How to build search engine-friendly sites

How to build search engine-friendly sites

Your website is the center of your digital marketing world. It’s where you have the most control and where all digital marketing rivers run toward.

Generally, the largest of those traffic sources is organic search. 

Yet, all too often, SEO is not deeply embedded when a new website is being designed (or redesigned), and SEO thinking is often only addressed after a site has launched. 

This is a problem. 

When building a new website as a marketing vehicle for your business, SEO considerations should be included in the planning stages before a line of code is written. 

My team and I have helped hundreds of businesses design and build sites that take their SEO and marketing to the next level.

Unfortunately, we have also helped many businesses recover SEO traffic after a botched website redesign that failed to factor in SEO.

This article explores why – and how – SEO plays an integral part in the website design process.

It details exactly what you need to consider to build a site for search marketing and lead generation and how to focus on what your users want to help keep the Google gods on your side.

We will also dive into common pitfalls businesses looking to build a new website and maintain SEO traffic may encounter. 

1. How to develop an SEO-friendly website

The following are the key areas to consider in building a truly optimized website. 

  • Fundamentals: Domains, hosting and CMS.
  • Crawling: The technical bit.
  • Information architecture: How to structure your SEO-friendly site.
  • Mobile: Mobile-friendly sites need more than just responsive design.
  • Page speed: Fast sites make for happy users.
  • Usability: Confuse them and lose them.

The rest of this article will dive into each of these points in detail. 

Fundamentals

There are a few core elements that set the stage for a well-optimized website design process.

Domains

Your domain name is the entry point into your website, and there should be one single (canonical) domain. You may have others, but they should all point (redirect) to this one.

Our business is called Bowler Hat. We operate in the UK. We are a web-based business. It naturally follows that our domain is www.bowlerhat.co.uk. All subdomains 301 redirect back to the main URL www.bowlerhat.co.uk. We have a few domain variations that 301 redirect back to the main URL. This all makes sense.

Your domain should be brand led in the majority of cases, and having www.crammed-my-keywords-in-here.com is not going to help you rank today (1999 just called and wants its SEO back). 

Hosting

You can buy hosting for $1 a month – but guess what? It is not very good. 

Slow, cruddy hosting creates a poor user experience and ultimately creates a site that Google is not so keen to show in the search results. 

Buy the best hosting you can afford and ensure your site has good uptime and runs well on it. 

In most cases, hosting should follow common-sense rules:

  • Be situated where
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3 SEO tools to build for your clients in Looker Studio

3 SEO tools to build for your clients in Looker Studio

With the wide variety of clients out there, you’re bound to run into the occasional DIY marketer. These marketers prefer that you teach them how to be self-sufficient rather than rely on you for every little question.

These clients can be a blessing but can also be dangerous. The challenging aspect of client management is finding the balance between empowering them to get the data they want without feeling like they don’t need you.

That’s where Google’s Looker Studio tools come into play.

Looker Studio is typically used for general reporting. The real beauty of Looker Studio is that it can be used for so much more. 

By creating tools for clients, you enable them to do the actual research it takes to accomplish SEO while still providing that much-needed maintenance and guidance that comes with experience. 

This article illustrates free dashboard templates you can use with your clients. 

How to change the branding

Before we dive into the specifics, you may want to update the branding and logo of your dashboard. This process could not be easier.

Right-click on your logo, and you will see a menu appear. Near the bottom, select “Extract theme from image.” You will then be presented with three different color scheme options. Select whichever one you feel best represents your brand.

This will automatically change most of the colors and get you most of the way to the finish line of designing in your Looker Studio tool. However, there may still be a few charts or texts you’ll need to update.

1. Technical SEO auditing

Tracking technical SEO efforts can be difficult to visualize. Sure, you can track it in a spreadsheet, but that isn’t client-friendly. 

For years, SEOs have attempted to make dashboard trackers to help show improvements in site health over time. 

Luckily, our friends at Screaming Frog have finally cracked the case of the perfect technical SEO dashboard. The best part? The template is free. You can see it here.

How to copy the dashboard

To copy the dashboard:

  1. Click on the three dots in the top right
  2. Select make a copy
  3. Select your data source (don’t worry, you can update later)

How to set up the technical SEO tracker tool

Screaming Frog has published a helpful guide on setting up this Looker Studio tool. What they will walk you through includes:

  • Setting up a scheduled crawl
  • Configuring the export to a Google Sheet
  • Connecting that Google Sheet to the Looker Studio dashboard

You can find the full tutorial here.


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2. Keyword research

The presentation of keyword research takes many forms. Most recognizable is the simple spreadsheet. Some people create keyword maps for each page or topic, while others with smaller clients have a short list of keywords.

However, Looker Studio can be a powerful analysis tool for larger sites with tens of thousands or millions of keywords.

If you are working with millions of keywords, do not use Google Sheets

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How To Build A Scalable Solution For Several Customer Internet Design and style Requirements

How To Build A Scalable Solution For Several Customer Internet Design and style Requirements

By Sujay Pawar, founder of Astra, a single of the most preferred WordPress themes.

As a web page style and design company, you know that constructing effective customer associations can take time and consistency. With the appropriate tactic and execution, it doesn’t have to experience like a marathon. As a substitute, it can be a dash. A pleasurable one particular!

As an company, you will have to develop a scalable option for your client’s world wide web design desires from the get-go. Not only can this support you retain them as customers, but it can also retain them happy for the extended haul.

Listed here are a several factors you ought to continue to keep in head when building a scalable solution for your client’s world wide web structure desires.

Identify Your Client’s Legitimate Objectives

1st, you will need to recognize your client’s goals. This assists you better detect your client’s real demands and avoid squandering methods in the approach.

For instance, our group was after employed by a customer to update their web-site. But when we got onto the job, we understood that they weren’t really in have to have of a new internet site. They wanted lookup engine optimization, something that would assist them enhance their rankings and achieve additional visibility in look for benefits.

So rather of creating a total new web site, we helped them comprehensive the optimization and saw their internet site rating grow. And with that, we saved time and assets even though building a scalable answer that labored.

The Issue

When it comes to structure, different purchasers have unique requirements. Each individual customer will come with its distinctive enterprise offering and exceptional requirements, and it does get demanding to handle past-minute variations.

In limited, structure is a resourceful endeavor.

Small business owners and designers will need to operate jointly to assure that the client’s needs are met.

Guidelines For Profitable Consumer Administration In Website Style

Retaining observe of your clientele is 1 of the most complicated tasks as a designer. You have to regularly make certain they are performing proficiently and be resolving any troubles they may perhaps have.

Whilst it might be exhausting retaining monitor of the clientele you function with, it’s essential if you want to stay on top of your sport.

Right here are a couple of recommendations that can assistance you create a scalable remedy:

1. Established And Fulfill Client Expectations

When it will come to new clients, it is straightforward to tumble into the trap of setting expectations as well high to safe the contract. This does additional damage than superior. You under no circumstances want to make claims you simply cannot supply.

Environment anticipations in the suitable way can established you up for increased success with new purchasers.

Below are a several means to ensure you established the correct anticipations.

• Initial, be certain you comprehend your client’s organization and ambitions in advance of beginning a undertaking. By placing anticipations properly, you will be a

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TechScape: Can the United kingdom build a safer internet? | Engineering

TechScape: Can the United kingdom build a safer internet? | Engineering

Respect can be a unusual commodity on-line, based on what Twitter threads or Fb teams you are in. But the term was utilised firmly by the Uk authorities previous thirty day period when it said it would resist tries to water down its proposed powers above the world-wide-web.

The mannered language belies a legislative wolf in sheep’s garments, say critics of the on-line protection invoice. This considerably-contested legislation returns to parliament on 12 July, and MPs built it very clear this week that they imagine the culture secretary will have much too significantly electric power about the online as it stands.

Indicator up for our weekly engineering newsletter, TechScape.

Julian Knight, the Conservative MP who chairs the digital, lifestyle, media and sport committee, warned that the secretary of point out will have too much affect about Ofcom, the independent regulator charged with utilizing the act. He named for the removing of clauses that would allow Nadine Dorries, even now culture secretary at the time of publication, to order Ofcom to improve codes of follow, including on dealing with terrorist and boy or girl sexual exploitation information, right before parliament considers them.

“A absolutely free media relies upon on ensuring the regulator is totally free from the threat of working day-to-day interference from the government,” claimed Knight. “The governing administration will however have an important part in setting the course of journey, but Ofcom ought to not be regularly peering above its shoulder answering to the whims of a backseat-driving secretary of point out.”

The federal government was polite with its difficult no. Speaking to a committee of MPs scrutinising the invoice past month, the electronic minister, Chris Philp, reported the govt would “respectfully resist” makes an attempt to drinking water down the secretary of state’s powers.

The governing administration won’t go on that level, but it is introducing changes however.

The monthly bill spots a obligation of treatment on tech corporations – or alternatively, platforms that produce user-produced content these kinds of as social media giants, as very well as huge search engines together with Google – to defend consumers from destructive material. That responsibility of treatment is broadly break up into 3 pieces: restricting the distribute of unlawful information such as little one sexual abuse photographs and terrorist materials ensuring little ones are not uncovered to unsafe or inappropriate content and, for the significant platforms these kinds of as Facebook, Twitter and TikTok, shielding grown ups from authorized but unsafe information (these types of as cyberbullying and taking in disorder-relevant product).

The legislation will be overseen by Ofcom, which will be able to impose fines of £18m or 10% of a company’s world-wide turnover for breaches of the act. In severe situations, it can also block web-sites or applications. On Wednesday Ofcom printed its roadmap for employing the act, which includes a target on tackling illegal content within just the very first 100 days of the legislation staying applied.

In this article is a speedy summary

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3 SEO tools to build for your clients in Data Studio

3 SEO tools to build for your clients in Looker Studio

With the wide variety of clients out there, you’re bound to run into the occasional DIY marketer. These marketers prefer that you teach them how to be self-sufficient rather than rely on you for every little question.

These clients can be a blessing but can also be dangerous. The challenging aspect of client management is finding the balance between empowering them to get the data they want without feeling like they don’t need you.

That’s where Google Data Studio tools come into play.

Data Studio is typically used for general reporting. The real beauty of Data Studio is that it can be used for so much more. 

By creating tools for clients, you enable them to do the actual research it takes to accomplish SEO while still providing that much-needed maintenance and guidance that comes with experience. 

This article illustrates free dashboard templates you can use with your clients. 

How to change the branding

Before we dive into the specifics, you may want to update the branding and logo of your dashboard. This process could not be easier.

Right-click on your logo, and you will see a menu appear. Near the bottom, select “Extract theme from image.” You will then be presented with three different color scheme options. Select whichever one you feel best represents your brand.

This will automatically change most of the colors and get you most of the way to the finish line of designing in your Data Studio tool. However, there may still be a few charts or texts you’ll need to update.

1. Technical SEO auditing

Tracking technical SEO efforts can be difficult to visualize. Sure, you can track it in a spreadsheet, but that isn’t client-friendly. 

For years, SEOs have attempted to make dashboard trackers to help show improvements in site health over time. 

Luckily, our friends at Screaming Frog have finally cracked the case of the perfect technical SEO dashboard. The best part? The template is free. You can see it here.

How to copy the dashboard

To copy the dashboard:

  1. Click on the three dots in the top right
  2. Select make a copy
  3. Select your data source (don’t worry, you can update later)

How to set up the technical SEO tracker tool

Screaming Frog has published a helpful guide on setting up this Data Studio tool. What they will walk you through includes:

  • Setting up a scheduled crawl
  • Configuring the export to a Google Sheet
  • Connecting that Google Sheet to the Data Studio dashboard

You can find the full tutorial here.


Get the daily newsletter search marketers rely on.


2. Keyword research

The presentation of keyword research takes many forms. Most recognizable is the simple spreadsheet. Some people create keyword maps for each page or topic, while others with smaller clients have a short list of keywords.

However, Data Studio can be a powerful analysis tool for larger sites with tens of thousands or millions of keywords.

If you are working with millions of keywords, do not use Google Sheets

Read More

4IR-all set companies build each individuals and technologies

4IR-all set companies build each individuals and technologies
  • New producing alternatives are expected to create 133 million jobs in the upcoming 4 a long time because of to the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), but an believed 75 million jobs are likely to be missing to engineering development at the exact same time.
  • Suppliers have to prioritise their people today and their technological know-how to thrive in the 4IR age.
  • Emerging very best exercise in this location will involve attracting and engaging with talent, and operating with third parties to develop the expertise of equally present-day and upcoming workers, as well as 3rd functions this sort of as suppliers.

We live in one particular the most exciting ages at any time – the age of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR). Electronic transformation, and technology much more broadly, more and more form an integral component of lifestyle, giving humanity a special option to rethink and redesign the way they source, generate, produce, and consume. And this is not only to improve efficiency and advancement, but also to produce new value for staff, culture and the atmosphere.

Producing accounts for about 22% of world-wide work, however the the vast majority of producing companies continue to absence a clear method on how finest to equip their workforce with the essential capabilities for this new age. The 4IR could direct to the displacement of an approximated 75 million positions globally in the up coming 4 a long time. At the identical time, it is predicted that new opportunities could build 133 million new work – a web favourable of 58 million new 4IR roles by 2022.

So, how can businesses prosper in the age of the 4IR? The respond to is easy: the future of producing is not just about engineering, it is really about creating both technological innovation and men and women. Right here are a few manufacturing greatest practices that optimize the two the expertise of men and women and the use of machines:

1) Expertise attraction and engagement

While engineering has created anything much more productive, it is normally by including a blend of talent and techniques that providers are profitable. All systems, procedures and technologies drop flat when we never have the appropriate individuals to perform with them. Now, much more than ever, companies will need to seek the services of the ideal talent offered and build a strong employer brand. Furthermore, companies have to have to actively interact their staff in the style and implementation of their digital tactics – from senior management to shopfloor workers. This will ease know-how adoption throughout the organization, somewhat than pushing as a result of acceptance of new methods and tools from the major down.

When brewing corporation Heineken wanted to spotlight the worth it destinations on its men and women, it produced a collection of movies showcasing the tales of recent Heineken workforce that perform in a selection of positions and areas. The intent and result of the campaign was to clearly show that the model revolves all-around the unique personalities

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