SEO - or Search Engine Optimization - is the practice of increasing your website traffic by improving your rankings in organic search engine results.

Most people think SEO is a tedious task that is both exhausting and annoying. Honestly, most people are right. But that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t do it!

The benefits of excelling at SEO are tremendous, and there’s no substitute for a steady stream of search traffic to your website.

If you’re just starting a new company, it can be tough to make time for SEO.  

But you can’t ignore SEO. You need to do SOMETHING. So what are the 20% of SEO tactics that will give you 80% of the results?

Make it Easy for Search Engines

Make sure that search engines like Google can crawl and index all of your pages and content easily.

• Have a sitemap. This helps Google to crawl the site more efficiently and effectively.
• Follow proper content practices. All video, interactive content, and animations should have parseable text that Google can access.
• Make sure that there are no broken links on your website.

Create Good Content

Search engines are constantly getting better at providing users with the most relevant search results. If you’re content is no good, you’re not going to get ranked.

So how do you ensure that your content is good? Here’s my suggestion:

When creating content, address your content towards a real problem that people are searching Google for. Do your keyword research and find the relevant keywords and phrases that searchers are actually typing. Use what you found and insert those keywords into the headlines and topics of your article. And remember not to just keyword stuff, the content should truly solve the searchers problem and take them all the way through the solution from start to finish.

Amplify Your Content by Earning Links

When you’re just starting out, you’re not going to get listed in the search results without some help. Other websites are going to have to link to you. There are two main ways to get external links:

1. Share Your Content on Relevant Platforms

For example: if you write a blogpost that is beneficial to startups, it might make sense to share it on a website such as indiehackers.com or in a facebook group that is specifically for startup founders. Wherever it is, just make sure that sharing these links doesn’t come off as too salesy or pushy. If you’re content is helpful, you shouldn’t have to worry about this.

2. Get Others to Share Your Content

Before you write your post, make sure you have an answer to this question: “Who would be willing to share this link and why?” If you get that down, and put it in front of the right people/companies, your much more likely to earn links and engagement.

When doing SEO, remember that SEO is a long, slow game. You’re not going to see overnight results, but don’t get discouraged. Over time, this strategy will pay off and become super rewarding. Remember, a steady stream of search traffic is gold.