Simple Website SEO Checklist | Remodelers and Home Builder Marketing
We all know SEO can be complicated. There are entire agencies out there guaranteeing to get your website ranked at the top of Google. They make unrealistic promises like 100 calls per day or 1,000+ good leads per day.
Can you tell I’m a little skeptical? In the last 10 years, I’ve heard and seen it all!
Everyone wants to rank on the first page of Google. The trouble is, there’s no magic formula to do it. That is, unless you have a million dollar marketing budget!
Ranking on Google requires a little bit of work but there are some simple things to do to increase your odds of showing up in a Google search. These tips relate specifically to WordPress and Squarespace because they’re the two platforms our clients use the most.
Here is a list of ways you can help to boost your website’s SEO. The list isn’t all inclusive but does includes some basic tips you can implement immediately.
Fill in the Alt Tag Field. Each time you upload photos, fill in the “alt tag” with text describing the image. If your business is location based, include your city and state in the alt tag. For example. “New appliance in white kitchen, Edina MN.”
Optimize Website Speed. Website loading speed is important to search engines. One thing that can slow down your website is large photos. To prevent this, resize your photos before uploading them to your site.
An easy way to do this is to use Tinypng.com. If you use WordPress, removing old plugins will also increase your site speed. Squarespace users don’t need to worry about plugins.
Do Keyword Research. It’s one thing to know how your target audience would search for content relevant to your business, but you also need to know how those keywords perform. If a certain keyword or phrase is used a lot, it will be much harder to rank for. Using free tools like Moz Keyword Explore can help you identify relevant keywords, offer keyword suggestions, show ranking difficulty and the top sites ranking for them.
Use Clickable Titles. For blog posts write a strong title that someone would search for, using your keywords. Include a number whenever it makes sense, such as “5 Ways to…” or “10 Tips to…” and include a location if you are location based.
Set Up Google Analytics. Creating a Google Analytics account provides an easy way to see where website traffic is coming from and identify how your keywords rank. Google Analytics works for both Squarespace and Wordpress and is totally free to use.
If you have WordPress, you can also install the Google Analytics plugin to see stats right on your site’s dashboard.
Be Consistent with Content. Post regularly to your blog. We recommend posting a minimum of once a month. Your posts should be relevant to your business and what your target audience is interested in reading about. To optimize each post, include your keyword or phrase in the title and throughout the copy. The Yoast SEO plugin will make this easy to do!
Share Your Content. When you share information from your website or blog on social media, be sure to include a link to drive traffic back to your site whenever possible or appropriate.
Keep Learning about SEO Best Practices. If you are super duper interested in learning more about SEO and how to increase your search engine rankings, you can follow and learn a lot from marketing master, Neil Patel.
That’s it! Practicing these strategies will increase the odds of your business showing up in a Google search. One more thing to keep in mind: SEO is a marathon, not a sprint. Be patient and put in the work and you will eventually see great results!