Top tips from our in-house Online Services expert – Scott Sellars
The written word and quality looking images are important as visitors need to be engaged once they find your site. Search engines think a little differently, here are a couple of tips on what search engines look for, that you might not have considered.
- Your site MUST be accessible – A recent Google statement has made it very clear that sites which are not ‘responsive’ to the type of device being used to view a website will be downgraded in results. It must be easy to navigate on mobile devices, pads etc.
NB: if you want to check your site on different devices use chmbr.co/screen, if you want to know whether Google considers your site mobile responsive use chmbr.co/gmf.
- Emphasise keywords – Search Engines look at more than the words on the page and consider a lot of elements when ranking pages, text on the page being only one of them. When creating pages try and ensure the page name and page title contain keywords for the page; also use headings and sub-headings to emphasise keyword content.
- Importance of naming images – Don’t upload images to your website without renaming them to include keywords first. ‘0000001.jpg’ will get you nowhere in the rankings whereas ‘tea-cups-and-saucers.jpg’ is far more descriptive.
NB: Ensure you fill in the ‘alternative text’ box for images to describe the image (its a legal requirement, but also a great way to use those keywords again) e.g. ‘Bone china tea cups and saucers’
- Keyword Planning – It’s important to make sure you use keywords that people are searching for and Google Adwords will give you some ideas. Sign up for a Google account (its free) and find the keyword planner tool which you can use to list specific keywords that people are searching for.
For a free review of how you could improve your search engine rankings call Scott on: 01274 230074