SEO – Simply Put

Melting Tarts from Country Home Scents

Most creatives cringe when they hear the term “SEO”. The words “boring”, “complicated”, & “unnecessary” most likely come to mind, but let me tell you, it doesn’t have to be that way.

It may be boring. Most mundane tasks are, especially if you’re right-brained, but it doesn’t have to be complicated & it is most certainly necessary if you’re looking for a proven way to increase traffic to your shop or website.

Keywords

One of the most confusing parts of SEO is keyword research which just so happens to be the backbone of SEO. SEO is all about finding the right keywords & using them so that you can be found.

Let me explain how SEO works… basically that is.

SEO – Simply Put

Search engines scan webpages looking for words used in particular areas of the page. The search engine uses these words or phrases to determine what that page is about & then groups it with similar pages in search results.

That’s it… basically. There’s a lot more that’s involved when you’re talking about getting your shop or site to move up in search engine rankings, but it’s all based on the keywords you use.

Knowing how to choose keywords & where to place them is the first step in SEO success. Once you understand this SEO principle & you implement it in your business it will most definitely give you an increase in traffic & that will likely bring an increase in sales.

Today I’m going to give you 3 steps to achieving keyword success that will get you headed in the right direction when it comes to SEO for your creative business.

Targeting Keywords

Choosing keywords is pretty simple. It depends on what you’re trying to describe.

Remember how I said that search engines scan each page to determine what that page is about? Your page should be targeting one thing in particular. Not two things, not three… one.

Let’s take a blog post for example.

If you are a knitter & you’re writing a blog post about how to knit in the round, then you should be focusing on that subject only for your post. You’re not going to be focusing on that as well as how to switch colors or different knitting stitches. You may mention those things, but the majority of your post is going to be about knitting in the round.

When someone reads your post, they should walk away knowing that it was about knitting in the round & so should the search engine. Your reader & a search engine will come to that conclusion by how often you mention certain words that pertain to that subject. Those certain words to the search engine are your keywords.

Your job is to choose the right keywords & use them often so that the search engine knows exactly what your post is about & ranks you accordingly.

The first step is to write down words or phrases that you would use about the subject you’re writing on. In our example that would be words like “knitting”, “knitting in the round”, “how to knit in the round”, “knitting in the round instructions”, so on & so forth.

By using these words or phrases often throughout your post, you’re letting the search engine know without a doubt that your post is about knitting in the round… as long as you don’t talk about something else more that is. It will now group your post in with other pages about “knitting in the round”.

Next up is deciding which keywords are the best to use & where to place them in your post.

Finding Strong Keywords

When you see the phrase “strong keywords” it’s referring to keywords that are going to get you noticed by the search engine & will help move you up in rank.

Strong keywords are determined by three things.

1. Relevancy – how it relates to your subject
2. Frequency – how many people search for that keyword
3. Competition – how many people are using that keyword

You can use keyword search tools like the Google Keyword Tool to figure all this out. There are TONS of tutorials on how to use it on YouTube if you need some help.

When choosing keywords, you need to choose ones that reflect your subject in a clear way & are what people would search for on a search engine. We did that in our example by using the keywords “knitting in the round” & “how to knit in the round”.

You also need to look on the keyword search tool & see how often it’s searched for. If the number is low, you can determine that it’s probably not the best keyword to use since there aren’t a lot of people searching using that keyword. If it’s high, you have a better chance of people looking for that information, therefore coming across your post.

The last thing you need to look at when choosing strong keywords is the competition of that keyword, meaning how many other sites are using that keyword as well. If the competition is high then you’re going to have a harder time of being found among all those sites. If the competition is low, then you’re post is more likely to be found when someone searches using that particular keyword.

Once you determine which keywords are the strongest to use, it’s time to place them in the appropriate spots.

Keyword Placement

I said earlier that search engines scan your page, looking for keywords so they can determine what your page is about. When the search engine scans your page, it’s looking in certain spots to find your keywords.

Skipping the SEO jargon, those spots are in your post title, your post URL {usually the same as your post title}, the first paragraph, the last paragraph, sprinkled throughout the body of the post, in the image ALT tags, & post description & tags.

Depending on your blogging platform you may not have to worry about all those areas, but keep in mind where you should be focusing on so that when search engines scan your page, they easily know what it’s about.

Business Boost

When it comes to SEO, keyword research, & the battle to “page 1”, it may not be the most exciting aspect of your business, but it is an important one. Remember that you’re building a business & that means you have to be seen. This is one way to get the boost in traffic you’re looking for. There’s research to back it up.

Meagan Visser is a creative business coach that teaches moms how to build & grow their business while raising a family on her site MeaganVisser.com. She’s offering two people the chance to win 4 – 30 minute coaching sessions with her all about SEO as well as her digital guide “5 Steps To Etsy Shop SEO & Relevancy” starting February 8th.