What is SEO in digital marketing?

Get to know what is seo and how can you implement it in digital marketing:

Digital marketing includes various techniques, and SEO is one of the most important part of it.
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It consists of two words: Search Engine and Optimization. A Search Engine is a software system designed to conduct web searches. Optimization is the action of making the best or most effective use of a situation or resource.
Search Engine Optimization is the process of making your website/web pages better for search engines so that they can rank higher. SEO in digital marketing plays an important role in ranking the website on the front page of SERPs.

Do we optimize search engines in SEO?
No, we don’t optimize search engines. To learn seo, we should understand that we can’t do that. We optimize our websites/web pages.

Importance of Search Engine:
1. It helps us to visit the websites without remembering the exact URL of the website.
2. If there is no search engine then we have to remember the correct URL of any website to visit it.

What are White Hat SEO, Gray Hat SEO, and Black Hat SEO?

White Hat SEO: It is also called Ethical SEO or Organic SEO. This is done in the right way. It includes optimizing your website by following the restrictions imposed by search engines.

Black Hat SEO: It is an unethical way of doing SEO. It includes unethical techniques that are disapproved by search engines.

Techniques used in White Hat SEO:

1. Content Optimization
2. Quality Content
3. Relevant Internal Links
4. Relevant Strong Backlinks
5. Sitemaps
6. Technical Aspects
7. Better UX

Techniques of Black Hat SEO:

1. Keyword Stuffing
2. Duplicate Content
3. Cloaking
4. Hidden Text? Links
5. Link Spamming
6. Link Farming

Use White Hat SEO 95% and Black Hat SEO 5%, this is called Gray Hat SEO. This is used in the practical world. But don’t use Black Hat SEO if you are a beginner and recently learn seo. It may make your website blacklisted and it won’t appear in search results.

Types of SEO in digital marketing:

1. On-page SEO
2. Off-page SEO

On-page SEO: On-page SEO refers to optimizing the parts of your website you control like content, HTML, title of page, URL, etc.

Off-page SEO: Off-page SEO focuses on the ranking factors that occur outside of your website like brand mentions and backlinks.

SEO’s application in the world of digital marketing involves optimizing both on-page and off-page SEO elements.

Techniques used in On-page SEO:

Note: Both White Hat and Black Hat techniques are used in both On-page and Off-page SEO.

1. Optimized HTML file
2. Content Optimization
3. Keyword Rich Content
4. Optimized URLs
5. Image Optimization
6. Technical Aspects of Website etc.

Techniques of Off-page SEO:

1. Backlinks
2. Domain Authority
3. Social Links
4. Forum Submission etc.

Technical SEO

It is a type of On-Page SEO. In this, we work on the technical aspects of the website like loading speed, optimizing JS and CSS files, etc. which helps in better ranking of our website and if our website is ranking better by doing technical SEO then it is good for digital marketing.

Techniques used in Technical SEO:

1. Web page speed / Load time
2. Structure of Website
3. Sitemap
4. Redirect Pages
5. Mobile Friendliness
6. Robots.txt

How to start an SEO project?

When you first get a project or website to work on SEO for its digital marketing:

1. Understanding the business of your client and their goals. Understand what are the expectations of your client. In which area does he or she want you to rank their business?
2. Current Website Performance Analysis: Note the current performance of your client’s website so that when you do your SEO and get results, you have something to compare.
3. Keyword Research: When you understand the business and goals then you do the keyword research. We will do the keyword research with respect to the location in which they want to rank their website.
4. Competition Site Analysis: Who are our competitors? The keywords we selected which competitors are ranking on them. We will get an idea of what keywords they are using, what is their business, how they are optimizing their website and what is their approach.
5. On-page Optimization, Technical SEO & Off-page Analysis: Do On-page SEO first and do Off-page SEO simultaneously.
6. Maintain the Position by Data Analysis: See how much progress you have achieved, and how many conversions you have got. We will make our strategy on the basis of this. Maintain the ranking you have got.

How to decide on keywords for an SEO project?

To learn search engine optimization, we should know how to do keyword research and in this seo free training, we will now learn about this.

First Step for Keyword Research

Think about what our audience can search related to our main keyword

Google Auto-suggest

Go to Google Search > Type your main keyword > You will get the number of keywords at the bottom of each page > Note down the keywords you like

The above picture is a trick for finding keywords from Google Auto Suggest by adding an underscore in between words.

Type your main keyword and see the F&Q on the page, change your keyword to see other keywords at the bottom

Basic Tools for Keyword Research

• LSI Graph for keyword research
• SEMrush
• Google for LSI keywords
• Answer the public for informational keywords and questions
• Ubersuggest

Type the main keyword in Google and check the first website ranking, copy the URL, and search on Google Keyword Density Checker to check how many times they have used a particular keyword (to know what keyword our competitors are using)

Second Step for Keyword Research

Google Keyword Planner.
Login to your Google Ads account (if you don’t have a Google Ads account then sign up)

Now click On Tools > Planning > Keyword Planner > Discover New Keywords > Start With Keywords > Type Your Main Keyword (Don’t type more than 2 keywords) > Get Results > Apply filter according to you > Download > Open in Excel > Apply the Filters according to you and reduce the keywords according to monthly searches and save

Ubersuggest

Ubersuggest is great for helping you discover new keywords. To get started, simply enter the keyword or phrase in the tool. This is for keyword analysis and we can also do keyword research.

If the location is vast then ignore keywords with low volume.

Ubersuggest > Keyword Research > Keyword Overview (type the keyword you have got from LSI Graph, Google, or Google Keyword Planner and analyze one by one) > Make 2 more columns in your Excel sheet (Ubersuggest Volume and Ubesuggest Competition) > Check the volume and competition in ubersuggest and note to down in excel sheet > Now delete the columns containing volume and competition from Google > Now again sort the volume > Give ranking to your keywords (give 1 ranking to unique keywords and 2 ranking to repeated keywords and delete the keywords with ranking 2, like the next given example)

Google Trends for Keyword Research

Fresh Keywords: These are popular in current times.

Evergreen Keywords: These keywords were popular in the past and are popular in the present and will remain popular in the future.

If the graph is above 50, then the keyword is trending.

Paste all the keywords you have selected in Google Trends and see their trend. Compare your keywords and see which is the better keyword. Use the better keyword when writing an article.

How to Find, Choose, and Use Low Competition Keywords with High Traffic?

First, read all the keywords, select those that are not related to your article, service, or product and skip those keywords. After that, see the keywords which have repeated words and skip them.

Ex: home cleaning services Delhi (1st keyword)
housekeeping services in Delhi (2nd keyword)
house cleaning services in Delhi (3rd keyword)
now the 3rd keyword has the words that are in the 1st keyword and 2nd keyword so we can skip the 3rd keyword. Filter all the keywords like this and come up with the final keywords.

Keyword Prominence

It is the importance of a keyword. We should tell the crawler the importance of a particular keyword. Put keywords on top to tell the crawler that this is an important keyword.

Keyword Proximity

Keyword Proximity is increasing the distance between keywords. If we add more keywords then it will increase the keyword density which is not good for our site and if we don’t add more keywords then our site will not rank so we do keyword proximity.

Ex: house cleaning services in Delhi (keyword)
If you want cleaning services for your house then we’re available in Delhi. (Keyword Proximity)

Learn SEO in the context of digital marketing

On-Page SEO

When it comes to digital marketing, understanding On-Page SEO is crucial.

Checklist of On-Page SEO

1. Title Tag
2. Meta Description
3. Meta Keywords
4. URL Optimization
5. Heading Tags
6. Internal Linking and External Linking
7. Anchor Text Optimization
8. Keyword Density
9. Plagiarism
10. Grammar
11. Compression
12. Alt Text / ATT.
13. Title of Image
14. Keyword Cannibalism

Title Tag

1. Include Primary Keyword
2. Include Brand Name
3. Do not do Keyword Stuffing (do not add two keywords in the title, just use one long tail keyword and make a proper sentence)
4. Avoid Keyword Cannibalization (your two web pages should not rank on one keyword)
5. Be Creative (do copywriting, add a call to action or heavy discounts)
6. Avoid Longer titles (to check pixels of the title go to totheweb.com > SEO tools > Test Title & Meta Description in Google > Scroll Down > Page Title > Type your title)

For coding website:

In the same notepad, paste your optimized title and give it to the developer

For WordPress Website:

Plugin > All in One SEO > Select page > Change Title

Meta Description

It is not necessary to use primary keywords. We can use two or three secondary keywords and make proper sentences. Also, include CTA by the end of the description. Make it meaningful and relevant to your content. Don’t use quotation marks in meta description.

Be Creative (do copywriting while writing Meta Description)

To check the length, go to totheweb.com or type in Google to the web pixel checker > go to Meta Description in Site > Type your Meta Description and check the length

For WordPress Website:

Plugin > All in One SEO > Select page > Change Meta Description

Meta Keywords

Use three to four keywords.

G Meta Keywords Plugin by Sinan Yorulmaz for WordPress Website
On the bottom of the page or post, there is a box named by this plugin, in this box paste your keywords.

URL Optimization

What does a proper URL structure look like?

1. Include Primary Keyword
2. Should contain hyphen (-) instead of underscore (_)
3. It should be short and precise
4. Lower Case Only
5. Avoid the Use of ‘A’, ‘An’, ‘The’ or ‘to’, ‘in’, ‘From’

For coding website:

Copy the current URL in notepad > add your primary keyword in the place of slug, add a hyphen and remove space. Now give it to your developer so that the URL can be changed

For WordPress Website:

Dashboard > Go to pages > Select the page for which you want to optimize > Settings > URL > Permalink (paste your primary keyword) > Update

Heading Tags Optimisation

Total Headings: H1, H2, H3, H4, H5, H6

Primary Keyword in H1, Secondary Keywords in H2, H3

Only one H1 in a webpage, the rest of the headings can increase.

Headings should be in sequence

Internal Linking and External Linking

Internal linking acts as a hyperlink to the other sections or posts of the same website. It is important part of ON-Page SEO and crucial for digital marketing.

Why is Internal Linking important?

Webpages rank on SERPs not websites, so if traffic is coming to one webpage, we want it to divert to our other web pages to increase audience retention, user experience and better crawling and indexing. It is a type of hyperlink that links to other pages of the same website.

The links should be created naturally means the anchor text should be relevant to the link.

External Linking is Backlinks. We will talk about this in Off-Page SEO

Anchor Text Optimisation in SEO

Anchor text is the text which we use to apply the link. There should be relevancy in text and link

Two to three links in three to four lines.

Don’t use words like click here to know more

Keyword Density

To check Keyword Density, go to small SEO tools > search keyword density checker > paste URL or text

How to control keyword density?

1. Naturality: Include keywords naturally in proper sentence
2. It should be less than 5% and if it is natural then it can be more.
3. If you want to increase keyword density then you can use LSI keywords.
4. Target Long Tail Keywords
5. Keyword Proximity
6. Quality Content

Content Optimisation Plagiarism

Your content should not be plagiarised. It is considered as a red flag by search engines.

To check plagiarism > go to smallseotools.com > plagiarism checker > paste text or URL

Try to keep your content 100% unique

How to avoid plagiarism in SEO

1. Unique / Original Content
2. Use LSI keywords
3. Avoid Article Spinning

Content Optimisation Grammar

A page with correct spelling and grammar is preferable.

To check Spelling > go to onlinespellcheck.com > Enter text or URL

To check grammar > grammar.com > Enter the URL

Image Optimisation Compression

The image should be less than 100kb.

Plugin > WP Optimize by David Anderson, Ruhani Rabin, Team Updraft > Go to Installed Plugin > WP Optimize > Optimize > Images > Scroll Down > Compress Images > On Automatically compress newly added images > Custom > Make the slider in between Maximum Compression and Best image quality > Scroll Down > Select Images > Compress the selected images

Plugin for Lazy Load > Smush – Lazy Load Images, Optimize & Compress Images by WPMU DEV > Bulk Smush > See if there is any image which needs to be compressed if so > Bulk Smush Now > Save

Smush – Lazy Load Images, Optimize & Compress Images by WPMU DEV > Lazy Load > Activate > Select all formats > Set Animation > Save Changes > If you want to remove lazy load > Deactivate

Image Optimisation Alt Tag

What is in the image should be in the alt tag and simultaneously take care of keywords, you can add keywords naturally.

For ranking try your best to put your keyword in the alt tag naturally.

Content Optimisation Keyword Cannibalization

Keyword Cannibalization: When you have various web pages or articles on your site that can rank for the same search query in the search engine. To check: Make sure the primary keyword is different for different web pages. Go to the keyword density checker and check that each webpage has a different primary keyword. If not then do so. Primary keywords should be different for different web pages.

Learn Technical SEO

Technical SEO is a part of On-Page SEO in digital marketing. If you wonder how it is part of On-Page SEO, consider this: in On-Page SEO, we work on the site, and in technical SEO, we also work on the site, so we can say that it is a part of On-Page SEO. But if you want to consider these two different, then it’s ok; you can also consider that. There is nothing wrong with this.

Checklist for Technical SEO:

1. Sitemap.xml
2. Sitemap.html
3. Robots.txt File
4. Page Load Time
5. Optimisation of JS and CSS
6. SSL Certificate
7. Canonical Tag
8. Redirection (404,301,302)
9. W3C Validation
10. Open Graph Tag
11. Structured Data

Sitemap.xml

A list of your website’s URL is sitemap. It acts as a roadmap to tell search engines what and where content is available.

Sitemap.xml (for crawler)

An XML sitemap is a file that lists a website’s important pages so that search engines can crawl them all. It makes search engines understand your website structure.

example.com/sitemap.xml

Sitemap.html (for audience)

An HTML sitemap is a list of links to the main pages on the website. It helps the user find the desired section or page on the website.

How to submit sitemap.xml?

For coding website

Google Chrome> type https://www.xml-sitemaps.com/ > type domain name > after some time > view sitemap details > download your XML sitemap file

Now go to c panel > files > file manager > public_html > upload here the downloaded file

For WordPress website

Plugin > Yoast SEO > Settings > General > Site Features > APIs > XML Sitemaps > ON > Save Changes

Verify: domain.com/sitemap.xml

How to submit Sitemap.html

For WordPress website

Add new page > Page name: Sitemap or whatever > Publish

Plugin > Simple Sitemap by David Gwyer

Now go to the page that we have created > edit > + > type sitemap > Simple Sitemap > Update

Robots.txt

While learn search engine optimization, we should keep in mind that there may be some pages on websites that contain the personal information of users such as banking websites which have data of their users. Robots.txt is a file that tells search engine crawlers to not crawl certain pages or sections of a website.

example.com/robots.txt

Copy the robots.txt file from the browser and paste it to Notepad

Add the pages you want that should not be crawled under the Disallow section

User-agent : *

Disallow : /slug

Disallow : /slug

Allow : /slug

Allow : /slug

Now save the file with the name robots and .txt file type and save

For WordPress website

Plugin > All in One SEO > Tools > Robots.txt editor > Edit > Save Changes

Page Load Time

How to check website speed?
Tool: Pagespeed Insights
Pagespeed Insights > search your domain > run > origin (desktop)
Opportunities > Suggestions to improve

Tool: GT Metrix

How to decrease page load time?

1. Minify JS and CSS files
2. Asynchronous loading of JS and CSS files
3. Defer large-size elements
4. Choose the right hosting option
5. Media compression
6. Convert images to next-generation
7. Enable browser cache
8. Apply content delivery network (CDN)
9. Optimize the CSS
10. Enable lazy load
11. Regular monitoring of website speed

Canonical Tags

The canonical issue is the duplicity of URls. It means if we type www.example.com or https://example.com or https://www.example.com, all these 3 URLs are the same according to us but these are not the same according to a search engine so to avoid this we add a canonical tag which means that whether the user types any of the URL our main ULR will always be example.com.

Pages > Select the page on which you want to add as a canonical tag > Copy the link of the page

Now open the page in wordpress > Edit > bottom Yoast SEO > SEO > Advanced > Canonical URL > paste the page link > Update

Broken Links

A broken link is a webpage that can’t be found or accessed by a user for various reasons.

Reasons for broken link

1. Change in URL
2. Change in URL without redirection
3. Deleted Webpage
4. Content / Post deleted

Check broken links

Website > brokenlinkcheck.com

404 Error page

To check the 404 error page on the website

example.com/xyz

If a blank page with “not found” then apply a 404 error page

Already built-in WordPress

301 / 302 Redirection

A redirection is to send both users and search engines to a different URL from the one they originally requested

301 Permanent redirection

302 Temporary redirection

When to apply 301 redirection:

1. Webpage / Website Moved
2. Domain name changed
3. Ownership changed
4. Duplicate Page / Post
5. HTTP to HTTPS

WordPress > Plugin > Redirection by John Godley > Redirects > Source URL > Exact Match > Target URL Add redirect

If you want to redirect the full website

Same Plugin > Site Option > Relocate to domain > Update

When to apply 302 redirection

1. The page is updating / under maintenance
2. Unavailable content

How to apply

Add a new maintenance page

Open Graph Protocol

Open Graph is an internet protocol that was created by FaceBook to standardize the use of metadata within a webpage to represent the content of a page.

Google Chrome > OG Generator (smallseotools.com) > type title > description > copy > paste in head section of webpage

For WordPress Website

Plugin > Yoast SEO > Settings > Social sharing > Open Graph Data > Enabled > Save Changes

Twitter Card

With Twitter Card, you can attach rich photos, videos and media experiences to tweets, helping to drive traffic to your website.

wtools.io / Twitter card generator > generate on the website > after generating copy the code > save in notepad > paste in the head section of the website

For WordPress website

copy the code > go to theme section > header (change here) OR
Plugin > Yoast SEO > Settings > Social > Twitter card data > Enabled > save changes

For Pinterest
Same as the Open Graph steps

Schema Markup / Structured Data

Schema markup (schema.org) is a structured data vocabulary that helps search engines better understand the info on your website.

Schema.org tells search engines about your website.

Importance

1. It tells search engines about your website.
2. It improves the appearance of your website on SERP.

Types of schema

1. Organization
2. FAQ
3. Bread crumbs
4. Recipe
5. Article
6. Local Business
7. Event
8. Person
9. Videos

How to add structured data/schema markup to your website?

Google Chrome > type schema markup generator > generate > copy > WordPress theme editor paste in the body

For FAQ Schema, make the FAQ page

Learn Off-Page SEO

Off Page SEO focuses on the ranking factors that occur outside of your website like brand mentions and backlinks.
The main goal of Off-Page SEO in digital marketing is to bring audience and links from high authority platforms.

Checklist for Off-Page SEO

1. Search Engine Submission
2. Free Classified Submission
3. Image Submission
4. PDF/PPT Submission
5. Forum Posting
6. Guest Blogging
7. Social Bookmarking
8. Press Release Submission
9. Infographic Submission
10. Video Submission
11. Q&A Submission

Backlinks

To learn off-page SEO for digital marketing we should know what these are,
Backlinks are links from outside domains that point to pages on your domain. A backlink is a link created when one website links to another.

Importance of Backlinks

Backlinks are important for SEO in digital marketing because they represent trust from one site to another and they define the authority of your website.

Quality > Quantity

Dofollow Backlink

A do-follow backlink is a link that passes authority on to the website it is linking to the do-follow tag tells search engines to crawl that link.
<A HREF=”LINK”>ANCHOR TEXT</A>

Nofollow backlink

A nofollow backlink is a link that does not pass authority onto the website it is linking to the nofollow tag tells search engines to ignore that link.
<A HREF=”LINK” REL=”NOFOLLOW”>ANCHOR TEXT</A>

How to check whether the link is dofollow or nofollow?
Go to the source code of the website (ctrl+u) > ctrl+f > type nofollow

Dofollow backlink is given to:
1. To high authority websites (eg: Wikipedia, Google)
2. For copyrighted content

How to get a do-follow backlink?
1. High Quality Content
2. High Authority of your Websites
3. Less Spamming

2/3 backlinks of your website should be dofollow.

Authority
“Website Authority” is an SEO concept that refers to the “Strength” or “Score” of a given website.

Domain Authority
Domain Authority (DA) is a metric or score developed to predict how well a website will rank on search engine results pages (SERPS).

Page Authority
Page Authority (PA) is a metric or score developed to forecast how well an individual page will rank on the SERPs.

Google doesn’t rank websites on the basis of domain or page authority.
Domain and page authority is developed by moz.com.
Moz.com calculates domain and page authority on the basis of no. of backlinks and ranking.
We need to check the domain and page authority of a website while creating backlinks.

Ways to check domain authority and page authority
Google Chrome> search domain authority checker moz > go to moz website > type domain name > analyze domain

moz extension > search this extension on google > download mozbar

Link Building Search Engine Submission

Search Engine Submission is the process of submitting sites to different search engines so that our website can get traffic from different sources.

Google Chrome > search free web submission > enable the Mozbar extension > see the search engines > click on the search engines about which you don’t know > see their domain authority, it should be more than 50 or 60 > also see spam score, it should be less than 10% > remove the search engines where you don’t want to submit your website > now paste your website URL > type name of your website > fill the details > Submit Your Site

Link Building Free Classified Submission

This submission is about your product or services on different websites. This is for business websites. Select sites with domain authority of more than 50

Google Chrome > search free classified submission (thewebhospitality.com) > select the website > visit that website > and post about the product or service

Link Building Image Submission

You can use FaceBook, Instagram etc. for image submission but Pinterest is better
Create a pin on Pinterest > copy the link of the pin created and paste it into your Off Page SEO report.
Note the Platform, link attached, keyword-focused, landing page (link of pin/post created)

Flickr is also good
Always use your company or website name to fill the name of the login page of an image submission site

Google Chrome > Image submission sites

Link Building PPT Submission

The first page of the PPT should be of title and company or website name or logo. The logo should be on every page
Attach relevant links in the PPT

Go to SlideShare > Login > Upload
and keep the record in Off Page SEO report

Google Chrome > PPT submission site list > see sites > submit the same PPT

PDF Submission

Make a PDF of any kind such as your product or service Use the official email ID and number and the same password

Make PDF > attach relevant links in PDF

Google Chrome > pdf submission website list > select sites > upload

Link Building Forum Posting

The forum which is related to your website or business, posts in that forum.

Go to letsdiscuss.com > register > answer questions > attach relevant links
Keep record
Quora is also good. Go to Google search forum submission sites, check the sites that have high domain authority and participate. Google and Microsoft also have private forums, try to participate in these.

Link Building Guest Posting

Guest Posting is also called:

1. Write for us
2. Contribute
3. Guest Post
4. Guest Contribution
5. Editorial Guidelines
6. Contribution Post
7. Submit a Post
8. Submit an Article

Google Chrome > search guest post *your niche* or guest blog *your niche*
Read the instructions before writing a post or blog
Give your blogger profile at the end of the blog or post: Name, Designation, Social Media, Website
Submit by your individual name, not by website or company name

Link Building Social Bookmarking

Use this in low quantity and choose quality websites

Pinterest is better, Reddit is better, scoopit, Tumblr
Reddit > create post > attach links > post

Link Building Press Release

When there is any important event in your company that you can use as a news
Google Chrome > Press Release Submission Sites free > Check the domain authority and page authority of the website you select
Write the article as a third person

Link Submission Infographic Submission

The number 1 Website is Pinterest for infographic submission
Visual.ly is also used
Reddit
Flickr
Slideshare.net
Instagram
Facebook
You can use Canva to make infographics
Add keywords while writing titles
Include your watermark in your infographic

Link Building Video Submission

The video should be related to your niche and audience’s interest
YouTube is the number 1 site for video submission
Vimeo
Scoop.it
Instagram
Facebook

Link Building Questions and Answers Submission

The number 1 site is Quora
LinkedIn
Answers.com
Ask.com
Your profile should be according to your business.

Link Building Article Submission

Google Sites
Quora
blogs.findmaster.com
Don’t Copy from other articles
Avoid Plagiarism
Don’t Do article spinning

On-Page and Off-Page SEO Report

An SEO report is a summary that shows how your site is performing. It is used to display your SEO results on your website.
Essentials of a perfect SEO report
1. Define your Key Performance Indicator (KPI)
2. Traffic & Traffic Source
3. Conversion
4. Show Progress Over Time
5. Be Transparent