By now you are probably aware of the basic tactics to jump start your search engine optimization strategy. You know about keyword optimization, paid search, organic search, and the importance of content creation. Lots and lots of content. However, there is more to SEO than meets the eye. Here are 6 more SEO tactics that you may never have noticed, but will enhance the effectiveness of your SEO campaign:
- Alternative text. This is the invisible text that accompanies a picture. Even though visitors to your website cannot see it, search engines can. Alternative text allows search engines to realize that your picture is relevant to the content on your site. Having the picture link out to a website or another page on your site is also a smart idea.
- Long tail key phrases. Choosing the appropriate keyword or key phrase is one of the most important parts of SEO, and also one of the most difficult. Targeting a general, non-specific key phrase puts you in competition with too many other sites. Choosing a long tail key phrase will narrow down the competition and increase the odds that visitors turn into customers.
- Keyword in title tag. Although visitors may not notice this tiny detail, it is not to be overlooked. The title tag is one of the most important tags for search engine rankings and is also used as the text that is displayed on search engine results pages.
- Key phrase in URL. Your website’s visitors might not read your entire URL, but search engines do. Editing the URL of every page on your website is a great way to add tons of keywords and phrases to your site before you even have any content!
- Inbound links. Getting a link to your site on a high-quality, reputable website will boost your search engine ranking. However, beware of black hat tricks that can severely harm your ranking. Don’t sacrifice quality for quantity when it comes to link building.
- Links to other pages in your site. This is an easy way to create links, which search engines like. Although internal links are not as important as inbound links from other sites, it is a good starting point and won’t hurt. At the very least your site will have better navigation and search engines will be less likely to miss any pages or content that you have posted.
Try using some of these subtle tactics as part of your SEO strategy to increase your page rank. Establishing these techniques into your strategy will increase the effectiveness of your content creation and other SEO efforts.