Your SEO Checklist – How Does Your Website Rank?

SEO Checklist

Have you identified your keywords?

Keyword research sets the direction for your SEO strategy. Determining which specific keyword phrases to target is extremely important to your website’s success or failure.

Phone Number & Address

Is your phone number listed prominently on your site and does it match the one listed in Google My Business? It is extremely important that there is consistency between your website and information listed in any online directories you use.

Additionally, to rank locally, you need a physical address and it should be displayed on your Homepage. In fact, SEO best practices recommend that you put your name, street address, phone number, and email address in an easy-to-find location on every page of your website.

Note: Google My Business requires a physical address. They will not list a Post Office Box number.

Have you optimized your Homepage?

This is probably the most important item on the SEO Checklist. Your Homepage needs to have several key components for good SEO.

Clear Navigation
Keywords that correctly identify who you are and the services you provide.
Your phone number and address.
At least 400 words of text, preferably more.
Images with alt text that includes your keywords.
A meta description that includes your primary keyword.
A good SEO title.
Internal links to other landing pages.
A link to your Blog.
Backlinks

Have you optimized your Landing Pages?

All items on this SEO Checklist that apply to your Homepage, also apply to the rest of your landing pages.

Blog

While your landing pages form the foundation of your SEO strategy, your blog reaches out to niche markets and helps boost your overall website ranking. Each blog article must follow a basic format and include meta descriptions. Not only do they help Google categorize your site, but they convince people to click through.

If you do not have a Blog, then get on the phone and call a Content Services Specialist and start one.

ADA Compliance and Alt Text

Why is that alt text so important? Auto Readers use it to describe the images on the screen to visually impaired users. ADA compliant sites don’t have to worry about getting sued and they can market to a larger audience. Other ADA compliant items to check off are high-contrast landing pages and clear navigation.

Internal Linking

Your website should be a web! Your Homepage should link to your primary landing pages, which link to cornerstone content, which link to supporting blogs. Those supporting blogs are interlinked until it would take years to sort out the connections. Every one of those links can give you small jump in rank. A whole mess of them becomes a virtual trampoline.

Local Directories

Have you registered on local directories? This would include Google My Business, Yelp, and Local.com. Currently, local listings get precedence over organic results, so you really need to take advantage of local optimization.

Once a year, you need to work your way through the SEO Checklist and decide whether it is time to update your website. Proper SEO can reap long-term benefits and should not be ignored. Call us and let us take a look at your site. We offer free assessments and SEO recommendations.

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