Here is the content extrapolated with SEO techniques applicable for 2024:
Many digital marketing companies that provide SEO services explain what they do in vague terms. They promise increased rankings and traffic, which by all means should be the end goal, but what are they really doing to achieve that? To help you understand the regular activities of a good SEO company, we’ve put together a list of the essential SEO strategies and what they mean in plain English.
Keyword Research
Keyword research is the foundation of any effective SEO strategy. An SEO company conducts extensive research to identify the most relevant and high-volume keywords and phrases that potential customers use when searching for products or services related to your business. By analyzing search intent, competition levels, and search volumes, SEO experts can determine the most valuable keywords to target for each page of your website.
The use of long-tail keywords, which are more specific multi-word phrases, has become increasingly important in current SEO practices. As voice search and conversational AI assistants continue to gain popularity, optimizing for long-tail keywords that match the natural language and intent of users’ queries is crucial for improving visibility and driving relevant traffic.
Redirect old URLs
Implementing redirects is a critical part of any website migration or redesign process. When you launch a new website or restructure your existing site, it’s essential to ensure that any URLs that previously held authority and received significant traffic are properly redirected to their new counterparts. This process helps preserve the established search engine rankings and visibility of those pages, preventing a potential loss of traffic and rankings.
With the increased focus on Core Web Vitals and page experience factors by search engines, implementing redirects correctly has become even more crucial. Improper redirects can lead to slower page load times and a poor user experience, which can negatively impact your search rankings.
Optimize Title Tags
Title tags are one of the most critical on-page elements for SEO in 2024. Search engines heavily rely on title tags to understand the content and relevance of a page. Crafting compelling, keyword-rich, and accurately descriptive title tags is essential for improving click-through rates and rankings.
With the rise of voice search and digital assistants, optimizing title tags for natural language and conversational queries has become increasingly important. Additionally, with the growing emphasis on semantic search and user intent, title tags should be crafted to align with the user’s search intent and provide a clear indication of the page’s content.
Add Meta Descriptions
While meta descriptions are not a direct ranking factor, they play a crucial role in improving click-through rates from search engine result pages (SERPs). A well-written, compelling meta description can entice users to click on your listing, increasing traffic to your website.
With the increasing importance of rich snippets and structured data, meta descriptions have become even more valuable. Search engines may display additional information, such as ratings, prices, or product details, alongside your meta description, making it essential to craft descriptions that complement this enhanced SERP presentation.
Additionally, with the rise of voice search and digital assistants, meta descriptions should be written in a conversational and natural tone, as they may be read aloud to users by these devices.
Here is the content rewritten to refer to “current SEO practices” instead of mentioning the year 2024:
Adding/Editing Content
In line with current SEO practices, creating high-quality, engaging, and regularly updated content is more crucial than ever for success. A reputable SEO company should consistently optimize existing content, add new pages, and keep your website fresh and relevant.
Content optimization today goes beyond just incorporating target keywords. It involves understanding search intent, leveraging natural language processing (NLP), and creating content that aligns with the user’s query and provides a seamless experience across devices.
The rise of AI-powered content generation tools has also impacted the content creation process. While these tools can assist with ideation and drafting, human oversight and editing are essential to ensure the content is unique, accurate, and valuable to the audience.
**Additionally, with the increasing importance of Core Web Vitals and page experience factors, optimizing content for improved loading speeds, visual stability, and mobile-friendliness has become a priority for SEO companies following current practices.
Optimize Images
Image optimization is a crucial aspect of improving website performance and user experience according to current SEO practices. Reducing file sizes through compression techniques and implementing responsive image formats like WebP can significantly improve page load times, a critical ranking factor for search engines.
**Beyond file size optimization, SEO companies should also focus on optimizing images for visual search and accessibility. This includes adding descriptive alt text, implementing lazy loading techniques, and leveraging image sitemaps to improve image discoverability and accessibility for users with disabilities.
Add Alt Tags to Images
Alt tags, or alternative text descriptions, serve multiple purposes in line with current SEO practices. Not only do they provide descriptions for visually impaired users and improve accessibility, but they also aid in image search optimization and can contribute to better rankings on visual search engines like Google Lens.
**With the increasing adoption of voice search and digital assistants, descriptive alt tags can also help these devices better understand and describe images to users, enhancing the overall user experience.
Enable File Compression
File compression remains a vital technique for improving website performance and load times according to current SEO practices. By enabling compression for various file types, including HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and multimedia files, SEO companies can significantly reduce the amount of data transferred, resulting in faster page load times and improved user experience.
**With the growing emphasis on Core Web Vitals and page experience signals by search engines, file compression has become an essential part of the optimization process, directly impacting rankings and visibility.
Leverage Browser Caching
Browser caching is another performance optimization technique that has become increasingly important in line with current SEO practices. By leveraging browser caching, SEO companies can ensure that static resources, such as CSS, JavaScript, and image files, are cached locally by the user’s browser, reducing the need to download these resources on subsequent page visits.
**Effective browser caching implementation not only improves page load times but also reduces server load and bandwidth usage, leading to a more efficient and cost-effective website infrastructure.
Rank Tracking
Rank tracking remains a crucial aspect of SEO monitoring and analysis following current practices. However, with the increasing prevalence of personalized search results and the focus on user intent, traditional keyword ranking tracking has evolved.
**In line with current SEO practices, companies leverage advanced rank tracking tools that take into account factors such as location, device type, search history, and user behavior to provide more accurate and actionable insights into search visibility and performance.
Monitor Website Analytics
Website analytics continue to be a vital source of data for SEO companies following current practices. However, with the increasing emphasis on user experience and engagement metrics, the scope of analytics monitoring has expanded beyond traditional traffic and conversion metrics.
**SEO companies now closely monitor metrics such as bounce rates, time on site, page depth, and user behavior flow to gain insights into content effectiveness, user journey optimization, and overall website performance.
Monitor Google Search Console
Google Search Console remains an essential tool for SEO companies in line with current practices, providing valuable insights into a website’s search performance, crawling and indexing issues, and potential security concerns.
**In addition to traditional Search Console data, SEO companies also leverage the tool’s Core Web Vitals reporting and rich results testing features to monitor and optimize for these critical ranking factors.
Redirect Any Crawl Errors
Properly handling crawl errors and implementing redirects continues to be a fundamental aspect of SEO following current practices. However, with the increasing complexity of website structures and the prevalence of single-page applications (SPAs) and progressive web apps (PWAs), the redirect management process has become more intricate.
**SEO companies must ensure that redirects are implemented correctly, preserving link equity and providing a seamless user experience, while also accounting for the unique challenges posed by modern web architectures.
Add Structured Data
Structured data has become increasingly important for SEO following current practices, as it helps search engines better understand and present website content in rich, visually appealing formats, such as rich snippets, knowledge panels, and voice search results.
**SEO companies focus on implementing structured data markup for various content types, including products, recipes, events, and FAQs, to improve visibility, click-through rates, and overall search engine visibility.
Submit Company Information to Main Data Aggregators
Maintaining accurate and consistent business information across the web remains crucial for local SEO in line with current practices. By submitting company information to major data aggregators, SEO companies ensure that business listings are up-to-date and consistent across directories, citation sources, and search engines.
**Additionally, with the increasing importance of voice search and digital assistants, providing accurate and comprehensive business information to data aggregators can improve discoverability and visibility on these platforms.
Create and Manage Your Google Business Profile
Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business) continues to be a vital component of local SEO following current practices. A well-optimized and actively managed Google Business Profile can significantly improve a business’s visibility in local search results, Google Maps, and related platforms.
**SEO companies focus on optimizing various aspects of the Google Business Profile, including business descriptions, categories, photos, reviews, and posts, to enhance local search visibility and provide a better user experience.
Check for and Fix Broken Links
Identifying and fixing broken links remains an essential aspect of SEO maintenance in line with current practices. Broken links not only negatively impact user experience but can also lead to crawling and indexing issues, potentially affecting a website’s search visibility.
**In addition to traditional link-checking methods, SEO companies leverage advanced crawling tools and monitoring systems to proactively identify and resolve broken links, ensuring a seamless user experience and maintaining a website’s authority and trust signals.
Is Your SEO Company Covering All of These Bases?
At Barta Media Group, we take website creation and SEO services to the next level. You are our priority. Our bread and butter. Your satisfaction is our main objective. Is your current SEO provider leaving some of these boxes unchecked? If it sounds like we may be a good fit for you, give us a call at 678-464-5785 or fill out this handy contact form.