What Is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a digital marketing practice that increases the number of visitors to a specific website by ranking high on Search Engine results.

According to research conducted by Chitika, 95% of Internet users pay attention to the 1st page of search ranking results. And many studies show that appearing high on the first page of Google search ranking increases the chances of getting clicked by users.

SEO focuses on generating organic traffic (non-paid) for websites.

Why SEO Matters?

Search traffic is the biggest source of traffic on the Internet. Google alone generates 40,000 searches per second, 3.5 billion searches per day and 1.2 trillion searches per year.

There are other major search engines like Baidu, Bing, and Yandex.

Let’s say you’re running a hardware store.  According to Google Keyword Planner, SEMRush and Ubersuggest, 8,100 people in Malaysia are searching for “hardware store” every single month.

The website ranking first on the search result page usually get 33% of the total traffic. That’s 2,673 visitors per month.

But what is the value of those visitors?

The worth of visitors can be easily estimated by looking at the average cost spent by advertisers for that particular keyword. For the “hardware store” keyword, advertisers are spending RM0.82 per click.

Which means the site ranking on the first spot of the search result will be getting traffic worth of approximately RM 2,191.86 (RM0.82 x 2,673) per month.

That’s just for one keyword. Imagine the site is ranking for hundreds of keywords. The site will be generating organic traffic without spending any money on paid ads for long-term.

How Does SEO Work?

Search engines position websites high on search results based on authority and relevancy of pages that are indexed. The web page should provide the best answer to the user’s query.

Many SEOs indicated that Google uses over 200 signals to rank sites on search results. It’s better to focus on providing the best answer to the users than ranking signals.

These ranking signals can be divided into 3 main categories:

• Technical SEO – helps search engine bots to crawl and index your website without any errors.
• On-Page SEO – important factors that need to be applied on your website content to make it human and search engine friendly.
• Off-Page SEO – ways to acquire links to your site to position higher on search engines.

My #1 SEO Secret to Rank High on Search Engines

Forget about Google ranking signals. The people that going to buy from you are humans.

You should focus on developing a website that they want to visit.

• Publish articles they want to read.
• Create videos that they want to watch.
• Record podcasts they want to listen.
• Design infographics they want to see.

When you focus on these things, just spice it up by getting the fundamentals of SEO in place.

Top Resources You Should Read to Learn More About Search Engine Optimization

Beginners Guide to SEO (Search Engine Optimization) by Moz

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Starter Guide by Google

SEO Made Simple: A Step-by-Step Guide by Neil Patel

How to Learn SEO in 2019 by Backlinko

What do you think about Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

Please share your opinion by commenting below.

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