Frequently Asked SEO Questions

• What does SEO stand for?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. Every website’s goal is to increase traffic to its pages. To that end, SEO is a method used for achieving high-ranking placement within a search engine’s results page.

• Which is better, SEO or PPC?

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Pay-Per-Click (PPC) are two different options for maximizing your company’s online potential. While SEO works systematically to increase website traffic, PPC cuts to the chase by charging a fee each time a user clicks on one of their advertiser’s online ads.

• Which is better, SEO or SEM?

SEM stands for Search Engine Marketing; therefore, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a component of SEM.

• What is on-page SEO?

From the foundational SEO concept of trying to rank higher on a search engine’s results page, on-page SEO will use only those resources accessible from within a particular page, such as content manipulation and/or HTML source code optimization.

• How is SEO changing?

As you may imagine, mobile online use increases all the time. In fact, Google now applies a ranking level for mobile page speed in downloading digital media. You don’t want to overlook the importance now, and in the future, of mobile accessibility when designing your website.

• What is keyword research?

Keyword research utilizes tools that measure search volumes for particular words or phrases. Obviously, the higher the volume, the more searched that word or phrase is. The research can be extended out to determine what questions are being entered into search lines, all to help us maximize our click potential when trying to increase website traffic.

• How do I conduct keyword research?

There are many sites available on the internet that allow you to search keyword usage and to compare words or phrases to find the best options. Also, when you input a keyword into the Google search line and press Enter for the results, simply scroll to the bottom of that page for a list of other searches related to your keyword and you’ll see samples of sentences that are being keyed in and searched on your topic.

• Will blogging help SEO?

Most definitely. Blogging is tailor-made for creating lots of content within which you can plant strategic keywords and phrases that will help increase your ranking during internet searches.

• Will HTTPS affect SEO?

Yes, and in a good way. HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) is a more secure form of the earlier data-transferring protocol HTTP and, as such, Google will prioritize the indexing of those more secure pages. HTTPS is faster too, which means potentially faster click-through rates, and that can help boost SEO rankings.

• Are SEO meta tags important?

The two meta tags that are important are the Title Tag, which is the title of a page, and the Meta Description Attribute, which is a condensed description of a page. These two tags allow search engines to determine the overall subject matter of every page, therefore you always want to put your keywords and phrases within these tags.

• What is robots.txt?

A robots. txt file works within a website to filter out overloads of requests for too many pages. Some pages aren’t valid for outside “crawling”, so this file tells search engine crawlers which pages on a site can or can’t be requested.

• Do categories help SEO?

Absolutely. The nice thing about organizing your pages into categories is that it reduces the potential problem of having random pages compete with other pages on the internet.

• What are breadcrumbs?

Even though the label sounds “scattered”, Breadcrumbs is actually an organizational format that assists search engines, and those visiting a site, by creating a clear, directional path within a website. Categorizing fits into this organizational effort as well.

• What are SEO backlinks?

SEO backlinks are a highly sought after “confirmation” from other websites that your site is both legitimate and worthwhile. When other sites provide a link to your website as a further valuable resource on a particular subject, it not only increases traffic to your website, but it triggers a search engine to evaluate your site as relevant and popular, helping to increase its SEO ranking.

• Follow vs. no-follow links: What’s the difference?

Sadly, the no-follow designated links on a website are indications to search engines not to count this link as a ranking factor, so it doesn’t help in boosting placement. Only the highly sought after “follow” backlinks are identified by search engines.

• What is link equity?

Within the subject of link vs no-link, there is a sub-rating of link equity. This is the degree of status that a link carries with it from one site to another. In order to keep down on the amount of useless links that existed for the sake of triggering false traffic to a site, it became necessary to rate the validity of a back link and thereby the no-link status was created and link equity became a way to clear a valid link.

• What is domain authority (DA)?

As mentioned above, link equity is a page’s validity ranking for a search engine’s assessment. Domain authority is assessed by the number of pages within a website that possess link equity. You could simply determine that the ranking link equity of the total of a site’s pages will determine that site’s domain authority.

• What is link building?

Still within our link equity subject, some website operators use a strategy called link building to help it rank better and draw more traffic through increasing its link equity. It is based on the concept that the more links, internal or external, to a website, the better overall potential for ranking and hits.

• How do you build links?

Starting with internal links, they are built into a website by linking pages within the site to other pages within the site. I would, of course, make sense to link to other pages that have gained link equity. External link building comes from sources outside of your own website, so there is more effort to making this outcome happen. Typically, you would find other sites that are related to your service or product and who would believe they could also benefit by a back and forth link between sites.

• Internal vs. external links: What’s the difference?

This one is nice and obvious. Internal links are links that are designed into the internal workings of a website and external links are links, such a back links, that come from an external source.

• What is anchor text?

Anchor text is the term used for the clickable text in a hyperlink that is embedded within the copy and which links to another source of information. Ideally, it will match the target keyword of the page it is linking to so that the search engine understands the topic relationship to that page.

• Will redirects affect SEO?

As it pertains to creating link equity, the answer is yes. Otherwise, too many redirects can cause confusion and they may start competing with each other. A redirect essentially sends both users and search engines to a different URL from the one they keyed in or clicked on. Some are permanent re-routes, some are temporary, and even a page refresh sometimes functions as a redirect. Always consider the long term effects of your redirect attempts on your SEO.

• How quickly can I expect to see results?

SEO is a smart strategy that will reveal its benefits over time. While it’s not designed to offer immediate results, you can usually see a difference in ranking and traffic within 4 to 6 months. Those results will compound on themselves over time, so when it comes to SEO, commit to the long game!