SEO 101The Fundamentals of SEO

About Learn SEO Houston

Moderators with over 25 years combined experience in SEO/SEM

SEO Software Strategist and Platform Developers

Guest Speakers at various events such as SMX London, DFWSEM, and other major expos.

Prominently fueled by 5 Hour Energy shots and trail mix (true story).

What is SEO?

The purpose of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is to produce more traffic to a website by organically (not paid) improving the visibility of it in search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo.

Traffic

Google Bing Yahoo Other

• 80% of search engine queries go through Google

• 8.5% use Bing• 9.5% use Yahoo• 2% use other search engines

Why not just use paid advertising?

87% of search engine users choose organic listings over ads.

Paid Search Ads are getting more and more expensive.

The synergistic effect between paid and organic listings can increase CTR by up to 20%

How Search Engines Operate

Crawling- The process by which Googlebot discovers new and updated pages to be added to the Google index.

Indexing- Googlebot processes each of the pages it crawls in order to compile a massive index of all the words it sees and their location on each page. In addition, it processes information included in key content tags and attributes, such as Title tags and ALT attributes.

Serving Results

Relevancy is determined by over 200 factors.

Pulls information from the index.

Social signals and web mentions are becoming prominent factors in Google’s ranking algorithm.

The Job of an SEOO

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Social

The Process

Great Content

Social Sharing

OutreachReputation Manageme

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PR Strategy

SEO Pyramid

Social

Link Building

Keyword Research and Targeting

Quality Content and Accessibility

Ranking Factors

Off Page SEO

Backlinks

Link Anchor Text

Social Signals

Web Mentions

Citations*

Authorship **

On Page SEO

Content

Schema.org

Interlinks

Keywords

User Experience (UX)

Latent Semantic Indexing

Authorship **

Ranking Factors

On Page SEO Off Page SEO

Authorship is a developing concept, but all signs point toward AuthorRank being implemented which will affect the rankings of article based on the Author whom it was written by.

Keywords

Keyword Research Google Keyword Tool: https://adwords.google.com/o/KeywordTool (FREE)

SEMrush (Paid)

Wordstream (Paid)

Analytics SEO (Free with paid options)

Long Tail Keywords- Long Tail keywords are typically easier to rank and are keyword phrases that contain three or more words.

Low Hanging Fruit- Usually long tail keywords that produce a moderate to high amount of traffic, but have low competition.

Keyword Density- An important factor to consider when optimizing a page. It’s important not to over optimize, but still include the keywords in the page.

Latent Semantic Indexing- Latent semantic indexing allows a search engine to determine what a page is about outside of specifically matching search query text.

A page about Apple computers will likely naturally have terms such as iMac or iPod on it.

Important HTML to Know

Title Tags- <title>This is the title of my website </title>

Heading Tags <h1> <h2> <h3> <h4> <h5> <h6>

Alt Tags- Within an image tag to provide relevancy to the image.

Anchor tags (<a href=“http://www.learnseohouston.org” title=“SEO Classes Houston”>

Bold <b> ; italics <i> ; <strong> ;

<meta name=“description” content=“This is a meta description. This will show up in the search engine below the title.”>

<-Title<-URL

Author

Meta Description

Proper Use of the Heading Hierarchy

H1 Tags- Should only be used once on a single page to describe the main point of the page or the article. It will be very similar to the content you place in the title tag.

H2 Tags- Each main section of the web page or the article.

H3 Tags- Good for subcategorizing main sections of the site.

Heading 4, 5, and 6- Rarely used but if more subcategories need to be made, can be used to do so.

Technical SEO Factors

XML Sitemap

HTML Sitemap

Canonicalization

301 Redirect (Permanent)

302 Redirect (Temporary)

Robot.txt File

Page Load Time

Friendly URLS (http://www.learnseohouston.org/blog/live-seo-campaign/)

Custom 404 Page

PageRank- The currency of the web

Formula invented by Larry Page (CEO of Google)

PageRank is passed to other pages through links.

Way of gauging the authority of a page.

Generally speaking, if two pages were

equally optimized except for the PageRank

difference, the page with the higher PR

would rank higher.

PageRank- Not as important as it used to beTests and results have been indication that social factors are beginning to outweigh backlinks.

Google weighs the virality of content by taking into account the number of shares and the velocity of which those shares occur.

8 Ways to Build a Strong Social Following

Connect with authorities in your industry.

Build relationships with bloggers, journalist, and other active social media users in your industry/niche on Google +, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook.

Publish quality content.

Speak at events.

Publish educational videos.

Host webinars.

Use Authorship.

Be consistent.

Panda and Penguin

• Duplicate Content• Low Quality Content• Relevancy• Hiding Text

• Backlink Spamming• Link Schemes (link wheels)• Link Relevancy• Link Diversity

Off SiteOnsite

Tools

Keyword Research

Backlink Analysis

Broken Link Checker

Page Optimization

Full Platforms

• Wordstream

• Keyword Discovery

• SEMrush

• Majestic SEO

• Ahrefs• Opensite

Explorer

• Screaming Frog

• Xenu Link Sleuth

• Check My links

• BloomReach

• Lipperhey

• Analytics SEO(You really think we’re going to give away our competitors? ;)

Free Competitive Auditing Tool: http://www.howgoodisyourseo.com

Shameless Self Promotion

Integrated with SEMrush for in depth keyword research data.

Integrated with MajesticSEO for superior backlink data – gain insight on competitors.

Completely white labeled solution.

Automate reports and export them to Excel, Powerpoint, or PDF.

Project management

Link Building Tool that helps you save time on research.

Track all Technical and On-Page SEO Factors

It’s All in One Place.

Save Time

Be More Efficient

Provide Better Service

Get Better Data

Infinite Scalability

Link Analysis

On-Page Analysis

Project Management

Competitive Analysis

Technical Analysis

Keyword Research

http://www.analyticsseo.com