3 Simple Tips & Tricks To Improve Your Website or Podcast SEO Strategy

So you have a website and you aren't happy with the amount of traffic you are getting.

Trust me we have all been there.

One of the worst feelings about being a content creator is the feeling that you are putting in a TON of work for extremely little or no reward.

What do you do?

For most of us, we start asking questions and making adjustments to our content.  Where this may be a good thing, today, we are going to look at some minor things that you are probably missing when it comes to creating a solid SEO Strategy for your website.  Again, don't worry … we have all been at this stage.

In our first four blog posts, we learned how our Avatars can be used to create a focused Content strategy that can then be used to help us build our brand through our Digital Hubs.

Today we are going to take a look at a topic that is often discussed but more often confused. . . SEO, or Search Engine Optimization. We are going to do so by asking the question; “What is a Website Strategy?”

What is SEO?

When we take a look at our websites, our podcasts, and our blogs, I often suggest thinking about who your target audience is. For many, they reply “my audience is educators,” or “I'm writing for teachers.” There this is true, it's not the full answer and often leads to undesired results in your Analytics.

So … who is your audience? Who should you be writing for?

The reality of the situation is that your audience should be thought of as the Search Engines. It's ok to say that you are writing for educators, but how do you want educators to find your content? Answer … Search Engines.

This means that your audience … is Google and the name of the game is to create your content in a way that “The Google” can find, crawl, and index your content in a way that is findable by your Avatars. (does this make sense?)

Now that we know who you are writing to, it's time to start to understand how to have those search engines find you … so that educators can then find you.

How Can You Improve Your Content's SEO?

Where there are many things that you can do to both your website and content strategy to improve SEO, today, we will be focusing on three things that you can do right away with little time or effort.

Title SEO

One of the best things you can to improve your SEO is to write compelling titles. If you think of all of the blog posts that you find on Twitter and Facebook, I bet you click on them based (at least) partially on their title. When composing titles for your blog posts and podcasts, there are three things to keep in mind.

1. Keep the titles inviting and interesting so people click on them.
2. Use words in combinations that your user might use when typing (or speaking) into their search boxes.
3. Think about the questions that people might ask and type into search boxes and create answers to those questions in your titles.

If you keep your titles clean and within a reasonable length then you will be sure to attract visitors.

Image SEO

1) Image Names

Have you ever taken a photo and put it directly on your website? How about “download” an image from the web and then upload it to your website?

Have you ever taken the time to rename your images?

Included deep inside the traditional Google Search box is Google Image Search. Think about all of the times you do a search for images yourself. How do you think Google is finding those images?

• Good: My_Favorite_Image.jpg
• Less Good: MyFavoriteImage.jpg
• Bad: IMG08375869372.jpg

2) Image Size

However, naming your images isn't the only thing that you should be doing with your images to improve your SEO. It's also important to have images at a very small size. Smaller image files not only load faster but improve the overall viewing experience for your users … especially when they are on mobile.

3) Image ALT Tags

Lastly, when adding images to your websites, it's important to insert all of your images with a proper ALT tag.  ALT Tags are helpful for those visiting websites using Screen Readers.

When adding images of any type on your website don't forget to give them user-friendly names and a little bit of image compression before you hit the upload button.

On-Page SEO

The last thing that is an extremely thing to think about on your website is your on-page SEO. Website pages and blog posts should be structured in a very linear fashion using the Header or Paragraph Styles. (otherwise known as H1, H2, H3)

Each of the paragraph styles means something different to your website, your users, and especially Search Engines. Paragraph styles are one of the top things that web crawlers look at to understand what your content is all about.

• H1: Reserved ONLY for blog titles
• H2: Major headers in your blog
• H3: Minor headers in your blog
• H4: Use only when needed

This not only creates a manageable and viewable page for your readers to look at, but it gives “The Google” a better idea of how to index your pages and posts.

For more information on how to use headings on your blog posts, please check out this great post from Yoast.com.

Get Started Today!

There are two things you can do to get started on your next website project. No matter if you are looking to create something from scratch, or redesign a current project the team at Educational Web Design is here to help you out. Please visit www.EducationalWebDesign.com for more information on how to take your ideas and build them into

What Do Other EDU's Use As THEIR SEO Strategy?

• Gretchen Shultek Bridgers suggests:
  • Choose your post keyword, use it at the beginning of your title and in your headings.
  • Make sure your snippet has the keyword and summarizes the post well
  • Give all images used ALT attributes

Enroll In Our FREE Online Course Today To Learn More!

If you are visiting this post, you probably fit into one of two categories:

1. You have a passion project you are working on and would like to get it to the point where you are making money from it.
2. You have an idea for a passion project and would like to learn how to make it profitable.

Does this sound like you? If so .. we would love to invite you to join us for our Build Your EDU Brand Online Course. Through this course, you will not only be able to interact with me 1:1 but will be given a host of additional worksheets and videos to help you with your goals.

Download Our FREE Branding Checklist

When building a brand, it's always important to have all of your thoughts in front of you. For this reason, we created a pretty awesome Branding Checklist. If you haven't yet had the opportunity to download it and go through it, you can access it by signing up for our online course (above).

Let's Work Together To Turn Your Dreams Into $$$'s

If you haven't had the chance to fill out our Branding Survey, please take a moment and let us know a little bit about yourself today. In our next email, we will be looking at the reasons why you need to have a website for your brand and will discuss several key ingredients that go into turning your average website into a digital hub for your business.

Don't be afraid to reach out with any questions you may have. We are all in this together!

I'm excited to be a part of your journey and look forward to working with you!

See you soon,

Jeff Bradbury