Insider Tips On Optimizing Your Website

Like many things in life, SEO becomes increasingly complex and all-consuming as your proficiency increases. While a beginner might consider adding image tags to be an achievement, an SEO guru will be hunting for subtle improvements aimed at augmenting a website’s overall search engine ranking.
Fortunately, SEO extends far beyond the use of robots.txt files and image tags. At WestHost we know plenty about advanced SEO, which is why we’ve launched our SEO Guru platform. Designed to boost site traffic while improving keyword rankings, SEO Guru provides in-depth competitor analysis and emailed reports containing a unique plan of action. The initial report is free and can be applied for here.
As well as developing our acclaimed SEO Guru platform, WestHost has also accumulated a wealth of knowledge about other ways to optimize a website.

These are some of our insider tips for the IT-savvy business owner who wants to give their website a helping hand…

#1. Maximize your network reach.

Create social profiles on every platform you can, from Reddit and LinkedIn to Periscope and Instagram. Ensure that each post drives traffic to your website, but don’t focus exclusively on the homepage.

#2. Eliminate crawl errors.

Issues like DNS or 404 errors are lethal to a site’s SEO, from page-level URL faults to site-wide issues. Fortunately, tools like Fetch or Google can identify problems while appointing a reliable site host should eliminate server errors.

#3. Optimize images.

Rename DSC_0001.jpg as NewProduct.jpg before adding alt titles and compressing it until just before it starts to pixelate on a Retina display. Batch image processing accelerates this process hugely.

#4. Diversify from homepage links.

If 90% of inbound links head for your homepage, you’re missing a trick. Every page on your site should have value and appeal, so channel inbound traffic to the most relevant page – Cost, Contact Us, etc.

#5. Remove unnecessary code.

Your site may have superfluous WordPress plugins that don’t justify their loading time. Maybe the programmer left too much CSS or on-page JavaScript behind. Lightweight code boosts loading times, which in turn aids SEO.

#6. Publish infographics.

In today’s attention-starved society, infographics help to keep people on your site longer – a key SEO metric. They’re easy to create and fun to read, but their content won’t be indexed by Google and Bing, so add text-based summaries.

#7. Avoid gated content.

Sure, gated leads will be high value. But can you really afford to fend off an estimated 95% of your target audience? Gating is only recommended for companies struggling with high volumes of low-quality inquiries.

#8. Finally, build SEO into your weekly or monthly work schedule.

It isn’t something you can do for a week and then forget about. Amid the daily whirl of invoicing, deadlines and projects, it’s hard to set aside time for checking links and adding social content. Yet this is how rival sites achieve that coveted #1 slot in Google, and in Bing, which remains a significant player in search, especially in America.