If you've dipped your toes into the world of digital marketing, you've likely heard the terms "on-page SEO" and "off-page SEO." But what do these terms mean? And why are they important for your website's visibility and search engine ranking? Let's break it down.
On-page SEO, also known as on-site SEO, refers to the practice of optimising individual web pages on your site to rank higher and earn more relevant traffic in search engines. It involves optimising both the content and the source code of a page.
On-page SEO is crucial because it helps search engines understand your website and its content, as well as identify whether it is relevant to a searcher's query. As search engines become more sophisticated, there is a greater focus toward relevance and semantics in search engine results pages.
In plain terms, search engines are getting better at figuring out how well your website appears and reads to a human, rather than how many keywords are just crammed together. On-page SEO ensures your website looks and reads good to humans, and ticks all the boxes for the search engine robots.
Improving your on-page SEO is all about improving the quality of your content and making your site as user-friendly as possible. Here are a few tips:
Off-page SEO refers to all the activities you do away from your website to raise the ranking of a page in search engines. It involves improving perception of a site's popularity, relevance, trustworthiness, and authority.
To decide if a website is trustworthy, search engines check how many different places have shared links to a particular site. The more times other people have linked to a page, the more likely it is that the information on that site is good quality. Lots of links, high authority.
If a website with high authority links to another website, part of that authority is transferred across. The reputable website is ‘vouching’ for the other page, and the search engine robots love it when reputable websites vouch.
Relevance, trustworthiness, and authority are major factors that the search engine algorithm considers when ranking websites. While the inner workings of search algorithms are unknown, reputable backlinks play a major role in helping to boost your website’s rankings.
Off-page SEO is probably already part of your marketing plan, whether you’ve realised it or not. Every time your product or service is mentioned by a blogger, in the media, or by an influencer, it works as a backlink for SEO. Your objective might have been to attract customers rather than boost your search ranking, but the end result is a double win for your site.
Improving your off-page SEO is all about building your online reputation. Here are a few tips:
Both on-page and off-page SEO are crucial for improving your site's visibility and search engine ranking. While on-page SEO helps search engines understand your site and its content, off-page SEO helps build your site's credibility and reputation. By focusing on both, you can create an effective SEO strategy that drives traffic to your site and helps you reach your business goals.
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