A Beginners

Guide to SEO
Build a Strong Longterm Strategy and Improve Your Site Ranking

Introduction
Lets admit, search engines play a huge role in our day to
day life. They have become the core tool used for any type
of research, be that information for a new project, a book
analysis, historical events or a new coffee shop that just
opened up around the corner of your building.
Along with the growth in popularity and use of search
engines, youve got to hear a lot more often about SEO
and ways to get your Site and Blog on the first pages of
Google and other SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages). Yes,
there are more than just one! This is why we call it SEO
- Search Engine Optimization, and not GO - Google Opti-
mization. If you need to find a review, you go to Yelp or
any other popular alternative platform, if you are looking
for a product you will probably search directly on Amazon
or Ebay, Goodreads for books, Facebook for people and
brands, Pinterest for inspiration, you get the idea, right?
SEO has come to be a very complex and multidimension-
al process, which takes time, effort and constant learning
to keep up with its trends. In this e-book, we focused on
creating a concise but comprehensive guide for beginners
who want to learn and understand key aspects of SEO;
as well as discover how SEO can influence their market-
ing and sales efforts. You will learn why SEO is important,
which factors are crucial for ranking well, how to build a
simple but efficient SEO strategy, as well as ways to mea-
sure your performance.
Roll up your sleeves, get a good cup of coffee and lets
make you SEO friendly!
 16
- Building an SEO Strategy
Keyword Research & Strategy
Link Building
SEO Plugins
Image SEO Building

Table of Contents Content Strategy

Site Speed
Local SEO

29
04
- SEO Basics - Measuring & Tracking Success
What is SEO? Website Audit

Why SEO is Important? Google Analytics

SEO Myths and Misconceptions Finding Issues

11 32
- Understanding SEO Fundamentals - Useful Tools for SEO
SEO Always Changes 33
Ranking Factors - SEO Resources
S
SEO Basics
The following e-book aims to provide you with a begin-
ners guide to SEO. As SEO is a complex topic, we will be
giving a detailed overview of various aspects and factors
you have to consider and work with, when building your
SEO strategy.

You will learn what SEO is and why it is important, what

are some of the most common myths and misconceptions
related to SEO, why it is always changing, which factors
have the largest impact on SEO, how to build a simple but
efficient SEO strategy and how to track your results and
success. Finally, we will provide some useful resources and
tools for your own further development on this topic.

What is SEO?
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the practice of in-
creasing the quantity and quality of the traffic that you
earn through the organic (not paid) results in search
engines.
- RAND FISH K I N , FOU N DE R OF M OZ

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 4

Search engines have 2 major functions, crawling* and in-
dexing a site, and providing ranked listings of content
most relevant to a particular search term.
* to crawl
the process of Google or other search engines visiting
your site for tracking purposes. Google for example
does this through its Spider crawler. After the Spider
crawls your site, the results get put onto Googles
index. This process is called indexing.
SEO is a method that will allow SEO robots to crawl and
check and understand the content on your website. It is
about understanding how people search for information
on the web, and how Google and other Search Engines
choose to display it to the users. The easier you make it for
search engines to crawl and index your content, the more
often your website will appear on result pages and rank
well for specific keywords.
Why is SEO important?
Increased Traffic and Visibility
A common joke amongst SEO experts is if you want to
hide a body, put it on the third page of Google results.
Nobody ever looks there. And as ridiculous as that may
sound to you at first, think about it - how many times do
you bother to check the second page of your search re-
sults? How about the third? Stats show that the first page
of search results in Google gets around 90% of the traffic.
Ideally this is where you would like to be listed. And the
key to getting on the first page is ranking well for key-
words which are most relevant to your business and web-
site. SEO is basically free advertising for your site on the
largest global platform. Do it right and youll drive large
amounts of organic traffic to your website, as well as in-
creased attention, interest and visibility for your brand.
Your SEO Strategy Can Increase Your Sales
A good SEO strategy is a great marketing strategy with
high potentials of return. If you can drive higher quality
traffic to your website, all those interested parties can be
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 5
converted into potential buyers, then into loyal customers
- with the right type of content.
SEO Helps You Create Better Content
When you understand the basics of SEO, it helps you cre-
ate more engaging content, which is more useful for your
users. More quality content ranks higher on SERPs (Search
Engine Results Pages), and creates more traction with your
audience. If you struggle with blogging, and need some in-
spiration for topics to write about or tips on how to blog
better, check out our article on 6 Ways to Blog like a Pro.
Google monitors the average time a user spends on your
site and uses these statistics when calculating your rank-
ing score. The higher the bounce rate, the more your score
has to suffer.
Increased Competitiveness
SEO can help you compete with other photographers in
your target market, if done correctly. When youre in a sat-
urated market or a small community where competition is
tough, having an SEO strategy in place can help you stand
out and improve your brand recognition.

Improved User Experience

Good SEO practices will not only help you improve your
online presence, but also create a better user experience
for your site visitors. This obviously includes a lower bounce
rate, since users will find the content they were searching
for and were promised in the search results page. The era
of clickbait headlines is long gone - even if you get the
user to access your website through bait keywords, they
will leave it the instance they realize that it was all a trap.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 6

SEO Myths and Misconceptions
SEO trends keep shifting in a matter of weeks and months.
The algorithms that determine which site appears first
and which drops down on the results page are also con-
stantly changing. Therefore, some of the factors that did
matter 1-2 years ago can be completely irrelevant or even
counter-productive today. Here are some of the common
Myths and Misconceptions when it comes to Search En-
gine Optimization:

More Links are Better than More Content

Whilst link building is one of the most important ranking
factors, the quality of the links is more important than
their quantity. Obviously, you want users that are relevant
to your business sharing your links - clients, photography
blogs, photographer reviewing websites etc.

Using HTTPS isnt Important for SEO

First of all, in case you are not familiar with the terms HTTP
and HTTPS, please have a quick look here. Secondly, Using
HTTPS for SEO is important. In 2014 Google announced

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 7

that it would start weighting sights higher with HTTPS. Its
still not a huge factor, but it will make a difference in the
future.
NOTE: As easy and straightforward as this process may
seem, we recommend consulting with technical support
before diving into shifting from HTTP to HTTPS, as this may
cause multiple errors and broken website links if not per-
formed correctly.
Meta Data and Meta Keywords Impact on Search
Ranking
In 2009, Google announced that meta data and keywords
would no longer be used in ranking pages due to keyword
stuffing practices. However using meta data and keywords
shouldnt be discounted. Having better descriptions could
be the difference between someone clicking on your link
or not.
Just note, focus keywords and meta keywords are differ-
ent. A focus keyword is used to help you create a strategy,
and allows you to emphasize the topic that you are writ-
ing about. It is the search term that users will use when
looking for/finding your content. Your focus keyword
should be relevant and related to your content (Read
more about Key words and building a Keyword strate-
gy on Page 17). Meta keywords on the other hand, were
something that SEO specialists used to add to a website
back in the early 2000s. They are not visible to your us-
ers, as they appear behind the scenes, in the HTML code
of your page. If you want to learn more about Meta Key-
words, Wordstream has a good intro article on it.
Keyword Optimization is the Key to SEO
Not necessarily true. Google reads through your con-
tent, and matches the most common words or phrases -
as keyword indicators. This means that you can use syn-
onyms of your main site title, when it makes more sense.
However using keywords correctly is very important in
your SEO strategy.
H1 is the Most Important On Page Element
H1 is important (thats your page title), but its not the
most important element. Your content matters as much,
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 8
and should be well structured. So combine h2, h3 and h4
tags to make it easier for your users to navigate through
your articles. Use a clear headline to get the message
across to your clients quickly.
H1 tags have been overused, so theyve become less im-
portant for Google, but shouldnt be ignored complete-
ly. Heres a simple and fun guide on How to write Catchy
Headlines.

My Homepage Needs Lots of Content

Dont overthink it, or clutter your home page! Think about
what value it adds, and what your customers want to see
when they enter your website for the first time and have
ty content at all times. Remember, less can sometimes be
no clue about who you are and what you do. Your home-
more.
page should probably show only content that provides
context, and helps users understand what the site is about.
User Experience is an Added Bonus Not a Require-
The More Pages, the Better ment
Again, its all about quality, not quantity. Adding multiple WRONG! As briefly mentioned earlier in this book, it is
pages to target various users from all sorts of areas isnt very important that you create good content, in a clear
necessarily a good thing. It may even get your website and readable manner. Think how people will be using your
penalized in the future. Make sure you are adding quali- website. At Flothemes, when creating a new design, we

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 9

focus heavily on the experience that the users will have
with each of our themes, both on desktop and mobile de-
vices. The more your users enjoy spending time on your
website, the better chances that they will keep coming
back, sharing and recommending your site to their network.

Local SEO isnt Important

Local SEO is very important if you target clients within
your area. Google actually takes into account proximity,
when determining your ranking. Local search rankings are
as significant as the general (global) search rankings. Time
to think about your target market, if the majority of your
clients and potential clients reside in your neighborhood,
city and country - time to think about setting up at least a
Keep reading as we will be discussing more about Local
SEO in the next chapters.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 10

U
SEO Always Changes
SEO is ever changing, and unless youre hiring an SEO pro-

Understanding fessional to work on your site regularly, its going to be

hard to keep up with all the search engines constantly

SEO Fundamentals changing algorithms. Remember just one thing, to be suc-

cessful you need to be relevant, be popular, and be trust-
ed by search engines.

We will not get tired of stressing this out - your main focus
should be on the quality of the content you are pushing
on your website. Your posts should have purpose and pro-
vide maximum usability for your audience.

Ranking Factors
Understanding which ranking factors weigh more and
which weigh less, will allow you to craft a better focused
SEO strategy, as well as give you some ideas on additional
elements you need to consider apart from your content.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 11

So, here are the main SEO ranking factors for you to keep
in mind and improve:
Content
Content length - the number of words and images
used on a page. According to experts from the popular
blog platform Medium 7 minute blog posts are the op-
timal length of a blog post, capturing the most attention
from readers. This amounts to around 1,500-1,700 words.
However, lets not forget that most of you are photog-
raphers or creatives having content focused on imagery.
In this case, keep it short but informative and useful. Sev-
eral paragraphs describing the photo collection, location,
background story and parties involved should be more
than enough. Read more in the Content Strategy section,
Page 23)
Readability - well written and well structured content,
using correct mark up and h1, h2, h3, etc.
Uniqueness - create unique and compelling content,
even if a topic has been discussed and chewed on multi-
ple times already, add your personal touch and perspec-
tive to it.
Relevant terms to the topic / proof terms - For example,
if you write about photography or weddings, the relevant
terms may be: bride, camera, canon, fuji. You may want to
check out Googles trend correlation tool for inspiration
and research purposes.
Keywords in content text (first paragraph if applica-
ble). This can also be done by writing synonyms or related
terms, as keywords arent always suitable to describe your
message correctly.
User Experience
Desktop and Mobile responsive design - we hope we
dont need to explain that having a responsive website is
a MUST. Hint: think how people consume any type of in-
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 12
formation today desktop vs mobile usage. If your web-
site is not responsive yet, we suggest you check out
Flothemes, as we are a responsive framework by nature,
and your site will work responsively and score highly based
on this factor.
Click through rate (CTR) - the ratio of users who view
your link in search engines, versus those who actually click
on it. To improve your CTR, you need to use good title tags,
include meta descriptions (rich snippets), and use friendly
permalinks.
Time on Site - the average time a user stays on your site.
As mentioned previously, high bounce rates may harm
your ranking - so avoid using clickbait titles.
Internal Links - Determined by how easy it is for us-
ers to navigate through your site, click from one page to
another. We recommend using features such as Previous/
Next Post or Recommended Articles based on what the
user has read already. All these options are available with
Flothemes.
Video Integration - Using video content on your site
creates better user engagement.
Using Images - as photographers and creatives, this one
comes naturally. Just remember to keep your images opti-
mized (Save for web and/or use JPEGmini. )
Technical Aspects
Domain name - when selecting a domain name make it
descriptive, i.e the use of the word photography in your
domain name. It doesnt have to be a keyword.
HTTPS is now increasing in importance, if you havent
got an SSL certificate, we suggest speaking with your
hosting provider about this.
NOTE! As easy and straightforward as this process may
seem, we recommend consulting with technical support
before diving into shifting from HTTP to HTTPS, as this may
cause multiple errors and broken website links if not per-
formed correctly.
Existence of a site description - dont leave it to chance,
explain briefly who you are and what is your business about,
how to contact you, what locations do you cover, etc.
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 13
 SEO Visibility - the volume and position of ranking key- Keywords in anchor text - when someone links back to
words on your site. Here, search engines also take into your site, the link should be descriptive.
consideration how relevant are the keywords in relation Domain name in anchor text.
to your content.
Site Speed - how quickly your website loads? Aim for site
loading time under 4 seconds. Heavy images need to be
optimized. Check our guide on Optimizing your Portfolio.

Social Sharing
Quality and quantity of social media shares helps build
credibility and trust for your website. The following items
are taken into consideration (the more shares, and better
BackLinks description with the share - the better):
Twitter shares
Backlinks are links on other websites and social platforms
Facebook shares
that link back to your site. Search engines take into ac-
Google + shares
count the following items to determine the ranking of
Pinterest pins
your website:
Obviously, Google ranks G+ shares as the highest amongst
The number of backlinks.
these items, but dont underestimate the weight of the
The number of Referring domains - the number of
rest of these platforms.
different websites linking back to yours.
The backlinks age. New links vs older ones - the longer
the backlink the higher its rating.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 14

 Flothemes For Your Site
Creatively Crafted Portfolio & Blog Sites for the Modern Artist

- Elegant Modern Aesthetics

Beautiful minimalistic designs, seamless transitions & well thought
out elements to keep the users focused on your content.

- Customizable Responsive Layouts

Multiple styling options, flexible layouts & rich customiza-
tion features to help you get the look you want.

- Premium Plugins
We created additional plugins & tools to empower your
creative business online, simplify & optimize your workflow.

- Easy To Use
Easy to setup, no coding skills required. Full documenta-
tion & tutorials, setup services, as well as free updates &
support questions.
Save 20% On Any Theme
USE CODE: SEOGUIDE20
B
Now that you know which factors matter the most when
it comes to how search engines determine your ranking -
time to get the ball rolling. The following section will pro-

Building an vide you with some further ideas and tips on how you can
build up a successful SEO strategy.

SEO Strategy NOTE: If you are planning to work on your website while
reading through this guide, we recommend doing a Web-
site Audit first, to record your before and after results.
Please head over to the Measuring & Tracking Success
section (Page 29) to learn how to perform a Website Audit.

Brand Presence
Before we even start discussing strategies and settings,
lets check if you have the basics covered. Get a good
domain name and use it on all your social accounts. This
builds up credibility with search engines, as they will be
able to link all your accounts together. Credibility counts a
lot for search engines.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 16

User Experience
This is crucial. Is your site functional, easy to use, and easy
to read? Does it work well on mobile and desktop? If
youre not sure how well your site is performing, have a
few friends and close clients review your site and give you
constructive feedback on what works and what needs im-
provement. You can also use the following form to get a
quick overview of your sites performance.
Now, lets get to business!
Keyword Research & Strategy
Putting together a keyword strategy is important. This
is a list of keywords that you feel people will be using,
when searching for your site. While Long Tail Titles and
Keywords may provide lower search hits, they prove to be
higher quality leads with better conversions as the com-
petition isnt that tough. How can you develop a keyword
strategy? Start with the following steps:
Profile your ideal client
Who is your ideal client? What are they looking for? What
are they searching for? Once youve profiled your ideal cli-
ent you should have a better idea of what kind of con-
tent will attract and bring value to them. You can review
Hubspots buyer persona template for further reading on
this topic.
Created by Dynz
from the Noun Project
Check Related Searches
Now that you know your ideal client and what they are
searching for, go to Google (or any other popular search
engine) and enter some of the keywords or phrases that
you want to be found by, into the search box. Scroll to the
bottom of the page and use the related searches area to get
some suggestions when building your own keyword list.
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 17

Example of keyword searches related to Photography London.
Expand your Keyword list
Try using tools such as Google Keyword Planner to find
keywords and phrases that may be useful and relevant for
your audience. Or use a tool such as SERPS Keyword
Rank Checker. Both will give you information on how
many searches are used on a monthly basis and how diffi-
cult they will be to implement.
Optimize your keyword list
Now that you have a long list of keywords and phrases,
you will want to use a keyword difficult checker to re-
move items that will be too difficult to implement and
rank by.
Choose your keywords
Once youve removed the super competitive words, and
removed anything thats not relevant, you will have your
finalized keywords list in place. From now on, try focusing
on creating content related to your keywords. This should
allow you to position your content well on SERPs.
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 18
 you generate, the more trusted your site will become for
search engines. There are two types of backlinks that you
need to know about:
Natural editorial links - these are organic shares. When
users access your site and love your content, be that your
blog or portfolio - they share it and get you natural edito-
rial links.
Manual (outreach) building - these are the examples
mentioned above. You write about venues and they share
it on their own page, guest blogging, etc.

There are a few strategies that can help you create con-
tent that people will search for and will want to share with
Link Building their network:
Do your homework. Look for relevant popular search

Backlinks terms that you would want to be ranked and found by.

Link building is a vital part of SEO. Backlinks are links that Find those who are already doing a good job at it and ana-

other people share on their own websites and social lyze their site. For example, if you want to rank high for the

media platforms, which bring visitors and traffic back to term Photography London, search for those who already

you. They are one of the top factors taken into consider- score well by these keywords, check their website and the

ation by Google and other search engines, when calcu- type of content they create. Think of ways you can add

lating your ranking score. The more qualitative backlinks something unique and useful to what already exists.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 19

 Reach out to popular bloggers and/or blog platforms
from your industry. Some examples for wedding photog-
raphers might include - The Knot, Southern Weddings,
Brides, Style Me Pretty, Ruffled, Wedding Chicks, etc. Sub-
mit your work. If they share it, you will get a good deal of
traffic and exposure.
Competitors backlinks - make a list of those who rank
best in your area for your keywords. Check their site. Use
a tool such as Open Site Explorer to see where they are
linked. This may give you some additional ideas on how to
build your own backlink strategy.
Get your customers to link you - again content is King,
create content that people want to share. Make the infor-
mation valuable, informative and entertaining - so users
want to share it.
Make it news worthy - if other blogs, the press and me-
dia want to share your articles then youre going to get
lots of exposure.
Internal Links
Internal links are basically anything that allows the user to
click to another page on your site. These are breadcrumbs,
related posts, featured/favorite posts, next/previous arti-
cles, etc. Now lets explain a few terms and why they are
important:
Breadcrumbs - the links that allow the users to track their
path on your site, from the homepage to the page they
are currently looking at (i.e. Home < Blog < Client features).
Each of these has to be clickable and link back to the ac-
cording page. These help establish an information hierarchy
and a clear pleasant browsing experience for your site vis-
itors. Also, they help Search Engines understand your site
map better, therefore accurately index all your content.
Related posts or Previous/Next posts - this does not
only offer more useful/interesting content for your site
visitors, but also keeps them longer on your site - which
can be beneficial for your ranking.
Luckily, with Flothemes weve given you lots of options to
add internal links, including post pagination, related posts,
etc.
Fixing Broken Links
This is a significant factor related to user experience. Whilst
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 20
search engines will not directly penalize you for having
broken links (it may happen in the future) - it will impact
the overall user experience. There are multiple broken link
finders available on the web, to help you analyze your site
and see whether there are any broken links on your pages.
For example, you can use Broken Link Check right now,
to find out if your site has any broken links. If it does, you
can read this article to find out how to fix it, and use this
plugin to redirect your 404 pages to 410.
Friendly Permalinks
In case you are still in the dark on this topic, your perma-
link are your page URLs. An SEO friendly permalink con-
tains keywords that explain your page or post and can be
easily read and understood by both - your readers and the
search engine machines.
An SEO friendly URL would look like this:
www.flothemes.com/guide-on-your-yoast-seo-plugin
An SEO non-friendly URL would look like:
www.flothemes.com/?p=106754dasg99
When using WordPress and Flothemes, you can easi-
ly turn on the friendly permalinks option. Just go to your
WordPress dashboard, click on the settings tab > perma-
links > and then use post name or month and name.
Now, youre all set!
SEO Plugins
If youre not already using an SEO plugin on your site, get
one installed NOW! Yoast SEO is an easy to use plugin that
will help you build up your SEO. For a full tutorial on how to
install it, set it up and manage it, check out the Guide here.
The Yoast team also creates some great articles on their
blog, to help you get the most out of your plugin and SEO
settings.
Meta Descriptions
Use your chosen keywords or phrases. Write a short de-
scription about your page or post. This snippet will show
up on search engines page results. Keep it under 155
characters and make sure that its intriguing and catchy
enough, to make users click into your content. Again, the
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 21
Yoast SEO plugin makes it extremely easy to edit the Meta
description for each page and article. See how to do it here.

Image SEO Building

Add Alt Tags, and descriptions before uploading your im-
ages to the web. Also make sure to give them descrip-
tive names. It could be the venue, location, clients name,
something related to a keyword that will help drive the
traffic back to your site. If you are using our Lightroom Inte-
gration plugin, and uploading images and galleries straight
to your website - make sure to add descriptions and Alt
Tags directly in Lightroom, before exporting your images.
In case you havent done this before, or uploaded images
and have forgotten to add Alt Tags, it can be done later, in
the media library. Why is this important to do? An exam-
ple - someone searches for a venue or location, and your
images come up, they can click through to your site and
read the whole article.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 22

C
Content Strategy

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 23

Content is King. Write compelling articles related to your
work that people would want to read and share. Pay at-
tention to the keywords youve selected, and try to in-
corporate them (when relevant) into your new posts. And
remember, you dont have to show EVERY piece of con-
tent you have created on your site, curate your portfolio,
it should be a representation of the clients you wish to
target more in the future.
Back to articles. Youve probably spent already a good
deal of time and effort, putting together a good post and
image collection. Now, make sure you dont undersell
your post. Headlines and social sharing descriptions are as
important (or even more important) as the article itself.
Make it attractive, catchy and intriguing.
For examples: describing on Facebook your new blog post
with something like Head over to Matt & Gemmas beau-
tiful beach wedding on the blog is OK.
But putting some additional creativity and thought into it
results in the following snippet - Organizing a beach wed-
ding? Find out how Matt & Gemma were able to create
their perfect day in Bali on a budget, and how they used
the sea view to their advantage
Now tell us, which one would you be more curious and
excited to read about? Same blog post, whole different
story and level of engagement. Also make sure your copy
is SEO friendly. A proper mark up helps search engines un-
derstand what your content is all about. Dont forget to
use h1, h2, h3, h4 as well as relevant keywords and their
synonyms.
If you feel lost or dont know where to start and what to
write about, here are a few topic ideas:
Write Content for Your Peers
Think of interesting topics, industry news, tips or prod-
uct reviews that your peers will enjoy reading about. That
could be anything from new camera equipment and ac-
cessories, travel hacks, advice when shooting in bad light,
anything! Trust us, even if you think its obvious or that
there is plenty of information about it on the web already -
the majority of your readers dont know about it yet, or
would love to hear your view point on it, or it never crossed
their mind to research this topic before. There is no wrong or
right, there is only your experience and your ideas. Think of
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 24
your blog posts as of a real life conversation with a friend.

Write Content for Your Clientele

Make a list of topics and information that would be
useful and interesting for your clients and potential cli-
ents. If youre a wedding photographer, write an article
about choosing the perfect wedding cake, 10 ideas for
a beautiful low budget celebration, tips for planning a
wedding, what to wear for a photo shoot, make it use-
ful and fun. This will not only bring additional traffic to
your site, but also increased exposure to your business.

tions, but also additional exposure and blog traffic. Each

Rise by Lifting Others
The photography and especially wedding photography
industry has so many parties and collaborators involved.
Think of a larger picture. Approach venues, floral, MUA or
decoration specialists - write articles about them (i.e. Top
7 Rustic Wedding Venues in SF, Best Florists for your wed-
ding on the East Coast, etc).
Meet these collaborators, take a short interview and snap
some photos. This will not only get you some new connec-
of the people you will mention in your blog post will be
more than happy and excited to share your article with
their network. Its a great and easy way to generate quality
backlinks to your site, as well as deliver your content to a
larger audience.
Get your content shared
All of the above items will help your content get shared.
Since search engines give more value to content that peo-

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 25

ple share/talk about, youll be steadily strengthening your
market position. Dont forget to reshape, and mention old-
er blog posts in new articles, when relevant.
Semantics
Dont use the same SEO keyword over and over, make
sure to use synonyms and variations in your content.
Improve Your Existing Content
Review your older posts. Do they reflect your strategy?
Do they require improvement? If you feel that something
is not relevant any longer, you may want to remove it.
Though, in case of blog posts this can be more difficult as
it may affect your ranking. If you do remove older irrele-
vant posts, make sure you redirect the broken links to a
relevant existing page.
Re-use content
Use old content that youve written, which worked well
with your clients. Perhaps the topic is relevant again, so
you can reshape it or write a second piece with the men-
tion of the first one. Think creatively, list your Top 5 best
Groom sees the bride moments, or Top 7 most beautiful
wedding cakes. There are no rules, only you finding a fun and
exciting way of presenting content that you already have.
Image SEO Building
As mentioned earlier, your home page should load in un-
der 4 seconds. Speed, is one of the many user experience
ranking factors that search engines simply love. A good
and reliable hosting provider is very important in this
case. A few hosting companies that we can point out are
Siteground and Inmotion , as they provide WordPress spe-
cific hosting, allowing your site to load faster. For speed,
also consider image optimization, so that your page size is
small. You can consult our Portfolio Optimization Series as
well as use photo optimization tools, such has JPEGmini.
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 26
Local SEO
Having a localized SEO strategy in place is important. It can
help you stand out from your competitors in your area, for
specific search terms. A few things to keep in mind when
improving your Local SEO strategy:
Make sure your NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) is
the same across all your platforms.
Use keywords and tags of relevant places in your loca-
tion (geographic area, venue, cafe or restaurant, etc).
Aim to generate backlinks from local vendors and part-
ners.
Set up your business with Google Business.
Set up your business on Yelp so people can review it, as
these have a significant weight for your ranking. Quite of-
ten Yelp would even beat you on the SERPs, so as long as
your name pops up on top - you are getting the exposure

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 27

 Clients Using Flothemes
See Real Website Examples from Our Clients

Fer Juaristi - Porto Theme Benj Haisch - Crowd Theme

M
Now that weve covered some of the key factors and top-
ics on how to strengthen your SEO strategy well take a
quick look at ways you can track your SEO performance

Measuring & and success.

Tracking Success
Website Audit

Before you get started, make sure to audit your site. You
can do this with Hubspots Website Grader and youll get
a snapshot of where your website stands before optimi-
zation. You should save the report, but take particular care
to note:
Total Unique Visitors
Visitor to lead conversion rates
Lead to customer conversion rates
You should be checking these metrics each month to see
whether your efforts are paying off.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 29

 Analytics dashboard, select the reporting tab, then on the
right hand side, go to audience and overview. To see spe-
cific traffic related directly to SEO , youll need to go to
the Acquisition tab > All Traffic, where youll be able to
see exactly where your traffic is coming from. Youll want
to check what % of traffic is coming from search engines.
You can select the options you want to know more about,
and hit plot rows and youll get a graph for the source
selected.
See the following video from Yoast on tracking Overall SEO.

Page Specific SEO

Google Analytics Page specific SEO will allow you to see which pages are
driving the most traffic to your site. To see page specific
If you havent set up Google Analytics, we suggest doing
traffic, go to Behavior > Site Content > All Pages. To see
so now. You can learn how to get started with Google
traffic specifically for a page from Search engines, type the
Analytics here. If you want to learn how to install your
URL without the domain name in the search bar, click the
tracking code and set up some basic goals and traffic re-
Secondary dimension dropdown and click Acquisition >
ports you can do so at the Analytics Academy.
Medium.

Monitoring Overall SEO

To review your overall SEO efforts, go to your Google

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 30

Finding Issues
Bounce Rate
Bounce rate tells you how many users leave your home
page (or any page) without visiting another page on your
website. Higher bounce rates give you an indication that
there may be an issue with the content on that particular
page and it should be addressed.
To see your bounce rate click on the Behavior tab > Site
Content > Landing Pages. You will get a list of pages
through which people enter your site. Click on the com-
parison icon to the right, and from here youll be able to se-
lect the option for bounce rate. Anything between 0-20%
should be fine, items above that youll want to review.
See the following video from Yoast on checking Bounce
Rates.
ly, with Flothemes your site will be responsive out of the
box. It may be useful to track what per cent of users are
viewing your site from a mobile device - so you can en-
hance their experience.
If you go to Audience > Mobile > Overview, you will be
able to see how many people are entering your site us-
ing desktop, mobile or tablets. To have a better overview,
click on the pie chart icon to get a better understanding of
how many mobile visitors you get.
See the following video from Yoast on Mobile Traffic.
If you want to dive even deeper into ways and methods of
analyzing your SEO metrics, we recommend this detailed
and useful article on measuring and tracking success from
Moz.

Mobile Traffic
Google and other search engines have really ramped up
their importance on the responsiveness of sites. Thankful-

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 31

Useful Tools fo SEO Key word planners
Google Keyword Planner
The following section provides some useful tools that Moz Keyword Explorer
you can take advantage of, which will help you build a Google Trends Correlate
successful SEO strategy. Google Trends

Link Building
Open Site Explorer from Moz

Broken Link Finder

Broken Link Check

Google Analytics
Google Analytics

Site Speed
GT Metrix
Pingdom

SEO Plugins
Yoast SEO
All in One SEO

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 32

SEO Resources Some resources for further reading include:

Moz
Moz offers a number of free tools for SEO, including Open
Site Explorer and Keyword Explorer. They also write great
articles on their blog focusing on creating content on top-
ics related to SEO.

Yoast
Providing one of the best SEO plugins for WordPress,
Yoast also offers a great wealth of knowledge on its blog.
They will cover topics from basic SEO to more advanced
topics that you can use to improve your site.

Other eBooks
The SEOblog
has a great article with a list of useful SEO eBooks that you
may find useful for your business.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 33

Authors Mark Allen
Product and Communications Manager

Mark comes from a background in Finance and Software

Development. Now he spends his time developing prod-
ucts at Flothemes and providing awesome customer sup-
port to our amazing clients.

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO SEO 34

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