How to begin my SEO campaign?

An SEO campaign always implies two questions.

• How do I start?
• How do I continue?

Even though there are many convenient PPC tools at hand, they cannot cover and clarify all SEO issues. That is why understanding all steps of your search engine optimization strategy is essential for securing the best Google TOP positions for your website.

While it is not an overcomplicated process, it still has its peculiarities that we shall introduce you to.

Setting SEO campaign goals

Any campaign towards success begins with understanding the personal meaning of success. It means that you must realize your priorities and objectives. What you want to achieve first of all, why do you need it, what are you going to do with it next. 

When it comes to SEO, wanting to get high rankings in Google is not enough. Use the “Who? Why? How?” formula instead.

• Who do you want to engage?

Naming a category of people (elders, housewives, college students) is not enough. You must be aware of their interests, needs, and possible goals as this will be the foundation for your promotion and keywords selection.

• Why do you want this audience to see your site?

You want them there for a reason. Do you want them to buy your product? Do you want them to become your leads? Do you want them to subscribe? The answer to this question must be completely clear to you.

• How are you going to assess your progress?

Which metric matters the most to you? Is conversion your priority or do you rely on retargeting lists and emails? If you don’t know how to measure the success of your goals, you may not be as confident about your goals as you think.

These steps are a must for any successful SEO campaign. They give you a perspective on your business goals and make it easier for you to outline the plan of your promotion: from semantic kernel to design adjustments.

Knowing users’ search intent

Next, you must understand, why users come to search engines and what they have on their mind each time they enter a search query.

 Mainly, there are the following types of search intent:

• To get information: the keywords from this category are usually long-tail, featuring such phrases as “how to”, “where is”, “can I”, etc.  
• To compare and assess: all keywords with “best”, “reviews” and similar words in them belong to this group. They imply that the users have learned the necessary information about the product or service already, and now they are ready to make the next step.
• To buy/subscribe: long-tail keywords which include the specific name of the product, brand and have “buy”, “cheap” and “sale” in them are the ones which mean that these users are ready to become buyers. For that reason, never ignore this category when building a semantic kernel even if it’s low-volume. Your conversion rate depends on it.

As the procedure of selecting keywords can be time-consuming, many web sources now offer special software to users who need to build a semantic kernel.  Google offers the AdWords tool to help you with the process of keyword selection. You can also have the appropriate ratio of keywords selected for you with the help  of our experts within the AutoSEO or FullSEO package.

Auditing your site

To get started with the technical part, you need to know whether your site lacks any elements that are essential for SEO. Finding errors is an important part of a correct campaign. 

Elements to check

• HTTP status: whether your server responds correctly and on-time;
• Robot.txt file: it contains information for search engine crawlers which allows them to index your site correctly;
• URLs: make sure they’re not randomly generated and relevant to the content of their page;
• ALT-tags: each image alt-tag should describe its content and feature relevant search phrases;
• Redirects: your site should have a minimum amount of redirects to preserve high-quality loading speed.  

Once your check is complete, you will have a full understanding of what issues you should take care of immediately and in which direction you should develop your campaign. Semalt offers 24/7 support in case you have any questions regarding the specifics of your niche and site.