Want to start improving your SEO game but just don’t know how? Here’s the post checklist I use for my own blog posts which has helped me massively grow my search impressions (and clicks!) in just the past 12 months. These tasks are mostly for when you’re creating your content, and are easy pointers to remind you on how to best optimise your posts.
Keyword Research
If you’re not creating content based on previous Keyword Research, but on a topic that you just want to write about then finding a primary keyword or phrase you want to target is important. Using keyword research allows you to assess the “search intent” for it, and whether that is what your content is meeting. Seeing what’s already ranking for your keyword also allows you to improve your content as needed when writing.
On top of this, you can find other keywords, phrases, and even questions which people search for to include in your blog post. These will potentially give you a larger range of keywords to rank for, and then search volume and clicks.
Title, URL and Description Optimisation
Your URL should be short, but descriptive so that your reader knows what the content’s topic is. Longer URLs can sometimes look messier and are cut off in search engines. Your URL should match the title tag as well as the on-page H1 tag in someway so the reader isn’t confused/disapointed by the content after clicking. Your URL should use a broad key-term if a natural fit.
Many articles will say you have to include your target keyword into your title tag and meta descripton too, but if a different phrase works better to be compelling to a real person then you should go for that. Search Engines now have the capability of understanding different ways of writing a phrase, and so exact-match keywords aren’t as important as they once were. Your content, including your title should be catered towards your audience and encouraging people to click on your content first.
H1 and your Keyword
Your H1 is normally your on-page blog post title, although you can add more H1s if your content needs a secondary blog title at some point (although not recommended). Your keyword in your post title, similar to your title tag ensures the audience knows what the content is about but should be a natural fit for your headline. If your H1 title and title tag in search results are vastly different, your keyword is important to create a foundation for the content being shown on page. For example, this page specifies this is a “Post Checklist for SEO”, and using SEO shows that it’s not a checklist for anything else so the user won’t be confused.
Start off Strong
If people are clicking onto your post, and then immediately going back to search results it sends a signal to search engines that your content isn’t meeting the needs of the audience. This is potentially a reason why you would see content reduce in ranking, and so you need to make your intro as gripping as possible. Show that you’re going to answer the reader’s questions above the fold, and they’ll be more likely to read more even if they’re scanning content or skipping to a part they’re more interested in.
Write for Your Audience
Yes keywords and phrases are important, but when you’re writing these terms should feel natural to the reader and not be stuffed in the content. Write content which is easily readable for a user too, heavy paragraphs of text and technical terms may be off-putting.
On top of this, make sure your content is easily readable with headings, subheadings, images, and anything else that your audience will love to see. Your content should be enough words to answer what the user is searching for, and give hints and tips (look at the next point!) for where to go next with the topic.
You should aim for every piece of content you write to be the “best” content for your audience on that topic. Keep your content a good length where 300+ words is recommend to be deemed adequate although it depends on context. You should make sure you content has the right expertise, authrotiveness and trustworthiness that your audience expects too.
Internal Linking and External Linking
Search engines love links, and both internal and external links can help your blog posts. Internal links help build up your website as lots of content that links together, and not just 100+ random posts. External links show the search engine that your content is informative and that you’re sending your audience to find more info from a more factual source as needed.
Optimise Images
Use your alt text for firstly accessibility reasons, those with screen readers may want to know what your images add to your content. But secondly, descriptive alt text allows context in addition to your text, which should result in natural inclusion of your target keywords. If your target keyword doesn’t fit for your image, then don’t force it for the detriment of your users.
Schema Markup
You know those extra parts of a search engine page that come up before or next to the usual results? You can aim to be seen in these too. This helps you show star ratings, timings etc. Schema markup can be added through tools like RankMath to make it easier for you, or you can use Google’s help and paste it into the post.
