This guide provides a quick overview of how SEO works, and what you can do to be an SEO expert in 2022.
SEO is the practice of improving a website’s ranking in search engine results pages (SERPs) by increasing the number of visitors to the website. This is done mainly by obtaining more backlinks or through search engine optimization (SEO).
This site will show you all the important SEO tools so you can improve your skills, become an SEO specialist and pursue a career in it.
SEO is the fastest and easiest way to grow any website. By adopting practices that will help you achieve better search engine rankings, your site can enjoy more traffic and conversion rates.
Although some people might consider skills like SEO to be for rent, they’ve actually been democratized. Practically anyone can learn how to do it themselves. You just need to know what you’re doing on the technical level and have a good strategy for organic search engine ranking.
I’ve been practicing SEO for the past 18 years. As you’ll learn in this post, there are 10 steps that are important to follow in order to become an SEO expert.
I’ve found that everyone should learn about SEO because it’s one of the most important skills to have.
In order to get the most out of this article, it is important to understand the difference between an SEO expert and an SEO professional.
A search engine optimizer, or SEO expert, is someone who understands how to use the right SEO tactics in their work to increase the ranking of a website in search engine results.
An SEO professional is an SEO Expert that practices SEO as a profession. They can either offer you services as a consultant, as an agency, or as an individual on a project-by-project basis.
A lot of people are looking for SEO services because they are not well-versed in them. This isn’t surprising as there are many benefits to knowing about SEO even if you don’t plan on offering services to clients. Definitely worth learning more about…
Becoming an expert on SEO can help you gain visibility for your business. You can attract more traffic, increase your customer base, and build trust with the people who are using the internet.
Increase your rankings and traffic – This is the most obvious reason someone should aim in becoming an expert in search engine optimization.
If you know how to optimize your blog site to rank well in search engines, then it will benefit from the increase in rankings and traffic. This enables you to monetize your own website or start an online business.
Less dependency on SEO agencies – This might not be what you expect to see in the blog of an SEO agency, but it’s the truth. We value internal skills & expertise because once you have this, you can grow your business without relying on external assistance.
Decrease costs – If you are a solo entrepreneur or blogger, it’s a lot cheaper to do your own SEO so that you don’t have to hire an SEO expert for this.
Make better decisions like who to hire to work on your SEO – If you know SEO yourself then it’s easier to choose which agency or consultant to hire for your SEO needs. You’ll be able to understand what their SEO package entails and whether it is a good fit for you.
Highly recommended for Marketing managers – If you work as a marketing manager who specializes in SEO, then it would be beneficial to learn about the copywriting practices that are necessary for successful SEO. It will give you an edge over other managers who are not knowledgeable about SEO or don’t have any experience with this marketing tactic.
No business can survive online without SEO – SEO is no longer optional. Websites that are not built with SEO in mind, there is no way can survive in the highly competitive online World. Knowing about SEO and how to use it correctly, can make a huge difference in your website’s future
Hello! I am new to the SEO world and wanted to learn more about what this is like.
You can learn a lot about SEO in the space of a few minutes. These are the 10 steps to follow if you want to become an expert in this field:
-
Understand how search engines work
-
Get to know The Basic Search Engine Marketing Concepts
-
Understand the true meaning of SEO
-
Choose the right SEO Training
-
Stay informed about SEO changes
-
Choose the Right SEO Tools
-
Practice SEO – Don’t stay theoretical
-
Demonstrate your SEO Expertise
-
Be Patient
-
Follow the leads of established SEO Experts
1. Understand how search engines work
If you’re taking SEO seriously, the first step is figuring out how search engines work.
This could be something that many people know or think they already know. That’s why it’s always good to start with simplifying concepts and then work your way up to the most complex theories.
Put simply, search engines have three main functions:
-
Crawling – content discovery consists of web crawling processes that help SEO & ranking efforts.
-
Indexing – In order to rank your content, they have to have a way of understanding how your website’s structure.
-
Ranking – how they decide which search results to show and in what order, for a given search query
As an SEO specialist, you’ll need to know how to optimize a website for each stage so that search engines can read, index, and understand the content of your website without any issues.
Resources you can use:
-
How Search Engines Work – This article is a short and sweet introduction to the world of search engines. It explains how they work and what you can do with them.
-
How Search Works – in this tutorial, we explore how Google’s search engine works and explore some of its features. This should be a good starting point for you to learn more about search engines in general.
2. Get to know The Basic Search Engine Marketing Concepts
Planning a marketing campaign is confusing and difficult. Fortunately, a few clicks will let you find a knowledgeable strategy consultant to figure out what your goal is and how to reach it. A good place to start is with an understanding of what digital marketing is, how search engine optimization fits into all of that work, and the basics for getting started.
You should always have a clear idea of the different aspects of SEO and take advantage of all the other tools at your disposal to make your website stronger online.
In summary, SEO and SEM are different. SEO is free while SEM traffic needs to be paid for.
When it comes to SEO, your goal is to rank as high as possible in the search engine results pages for topics that are relevant to the user. This can be done by presenting content that matches their intent and publishing signals on your site that will help the search engine index it successfully.
SEM lets you use PPC platforms like Google Ads to place ads on the top of the SERP.
SEO can be a great asset if you want to get traffic from search engines. Unlike PPC, you don’t have to use any paid ads to get more visitors to your site. For some keywords, you can rank higher on search results. Once this happens, your website will receive continuous traffic without having to spend more money on advertising
This is just one of many benefits you can enjoy when you get to the top of the SERPs. You can benefit from other things that are beneficial for growing your business, like brand awareness, user trust, and recognition.
3. Understand the true meaning of SEO
SEO is more than just about keywords and links, it’s also about giving users a great experience with exactly what they want. It’s not an easy task but this year companies are prioritizing customer experience above all else.
Website traffic is good, but it won’t mean anything if none of your visitors take any action. You need to make sure your site’s pages turn visitors into returning customers and social shares in order to grow a valuable audience.
SEO has a number of different types, but the 3 most important ones are:
As an SEO expert, you’re responsible for applying the right SEO strategies at each stage of the process.
Here is what each SEO service does:
Technical SEO – Technical SEO is responsible for indexing pages in the crawling phase. One way technical SEO can help is by making sure you have all the important pages on your website indexed properly to ensure good search engine results. The most important technical SEO tasks are:
-
URL Canonicalization
-
XML Sitemap Optimization
-
Setting your preferred domain
-
Optimizing your page URLs
-
Optimizing your website structure
-
Improving your website page speed
-
Optimizing your website for mobile
-
Finding and fixing crawl errors
On-Page SEO – On-page SEO is the process of building and refining the content and structural elements on a given page. Elements like text, images, and videos all need to be optimized for search engines to understand their context.
The most important on-page SEO aspects are
-
Page title optimization
-
Meta description optimization
-
Content optimization
-
Making proper use of headings (H1 tag, H2, etc)
-
Internal and external links
Off-Page SEO – The last step of SEO is called off-page SEO. This is different, from on-page SEO, since it involves activities that are out of the scope of a website. Getting backlinks from related websites and promoting your website on social media are factors that can help search engines rank you better.
4. Choose the right SEO Training
Once you start learning SEO, you will quickly realize that there is a huge amount of information to take in and quite a few things to learn. This might seem overwhelming at first, but the results are totally worth it.
If you put the time into research and experiment on your own, there’s a chance you’ll end up with an endless list of articles to read and things to try.
It took me years to learn SEO because I had no resources to learn from back when I started in 2003. There were no courses or tutorials available so I learned what little I knew through trial and error.
Nowadays people wanting to learn SEO can do so by following a reputable course without having to spend endless hours searching the internet and reading article after article.
Resources you can use:
Google Digital Garage – Google has started releasing new online courses on Digital marketing and they cover everything that you need to know. They don’t go into the more technical details but they provide a good overview of the most important things about online marketing and are a great starting point for beginners.
Moz SEO Course – Moz is well-known for its tools but they’ve also created a course that covers the basics of SEO. It’s not complete, but it’s a good place to start if you have no prior knowledge about SEO.
SEO Guide – This is Google’s guide to SEO and unlike most other guides, it does not offer any recommendations for successful ranking; rather, it outlines the things YOU need to do in order for your site to rank well. But still, I say take a couple of hours and go over the tips. There’s some valuable advice in there.
5. Stay informed about SEO changes
The field of SEO has been changing quite a bit in the past few years. The rules and algorithms change all the time. Google alone is making more than 250 changes to their ranking algorithms per year, that’s just one search engine. Good SEO experts need to keep track of these changes and adjust their strategies accordingly.
The best way to stay informed about the latest changes is to follow a couple of SEO blogs that are both up-to-date and reliable. That way you won’t miss any important information and will be able to react straight away if anything changes.
Resources you can use:
Search Engine Roundtable – A must-follow website for anyone doing SEO. There is a regular daily flow of news, teaching insights about everything going on in the SEO world. I find this website to be the most valuable and helpful in the industry because it has such an extensive knowledge bank to tap into, which other websites just cannot compete with.”
Search Engine Land – One of the oldest websites in the SEO industry. Previously owned by Danny Sullivan, now he works for Google.
Google Blog – Recently, Google created a blog for people to stay updated on the latest information on Google products and services. Posts occasionally cover things like Google search as well.
Google search blog – The blog post by Google about Search is worth reading.
Google Webmasters Blog – The official Google webmasters blog. Follow to get the latest news about changes in search.
6. Choose the Right SEO Tools
Doing SEO on your own is impossible. There are just too many data points to consider and decisions to make, hence you won’t be able to spend your time in tasks that will help grow your business.
It’s also true that SEO tools do cost a lot of money but over time the benefits outweigh the monthly fee you will pay for a good SEO tool.
SEO Tools you can use:
Google Webmaster Tools (Free) – Google Webmaster Tools is one of the most useful tools for SEO. It’s free and it can give loads of information about your website. Make sure to check out my previous guide on how to use Webmasters Tools in order to improve your site’s SEO
Google Analytics (Free) – Google released this tool for free and you can use it to learn more about the traffic your site receives and how your users move through it. There are a variety of reports and metrics to explore and analyze once registered with Google analytics.
SEMRUSH (Paid) – This is my favorite SEM tool – it’s not free, but it does a TON of different things which means you don’t have to use a bunch of different tools. It can be used for SEO, managing PPC campaigns, monitoring your competition and keywords they rank for, building links from other sites to yours, etc. It has been updated frequently
Ahrefs (Paid) – A free alternative to SEMRUSH. It has a monthly subscription but it also one of the best SEO tools on the market. It comes with 7-day trial period, so you can try before you buy.
Google Keyword Planner (Free) – The Google keyword tool is a free keyword research tool offered by Google. You can use it to find out what words people type into the search box and what they’re looking for.
7. Practice SEO – Don’t stay theoretical
SEO is one of the most debated theories on the internet, but it’s mostly an alteration of what you already do. The results from studying SEO theory should be a list of practical actions that will help your website rank better on search engines.
The reality is that every site is different, which makes it difficult to offer one SEO strategy for all. This is why you need to practice SEO the same way you would if it was your own website – by trying things out.
Reading through the success stories of other entrepreneurs who’ve succeeded in their SEO campaigns can be a huge source of wisdom & inspiration for you. Going through these case studies will give you insights on new strategies you can try, as well as maintain your motivation to keep trying until you get SEO right.
8. Demonstrate your SEO Expertise
They say one of the best ways to learn something is to try and explain it to others. This is also true with SEO.
After starting to write about SEO, I’ve been able to learn a lot of things and improve my SEO skills.
I would recommend starting a website, or an SEO blog, to share your expertise with other people.
Sharing knowledge is a great way to learn new things about SEO for yourself while also benefiting others in the process. Sharing your skills is an extremely rewarding experience.
9. Be Patient
SEO is a process that never truly ends. Your work will only pay off if you invest the time for it to do so. You should try to avoid any rushed, hasty conclusions too soon
SEO is not a quick fix for boosting your traffic. It builds a sustainable business with a strong foundation that will always bring in organic traffic.
Building SEOs into your website might seem like an afterthought, but taking time to see how they’re affecting your rankings and traffic is important. After you make a change it’s worth checking again to compare before & after.
Monitor your ranking and traffic, to make sure it’s not experiencing any quick fluctuations. Give it enough time before deciding on what you’ll do next.
10. Follow the leads of established SEO Experts
When you are learning SEO, there will be many difficulties that come your way. You may feel disappointed, frustrated, or ready to give up but it is important to stay motivated despite these challenges.
I’m sorry to hear that you’re not satisfied with the results you’ve been getting, and I hope this answer provides some clarity. You can read about other people and see that they didn’t succeed solely because they were lucky; it was because of hard work and many hours of reading & testing.
The list below includes 5 SEO experts you definitely need to follow for inspiration and understanding how SEO can be applied on a scale. All these influencers have managed to build multi-million businesses and did it because they know how to use social media.
Research their stories and learn about the strategies they employ. You may find that they do things differently than ‘traditional’ SEOs, as they have the confidence and expertise to try new things and experiment with SEO.
Neil Patel – One of the most respected SEO experts in the industry. Don’t just read his blog but try to analyze his practices and how he managed to use content SEO in scale.
Brain Dean – He is the expert in link building. His blog is a great resource for case studies and techniques you can use to get fast results.
Eric Enge – Speaker, Founder, and CEO of Stone Temple. An SEO with years of experience in the industry.
Joost de Valk – Founder and CEO of Yoast, the most popular SEO plugin.
Rand Fishkin – Co-Founder of MOZ, great presenter, and entrepreneur.
Conclusion
You should become an expert in SEO if you have any involvement or interest in the web.
This list includes marketing managers, developers, webmasters, web designers, social media managers, Pay Per Click experts, and solo entrepreneurs as well as eCommerce owners.
Why? SEO is the foundation of all Digital Marketing campaigns. Not only will it help drive traffic to your site, but SEO principles are used in other aspects of an internet marketing strategy as well
It may not be easy, but becoming an SEO expert can help your business stand out. The process includes a lot of reading, practicing, and testing.
If you are starting out with your SEO now, I recommend that you take a course in SEO, along with some of the new tools that are available for this purpose. The most important thing is to get out there and get started working on it—experimenting with it and learning from your mistakes.
Search engines and SEO are here to stay for years to come. It’s the best investment you can make for your business and personal skills.