Digital SEO: How to Build an Internet Marketing Strategy Focused on Search Engine Optimization

With over 5 billion people on the web across the globe compared to 4 billion just a few years ago, it’s hard to deny the fact that global Internet access and adoption keep increasing. The more it increases, the more people rely on the web daily. And businesses need to keep up with this.

Whether you’re a digital business or a small local company, digital marketing is not an option anymore but an integral part of brand building and growth. More and more people now explore products and services on the Internet, so if you don’t want to miss out on them, you need to ensure your marketing efforts find them out there. And SEO must be at the heart of everything.

What Is SEO in Digital Marketing?

Search engine optimization is the art of optimizing your website and its content to match the ever-changing demands of search engines. The ultimate goal of this optimization is to improve your position in search engine result pages (SERPs) and drive more organic (unpaid) traffic to your website.

Why Is SEO Important?

Though optimizing your site for search engines might sound confusing or unnecessary, there is no way a business can thrive without a good SEO marketing strategy these days. And here is why:

• SEO helps you get higher in SERPs.
• Since the first results on the page receive the most traffic, optimized sites receive the most online visibility and traffic.
• A big part of optimization is about quality content creation, so it can also help you increase your authority through valuable content and earn prospects’ trust.
• SEO also deals with your site's technical performance, helping you ensure excellent user experience and retention.

All in all, search engine optimization ultimately targets better brand awareness and more sales. Hence, it’s something brands of all shapes and sizes need to stay competitive and thrive.

Now, let’s see how to build your entire marketing tactic based on the core digital SEO principles.

1. Set Clear, Measurable Goals for Your SEO Strategy

To make your SEO marketing strategy work, you must place specific and attainable goals behind it. These goals should perfectly align with your business’s current state and general goals. So, a good starting point would be to run a deep SEO audit to see what needs to be improved.

For example, if you’re just getting started with search engine optimization, your first goal would likely be to increase organic traffic from your primary target keywords. Leverage specialized tools, such as AI rank tracking, to see where you are currently in SERPs for your keywords. Based on the insights you gain from the tool, you can specify your goal and create a data-driven plan to enhance your content to appear higher in results.

Other goals you may want to set include:

• Improve domain authority;
• Boost user experience (UX);
• Improve UX for mobile users;
• Enhance content engagement;
• Build high-quality links;
• Increase brand awareness and mentions, etc.

2. Conduct Thorough Keyword Research

Keywords play a massive role in search engine optimization as these are the queries people use to find the information, brands, products, or services they need. Respectively, if you detect these queries and integrate them into your tactic, you will be able to make your site easier to find for your target audience.

A good keyword to target should:

• Be relevant to your niche;
• Align with user intent;
• Demonstrate a high search volume;
• Have a low to medium competition.

To find queries satisfying all these requirements, leverage trusted keyword research tools, such as Google’s Keyword Planner. Tools like this will let you explore dozens of relevant keywords in a few clicks and instantly see their metrics to pick the best ones for your strategy.

3. Develop a SEO Content Strategy Aligned With Your Goals

As was mentioned earlier, content creation plays a pivotal role in SEO. When hopping on search engines to look for something that interests them, people are first of all looking for content that answers their questions and intents, and if this content is good, they can choose to stay and convert.

Here are some tips for building a brilliant SEO content strategy:

• Identify your target audience (aka ideal customers) and conduct in-depth research to understand their needs, interests, and pain points.
• Identify the overall subject for your content (that aligns with your niche and audience’s interests) and subtopics.
• Identify a few primary target keywords and several secondary and LSI keywords for every topic cluster. Be sure not to stuff too many keywords into a single piece to avoid looking spammy.
• When crafting content, focus on the E-E-A-T concept - Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. Simply put, create optimized content, but write for people first and put quality and value above all.
• Diversify your strategy with different content types for greater user engagement.
• To ensure consistency, create and stick to a detailed content plan that streamlines the workflow and defines your content’s rollout dates.
• Peep into your direct competitors’ SEO content tactics to identify effective approaches and gaps and use this in your strategy.

4. Optimize On-Page Elements

On-page optimization is about improving your site's content and other on-page elements to boost its crawlability and visibility in SERPs.

Here are the basic on-page tips for effective SEO digital marketing:

• Optimize existing content. Ensure that it aligns with your prospects' needs, is fresh and relevant, and delivers value. Integrate your target keywords into it.
• Enhance your meta titles and descriptions. Make them attention-grabbing to get more clicks, yet clear and descriptive. Keep titles under 55-60 characters (with spaces) and descriptions under 150-165 characters. Use your main keywords both in titles and descriptions.
• Optimize your pages with header tags (e.g., H1, H2, H3, etc.) to boost content readability and improve UX and crawlability. Don’t hesitate to use keywords in headings and subheadings.
• Integrate quality visuals into your site for greater engagement. Optimize your images by ensuring their optimal sizes (for better loading speed) and attaching to them relevant alt text and file names for better accessibility and crawlability. Also, use your target keywords in your images' file names and alt texts to signal to Google that you want to rank for specific terms and boost your SEO.
• Develop a thorough network of internal links on your pages to create better navigation.

Image by freepik

5. Focus on Technical Optimization for a Strong Foundation

Technical optimization plays a huge role in defining your rankings, as well as the experience and level of satisfaction your users get. If you overlook the technical side of your digital SEO, you risk ending up with a slowly loading and poorly performing site with:

• A high bounce rate;
• A low dwell time;
• A low conversion rate;
• Poor visitor retention and returning traffic;
• And so on.

To avoid these and other issues, you need to pay due attention to your technical SEO. Here are some tips to get you on the right track with it:

• Run a thorough technical SEO audit first to see the errors and detect areas for improvement.
• Implement user-friendly design tips.
• Make sure your site is mobile-friendly and works perfectly on different screen sizes.
• Implement solid website security.
• Optimize loading speed and be sure to match Google’s Core Web Vitals.
• Fix any crawling and indexing mistakes that might be there.
• Test thoroughly to see if all errors are gone.

6. Build High-Quality Backlinks for Authority

Link-building is the core element of off-page SEO. It’s all about earning mentions of your brand and links leading to your site from other reputable sites that align with your niche. When done right, link-building can become your vote of trust, signaling to search engines and users that your content is truly valuable and credible.

In order to boost your authority and trust through link-building, try these tips:

• Create valuable, top-quality content that people will want to share. Try shareable content types like evergreen how-to’s, research studies, infographics, listicles, and others, and make sure to share some unique viewpoints in them.
• Find relevant and reputable sites and start guest blogging by offering them high-quality content.
• Share experience and value via relevant forums and communities.
• Network with influencers and bloggers to create partnerships and earn more backlinks.
• Leverage the broken link-building tactic - find articles that feature inexistent links and similar content from your site as a replacement.

7. Leverage Social Media

Being a big thing today, social media is a powerful marketing tool that helps grow awareness and brand image. It also helps SEO by offering:

• Improved content marketing and shareability;
• More opportunities for backlinks;
• More traffic;
• Improved trust through social proof;
• Higher ranking for branded search.

To gain all these benefits, amplify your SEO digital marketing with an active social media presence.

8. Track, Analyze, and Adjust Your SEO Strategy

To keep your SEO campaign effective, you need to equip yourself with the right software and tools. Find analytical solutions that you see efficient, for example, Google Search Console, and use them regularly to keep an eye on your core metrics.

Some of the core metrics you may want to track include:

• Organic traffic;
• Keyword rankings;
• Bounce rate;
• Page load speed;
• Average session duration;
• Mobile usability;
• Conversion rate, etc.

Be sure to watch these and other performance indicators that align with your goals and make strategic improvements in your approach to attain higher rankings and traffic.

9. Stay Updated With Trends and Algorithm Changes

As a fairly fast-paced field, SEO never stops challenging marketers and businesses with new demands and rules.

This basically means that you have to keep a close eye on the industry’s trends and changes. If you really want to make the most out of your optimization efforts and always stay ahead of the curve, of course. To stay updated at all times, use these simple tricks:

• Follow the SEO industry’s best-known blogs and social media accounts.
• Participate in online forums and communities.
• Attend relevant conferences and webinars.
• Watch Google’s resources.

Featured Image by Waewkidja on Freepik