On Page SEO Checklist

What Is SEO?

As a digital marketer I’m often asked the question, so what is SEO?  Well in laymans terms, SEO is short for search engine optimisation. SEO can be divided into On Page SEO & Off-Page SEO. By using an on page SEO checklist you can ensure that you’ve taken full advantage of techniques and tactics used to increase the number of visitors to a website by obtaining a higher rank in the search results page of a search engine. 

This question is normally followed by, “How can SEO help my business grow?” SEO can help your website pages rank higher in the search engines for the search terms your prospective customers use when they are looking for the product or service you offer.  More visitors leads to increased leads or sales for your business.

I’m A Newbie To SEO, Where Do I Start First?

I suggest if you’re new to SEO, that the best place to start is to complete your on page SEO or otherwise known as on-site SEO.  For anyone who owns a website, you should all have access to an “admin section.”  If you login to this area you should then be able to access and edit each page of  your website. 

Horses For Courses!

If you have a WordPress website I would highly recommend you install the free Yoast or Rank Math SEO plugin, as this will make it easier for you to ensure you’ve completed all tasks on your on-page SEO checklist for each of your website pages.  If you have a Squarespace or GoDaddy website you should still be able to optimise each page of your website, it will just be laid out slightly differently.

On-Site SEO First Step – Keyword Research

The first step you need to take before completing your on-page SEO is to carry out your keyword research.  There are many tools you can get a free trial for such as SEMrush or Ahrefs.

To start, I would suggest writing 10 different search terms you think a prospective customer would use to find the service or product you offer on the search engines. So, for instance let’s say you’re a graphic designer from Dorset and only want to get enquiries from Client’s in Dorset.  You may come up with the following search terms:-

• Graphic designer Dorset
• Graphic designer Bournemouth
• Graphic designer Poole
• Graphic designer Wimborne
• Website designer Dorset
• Logo designer Dorset
• Business card designer Dorset
• Brochure design Dorset
• Digital graphic designer Dorset
• Social media graphics designer Dorset

Please see below an example of one of the results you will get when using a Keyword Search tool:-

The table above shows that on average the search term “graphic designer Bournemouth” receives on average 50 searches per month.  SD stands for how difficult/competitive it is to rank favourably for this search term.  The score is between 1 and 100 and the higher the more difficult, so with a score of 30 this search term is easy/moderate to rank favourably for.  So it would definitely be worth you allocating this search term to one of your pages.  You could do this by adding or amending an existing website page or alternatively you could write a blog post optimising this search term.

For each page of your website you will be prompted to complete the following boxes:-

Focus Keyphrase

This is the phrase you want to show up on the search engines for.  Note – please ensure you carry out your keyword research before deciding on which keyphrases you wish to optimise.

SEO Title

Maximum number of characters should be 80 including spaces, although advice recommends somewhere between 50 – 60 characters is best.  Title tags are displayed on search engine results pages (SERPs) as the clickable headline for a given result.  The title tag of a web page is meant to be an accurate and concise description of a page’s content.  Optimal format for your SEO title should be as follows:- Primary Keyword| Secondary Keyword | Brand Name, i.e. 8-foot Green Widgets – Widgets & Tools | Widget World. 

Please note you must ensure each page of your website has a unique title. Also try to put important keywords first.

Slug

A slug is the part of a URL which identifies a particular page on a website in an easy to read form. In other words, it’s the part of the URL that explains the page’s content. For this article, for example, the slug is /on-page-seo-techniques.  The main SEO benefit of a slug is that you can change the words to make sure that it has the words that you really want to rank for. It’s one of the indicators Google uses to determine what a page is about.

Metadescription

Maximum number of characters should be between 155-160.  The meta description is an HTML attribute that provides a brief summary of a web page. Search engines such as Google often display the meta description in search results, which can influence click-through rates. A page’s meta description should include the key phrase in a natural readable way (maximum twice) and create a compelling description that a searcher will want to click.  As with title tags it’s important that meta descriptions on each page be unique. 

Alt Text

Alt text (alternative text are used within an HTML code to describe the appearance and function of an image on a page.  Top tips for writing a good alt text for each of your images include:-

• Describe the image as specifically as possible
• Keep it (relatively) short
• Use your keywords.  Alt text provides you another opportunity to include your target keyword on a page

I hope you’ve found this article on the basics of on-page SEO useful.  If you’d like any help with your SEO for your website, On and Off-Page please contact us to find out more about our affordable monthly SEO packages from just £200 per month.  Email us at mel@digitally-ahead.co.uk or give us a call for a FREE SEO Audit on 07824 382614.