SEO: What is it & How do I Improve it?
If you’ve done even the slightest bit of research into building your own website, you’ve probably stumbled across this term: SEO. But what is it and why is it important?
SEO stands for “search engine optimization.”
In short, SEO is the process of making your website more likely to be chosen as a result by a search engine (such as Google or Bing) when a user makes a search containing keywords relevant to your business. SEO also determines the order of result. The better your SEO, the more likely that your website will appear on that coveted first page of results.
So how do you improve your SEO?
Luckily, there’s a number of steps you can take on your own to improve your website’s SEO. Here are the big ones:
1. Customize Your Domain Name
This one is a must. If you’re still using a .site.live domain name, you’ll want to customize your domain name. You can purchase a custom domain name through Leia to have it automatically linked to your Leia website, or you can purchase through a domain registry if you would like to add an A-Record manually. Stay tuned for a Leia blog containing a step-by-step guide on how to do that.
2. Add Pages to Your Website
Upgraded Leia websites allow you to add an unlimited number of webpages to your website; take advantage of this by adding interesting content to your website across multiple pages. Search engines prefer websites that have more pages than just the homepage.
3. Put Interesting Content on Your Webpages
As far as SEO is concerned, the longer visitors spend on each page of your website, the better. Include engaging content on each of your webpages aimed to keep visitors on the page as long as possible. Videos are particularly effective in engaging visitors. You can add videos to your Leia websites by using iframes.
4. Edit Your Website Metadata
A particularly valuable feature of the Leia web editor is the access it gives you to your website’s metadata. In the toolbox, click on the “i” icon; you’ll be able to control the title and webpage description that will appear in search results for each of your website’s pages. Include an attention-grabbing title and a clear description with target keywords that will allow potential visitors to determine if your website is what they’re looking for. Relevant keywords help you rank higher in your targeted search. Make sure you customize the metadata for every page of your website, including blog posts.
5. Include Links to Your Website and Other Websites
Both links to other pages on your website and links to other websites will improve your website’s SEO. Make sure to link visitors to other pages on your own website as much as you can; you want them to stay on your website for as long as possible. When linking to other websites, make sure that you’re linking to credible, recently created or updated webpages. For example, providing a link to a webpage that was created or updated in 2019 is going to benefit your SEO much more than a webpage that was created or updated in 2012.
6. Start Blogging!
Blogs are a wonderful way to both add numerous webpages to your site and keep visitors engaged with your site’s content (plus they’re fun!). If you’re using an upgraded website, make sure to create your blogs as separate pages rather than pop-up windows so that you can edit the metadata and add custom content such as videos. Here’s a guide to the Leia blogging feature. Pro tip: blogs aren’t just good for SEO — blogging can also improve your relationship with your customers and help you take control over your brand. Check out our blog post on Business Blogs to read more about the powers of blogging.
7. Make Sure Your Website Looks Clean & Professional
Visitors are more likely to spend time on a website that is aesthetically pleasing. If your website is jumbled or displeasing to look at, visitors are likely to click away immediately. For tips on how to make your Leia website look more professional, click here!
8. Share Your Website on Social Media
Your SEO improves as you get more visitors to your website. Make sure you’re sharing your website on social media, especially while you’re working on improving your SEO.
9. Do Some Research
When choosing keywords for your metadata and blog topics, it’s best to do a little bit of research on what the sorts of visitors you’d like to attract search for. Ubersuggest is and excellent resource to figure out which keyword(s) to target.
10. Secure Your Website
Obtaining SSL for your website is important for a number of reasons, including improving your SEO. Users are far more likely to feel safe while on your site if you have SSL security, which is free when you upgrade to Leia Business.
Some of these tricks require features only available to upgraded websites. Click here for information on Leia’s upgrade plans.
Ready to make a website with Leia? Download Leia on iOS/Android or click here to get started.