In 2020, on-page SEO is one of the best ways to increase your website’s rankings on Google.
But how can you get started?
In this guide I’m going to cover 5 on-page SEO tips to increase your rankings and drive more organic traffic.
Table of Contents
5 On-Page SEO Tips
Tip #1: Focus On Search Intent
The first on-page SEO tip I would give is to focus on search intent.
When you’re creating content, this should be your main focus.
Whatever keywords you’re trying to rank for, figure out:
- How can I give the user what they want when they search for this keyword?
- How can I make my content as relevant as possible and answer all the questions someone would have about this particular topic?
You need to figure out exactly why someone is searching for this keyword.
Normally, when it comes to keywords on Google, your content should solve a problem.
So ask yourself:
- How can you answer that problem?
- How can you solve it?
- How can you make your content highly actionable?
Search intent is only going to become more important as a ranking factor:
So figure out what your audience wants and how your content can be focused on helping them.
Tip #2: Focus On Content Quality
Next up, I would recommend focusing on content quality.
Truth is, content quality is entirely within your control. You have no excuses not to do it!
So focus on making sure your content is:
- In-depth
- Relevant
- Easy to scan and read
- Includes plenty of images and videos
Content quality is critical. And the standards for content are being raised all the time.
When it comes to content, whether you do it or your competitor does, the bar is going to get raised.
So you have to make sure your content matches the expectations of the user, especially if you want to rank higher on Google.
If you don’t do this, then your competitors are only going to get the jump on you.
So be honest and ask yourself:
- Is your content comprehensive enough?
- Is it detailed?
- Does it answer all the questions someone would have about that topic?
- Can the reader quickly scan through your guide and find the answers they want?
Content quality is only going to become more competitive as on-page SEO evolves.
So if you make a habit of increasing content quality now, it’s going to pay off dividends in the future.
Tip #3: Meta Tags Are Still Important
When it comes to on-page SEO, meta tags are also important:
But not in the way you think.
They don’t directly impact SEO in the traditional sense:
So if you optimise your meta tags, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll automatically rank higher.
However:
If you improve the title tag and the meta description, you’re going to get higher click-through rates on the first page of Google.
Why is that important?
Well, the higher your click through rates are, the more this indicates that your content is relevant.
So higher CTRs can help boost your rankings.
You should be optimizing your title tag and your description to make sure they are:
- Attention-grabbing
- Easy to read
- Relevant
- Not overly clickbait
Your title tag should stand out above everyone else’s – because you’re competing for attention.
So when people are browsing through the first page, they choose your article VS your competitors.
Overall, the higher your click-through rates are, the better that’s going to be for your website.
Tip #4: Increase Your Site Speed
Site speed is critical when it comes to on-page SEO.
If you have a website and it takes too long to load, users are just going to bounce off your site.
Your audience demands a fast site speed:
They want information asap – and time is a precious commodity.
So you can use tools like Google’s PageSpeed Insight tool to optimize it.
Now, there are a few quick changes you can make, such as:
- Compressing your images
- Minifying your CSS and HTML code
- Making sure you choose the right website host servers
And if you make all of these changes, then you will see:
- Better on-page metrics
- Reduced bounce rates
- And overall, your website will perform much better
Tip #5: Optimize The URL
Finally, your URL should be optimized too.
The URL for the page that you’re trying to rank should be optimized properly:
- URL should be relevant to the keyword you’re targeting
- It should be short
- Keep it clean/tidy
- Describe what the page is about
For example, let’s say you have a page on “making money online”…
In that case, an ideal URL would be:
yourURL.com/make-money-online
It’s clean, tidy and relevant to your keyword.
In fact, you’ll notice when you search on Google, the top 3 results normally have:
- A short URL
- Relevant
- Includes the keywords
To sum it up
Here’s my top 5 on-page SEO metrics:
- Focus on search intent
- Improve your content quality
- Optimize your meta-tags
- Increase your site speed
- Keep your URL short, tidy and relevant
On-page SEO is essential:
With all of the tips I’ve mentioned above, you should be optimizing each of them if you want to increase your website’s rankings.
Here’s the beauty of on-page SEO:
It’s one of the few elements of SEO that’s within your control – in comparison to off-page SEO, that requires some serious link building skills!
With on-page SEO, you have complete control of your website.
So you can change the URL, minify the CSS code, and make sure that all your title tags are optimized.
And this doesn’t really take much time to do either.
