Is your search engine optimisation (SEO) journey just getting started? You may have heard that by understanding how search engines operate, SEO can assist in increasing website traffic and rankings.
Our goal is to clear up any misunderstandings or complexities around SEO while providing some context for the role artificial intelligence (AI) plays in digital marketing. After you grasp the basics, you can discover how to use SEO to increase traffic and produce high-quality leads.
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO): What is it?
Let’s begin by posing the obvious query: what is SEO?
The practice of obtaining traffic via free, organic, editorial, or natural search results in search engines is known as “search engine optimisation,” or SEO. It seeks to raise the ranking of your website in search engine results pages (SERPs). Keep in mind that more people will view a website the higher it is listed.
Rand Fiskin, a co-founder of Moz, made a fantastic graphic based on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs pyramid. Fishkin’s “Mozlow’s Hierarchy of SEO Needs” examines the proper way for people to carry out SEO.
What are SEO’s three pillars?
Getting your brand, website, or business discovered by search engines is a fundamental skill for digital marketers, and staying up to date with the latest developments in SEO can help you stay competitive.
Although SEO is always evolving in little ways, its fundamental ideas remain constant. We can divide SEO into three fundamental elements or pillars that you should understand and consistently implement:
Technical optimisation is the process of finishing tasks on your website that are unrelated to content yet are intended to increase SEO. It frequently takes place in the background. Technical optimisation can be as easy as uploading your sitemap to Google.
The process of making sure the information on your website is pertinent and offers a positive user experience is known as on-page optimisation. It involves using a content management system like WordPress, Wix, Drupal, Joomla, Magento, or Shopify to target the appropriate keywords inside your content. Off-Page Optimisation: Off-page optimisation is the process of enhancing your site’s search engine rankings through activities outside of the site. This is largely driven by high-quality backlinks, which help to build the site’s reputation.
What are SEO’s three pillars?
Getting your brand, website, or business discovered by search engines is a fundamental skill for digital marketers, and staying up to date with the latest developments in SEO can help you stay competitive.
Although SEO is always evolving in little ways, its fundamental ideas remain constant. We can divide SEO into three fundamental elements or pillars that you should understand and consistently implement:
Technical optimisation is the process of finishing tasks on your website that are unrelated to content yet are intended to increase SEO. It frequently takes place in the background. Technical optimisation can be as easy as uploading your sitemap to Google.
The process of making sure the information on your website is pertinent and offers a positive user experience is known as on-page optimisation. It involves using a content management system like WordPress, Wix, Drupal, Joomla, Magento, or Shopify to target the appropriate keywords inside your content. Off-Page Optimisation: Off-page optimisation is the process of enhancing your site’s search engine rankings through activities outside of the site. This is largely driven by high-quality backlinks, which help to build the site’s reputation.
Paid search vs. organic search – the differences and similarities
From the outset, it’s important that you understand the differences and similarities between the organic, natural search synonymous with SEO and paid search.
Paid search vs. organic search – the differences and similarities
From the outset, it’s important that you understand the differences and similarities between the organic, natural search synonymous with SEO and paid search.
Position:
The first difference is that paid search results appear at the top of search engine results pages, and organic results appear beneath them.
Here’s an example from searching ‘best water bottle.’ The paid ads or sponsored posts come up as images, while the organic results are below it.
Here’s an example from searching ‘best water bottle.’ The paid ads or sponsored posts come up as images, while the organic results are below it.
Time:
Time is another important distinction between organic and sponsored search. You can obtain results more rapidly with paid search than with organic search, which frequently takes weeks, months, or even years. Therefore, you must use organic search in a medium- to long-term strategy.
Payment
Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing, as the name implies, involves paying for sponsored search traffic on a cost-per-click (CPC) basis.
This implies that each time a user clicks on your advertisement, you are charged a price. Therefore, you purchase traffic for your page by paying Google to display your ad when a visitor searches for your keyword, rather than depending on organic traffic to your website.
Although it does demand a time and resource commitment, traffic from organic search is free.
ROI
It is significantly simpler to quantify paid search in terms of return on investment (ROI). Part of the reason for this is because Google gives you access to more keyword data in Google Analytics (GA4).
On the other hand, ROI may eventually stagnate or even decrease with paid search. ROI is a little more difficult to gauge with organic search, although it frequently gets better with time. Organic search can provide a very high return on investment in the long run.
Share of traffic
According to BrightEdge data, organic search accounts for 53% of all site traffic, while paid search accounts for 15%. Therefore, the organic results actually receive the majority of clicks.
There are parallels between sponsored and organic search as well as distinctions.
Researching keywords: Both organic and sponsored search engines require users to submit a term. Researching keywords is therefore necessary for both paid and organic search.
There are parallels between sponsored and organic search as well as distinctions.
Researching keywords: Both organic and sponsored search engines require users to submit a term. Researching keywords is therefore necessary for both paid and organic search.
In reality, how do search engines operate?
People utilise search engines when they have a question and want to look for the solution online.
Search engine algorithms are computer programs that look for clues to give searchers the exact results they are looking for. Search engines rely on algorithms to find web pages and decide which ones to rank for any given keyword. That’s why Google algorithm updates can have a huge impact on brands and marketers, so you need to keep on top of them. Remember there are also social media algorithms to consider for search.
There are three steps to how search engines work: crawling, indexing, and ranking.
Step 1: Crawling by Search Engines
The initial phase is known as crawling. In this stage, search engines deploy web crawlers—also referred to as ‘spiders,’ ‘robots,’ or ‘Googlebots’—to locate new web pages and collect data about them.
The initial phase is known as crawling. In this stage, search engines deploy web crawlers—also referred to as ‘spiders,’ ‘robots,’ or ‘Googlebots’—to locate new web pages and collect data about them.