The rapidly evolving digital ecosystem has significantly changed online consumer behaviors. There has been exponential growth in digital adoption, as consumers and businesses increasingly leverage online channels. Optimizing a page on your website requires both text- and HTML-based changes. Check out this article for more information on the on-page SEO factors that contribute to ranking, and how you can improve your own website pages.  

What is on-site SEO?

When we talk about on-page SEO, it means optimizing web pages to obtain organic traffic and enhance a website’s rankings in the search engine results pages. On-page SEO covers optimizing a page’s HTML, internal links, and metadata (meta description, meta title, keyword density) and uploading high-quality, relevant images and content. This means that to have an optimized webpage through on-page SEO you need to apply a combination of all these aspects. On-page SEO depends on the site’s actual content, which means everything within the website can affect SEO. These include text, multimedia content, metadata, CSS, HTML code, JavaScript, and so on. Generally, this is called “content”, even though digital marketers often consider “content” as the text of a page like a blog post.   On-page SEO is less about keyword repetition or placement and more about understanding who your users are, what they are looking for, and about what topics (keywords) can you create content that best fulfills that need. This is different from off-page SEO, which is optimizing for signals that happen off your website.  

Why is on-page SEO important?

On-page SEO is the foundation layer of search engine optimization. It enables search engines to understand your site and its content and determine if it is relevant to a search query.   Google looks at things you can control through on-page SEO to decide if your page is a relevant search result. These include whether keywords from the query are on the page and how searchers interact with it.   In other words, Google regularly updates its algorithm, improving its ability to understand what users are literally looking for when they type a question and provide search results that satisfy both user intent (shopping, informational, or navigational) and overall user experience.   In fact, On-page SEO tells Google all about your website and how you provide value to visitors and customers. It helps your site be optimized for both users and search engines.

Important On-page SEO Factors You Should Learn

On-page SEO can be divided into three categories: content, HTML, and website architecture. We are going to look at them.  

• Content

SEO without content is like a car without an engine. It might look nice, but it would not work. Here are the content factors you need to learn to maximize your on-page SEO:

1. E-A-T

One way Google weights your site is based expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness or E-A-T. In 175 pages of Google Search Quality Guidelines, E-A-T is mentioned 135 times, which should be an emphasis on the role of it in the search engine’s algorithms.

2. Keywords

Pages that feature the keywords used in a query, whether in the body, headings, or both, are more likely to be relevant to the search.   Sometimes this is easy to determine. If you are optimizing the website of a pastry shop, you are probably going to want to include keywords like cakes, biscuits, cookies, croissants, etc. If it is a specialized pastry, you will want to make sure you are including long-tail keywords like Danish pastry, puff pastry recipe, and similar. In short, you need to know what your target customers are searching for and then create content that includes those terms. It is always a good idea to do research, so you are not missing any opportunities.

3. SEO Writing

Creating the type of content that both prioritizes search engines and converts human visitors to your site is a kind of art. Unless you’ve done it before, it can be quite challenging to write copy that reads well and still adheres to SEO best practices. We have an entire piece dedicated to helping you master the art, but some of the key takeaways include: Emphasize readability: Your content should be easily scannable, so users can quickly find the information they’re looking for. Do not overuse keywords: Also known as keyword stuffing, this technique was used in the past by unscrupulous SEO professionals to game the system. Google takes a dim view of sites that overuse keywords. If you’re caught doing this, your page could be demoted in SERPs or even removed altogether. Keep sentences and paragraphs brief: If you’ve ever clicked on a webpage only to be assaulted by an unbroken wall of text, you know how hard it is to read lengthy pieces of copy. Avoid driving users away by keeping your sentences and paragraphs short. Use subheadings: Subheads stand out because of their size, attracting attention from people who are scanning your page. Use an ample amount in your content to guide readers down the page. Use bulleted lists: This may feel very meta, but bulleted lists are a good way to break information down into easily digestible chunks. Use them whenever they make sense.

4. Visual Assets

Using images, videos, and infographics do more than making your page visually interesting to visitors. It also gives you opportunities to boost your SEO. More than 36% of consumers use visual search when they are doing online shopping, which means if you are not using images, you are missing out on traffic. Be aware of your image file sizes to prevent slow loading. Make your images shareable to identify opportunities for backlinking, which can help boost your E-A-T.  

• HTML

HyperText Markup Language or HTML is the code used to structure your webpages and their content. They tell the user’s browser what to show and where to show it. And it tells search engines what your page is all about and where they should rank you. Here are the on-page SEO HTML factors you need to consider:

5. Title Tags

This is one of those areas where it is important to focus on the details. The title tag is the title of your webpage when seen on search engines. The article’s name is what encourages people to click on it. In addition to adding a keyword, you can do some other things like:

• Keep it in within 60 characters
• Avoid including too many keywords
• Avoid using all caps
• Place main keywords before others
• Add numbers or words that can appeal to people (For example: 7 tips & tricks to enhance your site ranking)

6. Meta Description

Meta description refers to a summary of your web page and is often 160 characters in length. With the latest algorithm update, you can create 680 pixels (120 characters) for mobile and 920 pixels (about 158 characters) for desktop meta descriptions. Better meta descriptions give searchers a better understanding of what your page is all about, which in turn leads to more clickthrough. So, do not overlook meta description. A meta description of a page might have a considerable influence on whether users click it or not, so you need to ensure it contains the most important keywords and accurately summarizes what your page is about. Sometimes it is great to keep meta description brief and simple, but you still need to include the information about the article / page. In addition to, you also should have a look at your competition and similar articles / pages and how they generated their descriptions. Try to improve your meta description to make it more appealing to your target audience.

7. Image Optimization

We already briefly touched on the importance of visual assets on your page, but now it is time to look more closely at their technical aspects. Here are some tips to help optimize yours:

• Include SEO-friendly alt tags.
• Choose the right format and file size for fast loading.
• Customize file names instead of using something like IMG_08759.
• Ensure your images are mobile-friendly.

8. Geotagging

  It may be a global economy, but most business is still done at a local level. Connect with the people in your neighborhood by optimizing your on-page local SEO. While this is less important for mega-corporations, for small- and medium-sized businesses, this is so vital.

There are three main SEO tactics to consider when focusing on local traffic:

• Optimizing local listings and citations including name, address, and phone number (NAP), website URL, and business descriptions, using third-party apps, and getting reviews.
• Optimizing your local content, including accommodating for “near me” searches, providing location-based content, or buying a local website or blog.
• Optimizing and building links with other local businesses and organizations.

Make sure to include the name of your target location in your keywords and put them in your content wherever they fit.

• Website Architecture

Having a well-structured website is important for two reasons:

• A website laid out in a proper manner will be crawled more effectively by search engines.
• A well-structured website will create richer user experiences.

Here are the factors to consider when you are optimizing your site’s architecture:  

9. Site Speed

A slow-loading site does more than disappoint and drive away visitors – it actually reduces your search ranking too. If your site is not currently meeting these standards, there are several steps you can take, including:

• Enabling compression.
• Leveraging browser caches.
• Reducing redirects.
• Optimizing images.

 

10. Responsive Design

Mobile users are more than 56% of all internet users while additional 2.4% are tablet users. . Because more users are on mobile devices, Google followed the logical path and began to prioritize sites with responsive designs in mobile search rankings. This mobile-friendly update only impacts search results performed on mobile devices, and while it is still possible to rank in these results without responsive design, Google strongly recommends sites have a mobile version.

11. URL

The URL structure is so important because it helps the search engines to understand the relative importance and adds a useful relevance to the given page. The URL should contain keywords that describes the content of the post. Also, the URL should be short and friendly.

12. Links

One of the best ways your website can establish expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness is through links from other reputable websites.