? With the help of a marketing strategist, you should be able to create a dynamic content optimization campaign that puts your company’s ad in front of the eyes of the correct demographic.
If you are trying to target older adults in Baltimore who may need physical therapy, dynamic content optimization may help you with this.
How does dynamic content optimization improve sales?
One of the most significant ways that dynamic content optimization can improve sales is that it allows marketing professionals to obtain valuable data on each campaign. This strategy can help marketers understand what type of message appeals to each demographic. They can even test for specific colors or font styles.
Besides this type of testing, dynamic content optimization creates a personalized experience for the customer. A person who was recently searching for ways to reduce back pain may immediately be drawn to an ad for a chiropractor serving clients in their area.
What other strategies can draw potential clients and customers to my website?
Although dynamic content optimization may be one part of your online marketing strategy, it certainly is not the only one. Talk with a strategist to understand other methods that may improve your ranking. Here are some to consider.
Make sure your website runs smoothly.
People leave slow websites. They also quickly click away from poorly designed pages that have broken internal and external links. Before you consider more complicated strategies like dynamic content optimization, make sure your basics are covered.
Publish helpful content.
When was the last time you added content to your website? If you can’t remember the last time, you aren’t utilizing one of the most straightforward strategies for improving your ranking. Publish well-written, original content with helpful information regarding your industry. For example, if you are in charge of a Washington, D.C. optometrist’s website, consider helping your potential customer by adding articles about how to pick eyeglasses based on the shape of your face or how to tell you whether or not you need to switch your contact lens brand.
Optimize for local searches.
Is your company global, or do you serve people in a specific targeted area? If you work in a targeted area, make sure your website content reflects this. If you rely on foot traffic, make sure you claim and update your Google business listing.
Optimize for voice searches.
There are a growing number of people who use voice searches to navigate the web. Make sure your website is optimized for this by using natural-sounding phrases in your content.
How do you develop a web-based marketing strategy for your company?
You wouldn’t fill your own teeth or cut your own hair. You would hire experts in the industry for those important jobs, right? You also need to hire an expert SEO and online marketing strategist to assist you with your company’s online presence. It’s too important of a job to be left to amateurs.
The staff of Virtual Surge would love to discuss strategy with you. Even though we work in the Washington, D.C. area, we are happy to provide a free online consultation for companies located all over the U.S. and world.
This article was originally posted at Virtual Surge.
by admin | Jul 27, 2020 | Baltimore SEO
Healthcare Marketing During A Pandemic
Marketing your healthcare or senior living facility is always important, but it is especially vital during a pandemic. Even though some healthcare facilities in specific areas of the country are overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients, others are having to make the difficult decision of laying off staff because the number of elective surgeries and well visits have decreased so dramatically.
As each state loosens its stay-at-home orders, patients will return to healthcare facilities for routine visits and non-emergency surgeries. Families who need help with aging family members may reach out to senior living facilities. Of course, you realize many only do so out of desperation as many will be hesitant to go out in public, especially to places where the coronavirus has been known to be.
How will you give your patients the confidence to visit your facility? One way is to share your COVID plan with the general public.
Before they pick up the phone to make an appointment, your potential patients and clients will turn to Google to find out what your facility is doing to keep visitors safe.
They will want answers to the following questions:
- Is it safe to visit the doctor for non-COVID related illnesses?
- Can I be diagnosed or receive treatment over a video conference call?
- I need to find a senior care facility for my elderly parent. What protocol must we follow to visit your care center?
- What steps are being taken to make sure the elderly are kept safe from coronavirus at your facility?
Think about your healthcare facility’s website. Are you answering these questions? What are you doing to put your potential customers at ease that you are doing everything in your power to keep them safe from the coronavirus?
Where does your healthcare facility rank on a Google search?
As you think about whether or not your website is equipped to answer the COVID-related questions of your customers and clients, it may also be time to analyze your business’ SEO strategy. SEO stands for search engine optimization, and this is a complex strategy that enables your customers to find your webpage in the first place.
If you are old enough to remember printed Yellow Page directories, you may recall how many businesses were named “AAA Plumbing” or “A+ Roofing.” These past business owners knew the importance of appearing first in their category listings.
Appearing first in a Google search is the equivalent of appearing first in a Yellow Page listing. It’s not as easy as renaming your business to start with the letter “A.” Instead, increasing your ranking takes the expertise of an SEO strategist, especially one that specializes in health and elderly care.
The staff of Virtual Surge can help you increase your Google ranking. Here are some of the strategies that we will use to assist customers in finding your business:
- We will set up your local listings in Google My Business, Bing Places, and Yahoo Local.
- We will complete keyword research for your industry and formulate a targeted, keyword strategy that enables clients to find your business based on their Google searches.
- Virtual Surge will optimize your page’s URL.
- We will help you create unique, quality content that will drive traffic to your website.
- Virtual Surge will make sure that your webpage uses title tags, image tags, and backlinks.
Let Virtual Surge get your business to the top of your customers’ Google search pages without paying for expensive ad space.
Here are two SEO strategies for you.
1. It is vital to hire an expert to take care of your SEO needs.
Surgeons continuously retrain to learn best surgical practices. Elderly care coordinators complete continuing education to learn about the best strategies in caring for the aged. SEO experts are also continuously learning how to improve a business’ Google rankings. This is necessary because Google is always changing their “formulas” on how they rank websites.
2. It is important to be patient when working with an SEO strategist.
If you work in the healthcare industry, you probably have seen patients who have abused their bodies for decades but still want overnight cures for their medical problems. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. It takes time to feel better after being sick.
If you are hiring an SEO strategist, it is important to realize that the best results come from long-term commitments. You can’t fix your Google ranking overnight. It takes time and perseverance.
If you are interested in committing to a marketing strategy that will increase the number of visitors to your website, contact the SEO experts at Virtual Surge. Although we are located in Maryland, we serve national and international clients. Even though we specialize in healthcare and the senior care industry, we work in a variety of other sectors as well.
This article was originally posted at Virtual Surge.
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