How to Optimize Blog Posts for SEO

Have you recently started a company blog because you heard it would improve your search engine rankings? It’s true, a well-maintained blog is a great way to increase web traffic, engage people, and deliver valuable content to your readers.

But simply creating content and publishing blog posts isn’t enough to improve your SEO by leaps and bounds. If that’s news to you, don’t worry. We’re here to share a few tips on how to optimize your blog posts for SEO.

Use Keywords to Improve SEO
Hopefully you already have a list of relevant, high-ranking keywords for your company. If so, this is the time to use them! (If not, you’ll want to get right on that.) Strategically using keywords in the right places throughout your blog is one of the most important factors in improving your website’s SEO.

Where to Use Keywords in Your Blog Posts
Blog titles. Aim to use at least one keyword in every blog title. After all, the title indicates to search engines what your blog post is primarily about. (Reminder: do not stuff your title with keywords. This will only hurt you.)

Tip: When you brainstorm upcoming blog posts, strategize each one around a specific keyword. This allows you to easily insert appropriate keywords, rather than trying to fit already-created content into a certain category.

Headers. After titles, search engines rely on headers to tell them what your blog post is about and what the main points are. Use keywords in your headings that you want your blog post to rank for. Make it a habit to use the technical header tags (h1, h2, etc.), rather than just bolding headers or increasing the font size. These tags guide search engines through your content. Is this Greek to you? Give us a call and we’ll explain it!

Meta descriptions. A blog post’s meta description is a snippet that provides an overview of what readers can expect to find in your post. It is also the description displayed in search engine results, which is why it’s important to make sure it’s optimized. Again, avoid keyword stuffing. Insert keywords to increase rankings, but be sure to make it engaging and user-friendly for the real people who will be reading it.

Properly using keywords throughout your blog posts is one of the best ways to increase your overall SEO, and following these tips is a great way to start. If you’ve already been blogging for some time, you can easily go back and insert keywords and update the titles of your previous posts.

SEO is an ongoing process that doesn’t happen overnight. If you’re looking to build your brand by strengthening your SEO, we’d love to chat. Contact us today!