What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

In this post, you going to learn about SEO and how it works this year. This is a beginner-friendly definitive post, and I’m trying to cover main actionable strategies with resources in the next 10 minutes. Let’s get started…

What is Search Engine Optimization or SEO?

SEO is the method we use to rank our website in search engines. That means you have a website, and you want a lot of visitors on your website through the search engine. That moment you have to optimize your website to rank on the search engine. 

All the processes are organic, you need not spend money on it. Just pay your time and energy.

List of Popular Search Engines

• Google
• Yahoo
• Bing
• Baidu
• DuckDuckGo
• Yandex
• AOL
• Ask

… and a lot of out there.

Type of Search Engine Optimization

1. White Hat (Resort Search Engine’s All Rules)
2. Black Hat (Against of Search Engine’s All Rules)
3. Grey Hat (Use Both Rules – White Hat & Black Hat)

Which Technique We Should Follow?

Basically we follow the white hat technique to optimize our website. Because if we use a black hat or grey hat technique, search engines like Google give us a penalty. We lost our site ranking cause of this penalty. That’s why we are not going to follow that white & black hat technique.

Types & Overview on White Hat SEO

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

On-page SEO: The task we do in website backend, such as articles, page optimization, etc., is on-page SEO. On-page SEO includes,

• Keyword Research
• Use Short URL
• Keyword in URL
• Properly Use Keyword in Paragraph, Heading Tag & Title
• Create a High CTR Title
• Write a Great Meta Description
• Write a Quality Content
• Use Graphical Content (helps to increase engagement)
• Internal & External Linking
• Use LSI Keywords
• Optimize Images
• Use Content Table (helps your visitors to jump any section in your content)

Off-page SEO: Off-page SEO strategies are; the way you use to share your website on social platforms, forums, and create a quality backlink. Off-page SEO includes,

• Create High-quality Images
• Create Profiles on Social Platform
• Stay Active on Social Platform and Share Content Daily
• Produce More Content (that means to reach more visitor/clients)
• Find Guest Posting Opportunity
• Link Building from Blog Comment
• Build Links from Forum, Q/A Sites (like Quora, Yahoo Answers)

Technical SEO: This is my favorite part of SEO. This is a little bit complicated. If you want to make your website structure more SEO friendly, then this technique is just for you. For now, Google gives more priority to this section. Technical SEO includes,

• Use Schema Markup
• Make Your Site Mobile-Friendly
• Build AMP Version of Your Website
• SEO Friendly Robots.txt File
• Create SEO Friendly XML Sitemap
• Fix Broken Link
• Find Error and Solve it Using Webmaster Tools

Full SEO Checklist From Backlinko Blog.

Essential Tools for Search Engine Optimization

Lots of SEO tools out there, but I include a few of them (that I love). So… check this out,

• Google Keyword Planner (Free)
• Ahrefs (Freemium)
• Moz (Freemium)
• SEMRush (Get 7-days free trial)
• Long Tail Pro (Premium)
• Ubersuggest (Free)
• Small SEO Tools (Free)
• Answer The Public (Freemium)

Essential SEO Plugins in WordPress

• Yoast SEO/Rank Math/All in One SEO Pack (use one of them)
• WP SEO Structured Data Schema
• External Links – (nofollow, noopener & new window)
• Google Sitekit
• Redirection
• MonsterInsights
• Glue for Yoast SEO & AMP (use this one, if you choose Yoast SEO plugin)

Best SEO Extension

• Mozbar (Instantly show you website data)
• SEO Minion (Best free audit tools… ever)
• Keyword Surfer (Instant keyword suggestion & KW results)
• SEO Quake (Website SEO analysis)
• Check My Link (Brocken link checker)
• WooRank (Another SEO analysis tool)

What is Search Engine Optimization? And Essential Resources for SEO. Click To Tweet

Final Thought

If you want to learn more about SEO, simply head over to Google SEO Starter Guide. I think it takes only 3 to 4 months to become an SEO expert. Hope this article helpful. If you do not understand or need a guideline (what exactly I use) on SEO, contact me through the Facebook messenger. I’ll try to help you learn SEO from scratch.