What is SEO, anyway?
As a reminder, the Search Engine Optimization or natural referencing consists in improving the display and ranking of your website on search engines (Google, Bing, Yandex etc.) — generally in order to be first on key queries. So it's about implementing, measuring, and then making decisions about your website and your online reputation.
SEO is a never-ending task that takes time (don't think that SEO “is free”). If you want to stay up to date and competitive with your SEO, you need to act consistently and stay smart.
According to a recent study on search engine results pages (or “SERPs”), 40% of search clicks go to the 1st position, which means more leads, sales, and customers.
And while you're struggling to be number 1, Google updates its algorithms from time to time, which can influence your positions. Being first today is no guarantee of staying at the top of the SERP in a month. So how do you stay on top?
Here is the guide to good SEO practices to follow for 2024.
1. Optimize your technical SEO
Google is increasingly committed to providing its users with the best possible quality content and web experiences. Fast, fluid, mobile-friendly, for Google your website must be technically efficient.
Your website could contain a lot of scripts that make it difficult to navigate, unused plugins, not be adapted to mobiles... terrible things for its SEO!
More than ever, you need to focus on improving the speed of your website, its browsing experience, and the quality of your code — if you have web professionals around you.
Otherwise, Google may have trouble crawling and indexing your website or even worse, consider it a poor source of information for its users.
2. Conduct A/B tests
A pretty obvious point: you want to make sure that what you're communicating is really appealing and relevant to your visitors.
Simple tests allow you to assess and understand if some options on your site are performing better than others. Which one to choose?
This testing mentality can — or should — apply to all SEO and Digital Marketing best practices in general. So if you're wondering what would be best between two — or more — choices: just test, learn, and make decisions based on data!
consultancy: In practice? Use a web optimization tool, like Google Optimize for example, to launch experiences and to quickly change an element of your website. See how your test leads to better conversions - or not - based on Google Analytics conversions.
Consider testing one at a time, otherwise you won't be able to really know which change might be responsible for an improvement.
And for greater relevance, conduct your experiments over a long enough period of time by collecting enough data for your business.
Sometimes you might be surprised at the result!
3. Use structured data for FAQs
Many sites can benefit from structured data thanks to FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions), potentially allowing you to rank much better in search results thanks to rich snippets.
It's this pretty cool content that shows up in the search results and that you can interact with and find a solution to your problem.
These enriched extracts (in English) Search snippets or Rich Snippets), help you to better position yourself while responding to Internet users' requests. You then get more clicks by providing a relevant response to users.
How do I integrate structured data for FAQs? By default, most content management system (CMS) themes include structured data from schema.org to obtain these extracts.
So be sure to include a few in your content that will help users find you better!
consultancy : FAQ, recipes, products, number of employees... you can get search snippets with structured data for almost anything! More info on schema.org
4. Integrate author pages
In August 2021, Google has updated its recommendations regarding author pages.
Establishing your reputation as an author for your content is critical to Google's E-A-T standards (Expertise, Authority, and Trust) and can help strengthen your online presence.
As always, Google aims to offer the best possible content to answer a search query, that is, to provide qualitative and relevant content.
Linking your articles to a good author page using structured data schema.org will contribute to making your authors experts in a given field.
If you have not yet added author pages or simply a biography of one of your authors at the end of an article, now is the time to do it!
5. Rewriting page titles by Google
This is more information than a good practice to follow.
Numerous recent studies, including that of Cyrus Shephard, formerly Lead SEO Strategist for Moz, show that Google is now rewriting 60 to 80% of title tags of a site.
Many don't know this, so be careful and check how the titles of your site's pages appear in the SERP!
Why this update? In some cases, Google has started to replace HTML title tags and rewrite them in search results, changing your text with the H1 tag or anchor text (link text that may also appear on Google).
Previously, Google used metas to select titles. With the update, the system uses the text from the web page instead, taking the content under the H1 tags.
Sometimes, rewriting Google titles can help you by putting relevant content that you didn't think of. In other cases, it will replace your meta tags that you put so much effort into creating, considering it better for its users!
consultancy: Check how you appear in the search results by typing “site: https://votresite.com" into Google. You will see how the titles and descriptions of your pages are visualized by the people who find you!
6. Get right to the point
Don't write to say nothing, be concise.
When writing your content, you may have thought about the number of characters and tried to make your message longer without adding value, or you simply have a bad habit of not being very concise.
Although it could be a “good” technique when SEO was based solely on quantity, algorithms now mainly analyze the quality of the content. This can therefore be harmful for your SEO.
consultancy : if you are writing longer articles, only write quality content!
In fact, be aware that Google is now removing unnecessary information from title tags. Today, Google is rewarding websites that provide quick responses and more direct engagement with users.
So write for humans, and provide quality expertise in your field.
7. Optimize your internal links
If you only have a few external links with good domain authority or are a source of relevant information for your page, optimizing your internal links is a good complement to the networking of your website.
We are talking here about those pages to which too few links point or pages that are not well referenced in the search results.
What can we do to better identify and reference them? Start an internal link optimization audit! SEMrush is for example an excellent tool for carrying out link audits.
You will be able to identify if too many or too few links point to your pages. Developing your internal links is a great way to allow robots to navigate your site and better reference your pages.
8. Improve your “deep linking”
Another point on link management that is becoming more and more popular is the development of so-called deep links or “deep linking”.
In the past, when you created a link to a page, you simply asked for a simple URL. Today, there is an increase in so-called “deep” links, that is, links to specific passages or text fragments.
It is an increasingly popular strategy that allows Internet users to go deeper into a page to find specific information. It also gives Google and other search engines insights into specific elements of your pages.
This strategy is all the more relevant as Google has introduced “passage ranking”, an algorithm that no longer only evaluates the entire page but also includes individual passages.
consultancy: integrate “id” attributes into the html code of your sections to make them accessible through anchor links. For example, a paragraph with an “id=section” attribute will be reachable from a “https://monsite.com/mapage#section” link. You can generally integrate IDs directly into your CMS rather than into the code.
So work on your links and anchors!
9. Study the official affiliate guide
If you are an affiliate, know that Google has introduced a specific guide for affiliate sites.
Google also explains What should a good product review look like. Among other things: mention the advantages and disadvantages of a product and refer to several merchants so that visitors have a choice.
This is a first for Google on this subject. So if you're doing SEO for affiliate sites and product reviews, it's time to take a look at these smart tips.
In conclusion, be sure to create sites that Google rewards by following the recommendations of... Google!
10. Monitor your online reputation
If your business sells a service, a product, or provides professional advice, making sure you have a good online reputation is crucial for your SEO.
Inspiring trust and having a solid reputation on the internet are essential, especially when you consider the number of choices that users have today when comparing services and products.
Google evaluates your site based on what users say about you and the opinions they leave across the web. If you provide false or misleading information, your site's reputation could be seriously compromised.
So check and monitor your reputation!
11. Core Web Vitals — minimums
Les Core Web Vitals were already a big topic among digital marketers in 2021. But what exactly are Core Web Vitals?
In short, these are the three main pillars of the web page experience evaluated by Google, namely loading speed, interactivity, and visual stability.
Google introduced them in May 2020 and updated in June 2021. These are web performance measures that help you assess the performance of your site during user visits. These metrics can influence your search rankings.
Remember that until you have fundamentally failed the three key Core Web Vitals measures, you should not be affected that badly.
consultancy: Measure your performance and other metrics with Google tools PageSpeed Insights and the reports Lighthouse from the Inspector and the Chrome Dev Tools (press F12 or right click, inspect).
And now?
SEO is a constant and long-term job. The management of your website's positions will continue to evolve over time. In summary:
- publish quality content for your users around targeted search queries
- optimize the speed, security, and user experience (UX) of your website
- Define your meta tags correctly and try to get rich snippets
- Go look for quality external links
Need help improving the SEO of your website? Contact us and let's see how we can help you!
