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SEO Checklist

SEO isn’t only about being found on search engines and driving traffic to your website- it’s also about providing a great experience and generating leads and revenue. SEO may be a powerful tool for getting ahead of the competition, especially in the startup world. While SEO is unquestionably a long-term investment, it can serve as a solid foundation for your startup’s inbound marketing strategy.

Technical Search Engine Optimization

Adaptability of mobile devices

On mobile devices, the content must look great and have a positive user experience. Since Google’s index is now mobile-first, mobile usability has a significant impact on rankings. When creating a site from scratch, consider having a full mobile version. For it, you can use just a simplified design and remove unnecessary JavaScript elements from the code. This will make the website fast for mobile devices.
Speed
People hate waiting, so Google wants to send them to a page that loads quickly. Make sure that even with a sluggish internet connection, all of your content loads easily.

Here are some of the many ways for speeding up:
1. Reduce the size of your CSS, HTML, and JavaScript files that are larger than 150 bytes.
2. Optimize your code (including removing spaces, commas, and other unnecessary characters).
3. Reduce redirects – Your visitor will spend more time waiting for the HTTP request each time a page redirects to another page.
4. Blocking JavaScript should be avoided or used as little as possible.
5. Use browser caching to avoid having to reload the entire page every time a visitor comes to your website.
6. Improve the response time of the server.
7. Make sure your images are the proper size, in the right file type (PNGs are preferable for graphics with fewer than 16 colors, while JPEGs are better for photographs), and compressed for the web.
Quality of code

In order for Google to process and comprehend your content efficiently and effectively, it requires clean, transparent code. So make sure that your codes and styles are consistent across the board. That implies they must adhere to the W3C’s “strict” standards and pass a variety of CSS and XHTML validations. Validators don’t all look for the same things. Some merely look at CSS, while others look at XHTML, and still others look for accessibility. If you’re serious about exposing standardized pages to the public, run them through a series of validators. The World Wide Web Consortium establishes standards and hosts a number of validators for web pages.

Validation, in basic terms, ensures that your website meets the requirements that most web designers accept. This also implies that it will be available to a wider range of users, using a variety of web browsers and operating systems.
Schema.org

The schema.org markup outlines your content to Google in an easy-to-digest and understand format. When it comes to SERPs that have a Featured Snippet or Quick Response, Schema.org markup is a huge help to Google, and it can also help you rank at the top. According to studies, websites that use schema markup rank four positions higher in the SERPs than those that don’t. While it’s not entirely certain that the greater result is attributable only to the markup, there is clearly a connection.

Content Optimization

Page Titles

Google pays close attention to the meta title and page heading.

One of the most important things to remember is that Google crawls websites from top to bottom. The title tag is the first thing Google sees when it comes to determining what your page is about. As a result, it’s critical to include your primary keyword in the title tag. The character limit for title tags is around 55 characters, including spaces. Before you publish your web page, you should utilize a snippet editor to examine how your title tag will appear in the SERP. Yoast is a great free WordPress SEO tool that includes a built-in editor.

Headings serve as directional markers for readers as they go through an article. Therefore, they should indicate what a section or a paragraph is about. Otherwise, people won’t know what to expect. Readers prefer scanning content to gain a sense of what the text is about and to determine which sections of the text to read. They can do this with the help of headings. When there are no headings in the content, it is much more difficult for your readers to scan it. It’s even worse when you add long stretches of text after a heading.
The content's copy

Google is searching for quality, authentic, trustworthy content that serves a real function and benefits the user. Also, content that addresses the question or solves the issue that the user has expressed to Google in the context of the user’s search query.
Multimedia

People expect richer content as the web becomes more multimedia, and Google wants to deliver it. As a result, Google is searching for more than just text. To improve their users’ engagement with the content, Google needs to see photos, sound, and video.
Internal linking

Any link from one page of your website to another page of your website is known as an internal link. Links are used by both users and search engines to find content on your website. Users use links to navigate your site and find the content they’re looking for. Links are also used by search engines to navigate your website. They won’t be able to find a page if it doesn’t have any links to it
The content's length

Longer content tends to rank higher. That’s because, when done well, a longer blog post will often provide more in-depth information on the topic. You’re most likely to find 300-word articles in Google’s top ten as well as pieces that are far over 2,000 words long.
Outbound links

Outbound links are used by Google to verify the accuracy of your details as well as the author’s and website’s reputation. Outbound connections (to authoritative and relevant sources, of course) are a positive signal to Google, contrary to popular belief.

Outbound links can help readers understand the scope of the issue you’re writing about by directing them to further resources where they can learn more about specific themes. This is especially important when writing about complex topics where further explanation may be required to completely comprehend what is being discussed.
User interface

A common focus in the user interface designing process is asking yourself “What does the user want?” or “What does the user need?” and then building around those desires or needs. People want results, and they want to know that they’re on the right track to getting them. Including things like forward-focused step-by-step navigation can help them get in, get out, and get on with their lives. It’s important to make it simple for users to interact with your website. Then they’ll most likely remain on your website longer, lowering your bounce rate. Also, as a result of their positive experience, they may want to return and tell their friends about it.

Keyword Optimization

Post titles

Put the keywords right at the beginning of the title. Google is known to place a higher value on the first few words of a headline.
URL

The keyword should appear in the web address of your website.
H1 Tag

The title of the page is displayed by default in most content management systems. However, check to see if your platform uses a different setting.

A H1 tag should describe what the content of the given page is all about. Usually, the H1 tag will be the title of your blog post or article and it should give the reader a strong sense of what they are going to read.

Spiders are used by search engines to crawl web pages and index websites, and they pay special attention to text enclosed in H1 tags. As a result, include keywords in your H1 is critical in order to improve your search engine ranking.
The first paragraph of content

Finding the keyword at the beginning of your blog post will reassure Google that the page’s subject is accurate.
Meta title & meta description tags

These two code elements are used by search engines to show their results. They use meta-title as the title of the search listing. The meta-description gives the little blurb below it some context. However, they use both to gain a better understanding of the page’s subject.

The competition on search engine result pages (SERPs) is tough. If your website doesn’t rank in the top three spots (which receive the most clicks and, as a result, traffic), you’ll need to find alternative techniques to attract visitors. Meta titles and meta descriptions on your website can help with that. This is due to two major factors:
1. The meta title and description of your website are frequently the first things that visitors see. And, happily, maximizing these requires little work (compared to other SEO activities).
2. People use the meta titles and meta descriptions of websites to decide which link to visit in the search results page. You can encourage more people to click on the link to your website when it shows in their search results by producing a compelling, accurate, and relevant meta title/description.
ALT tags & Image file names

Only the file names of graphics on a website are visible to search engines. As a result, make sure that the keyword appears in the file name of at least one of the images.

Link Building

Backlinks from editorial, organic links

These are backlinks from websites that reference your content on their own.
Reaching other websites

This technique entails contacting other websites. This can occur in a variety of ways. You could make a great piece of content and send it to them via email. As a result, if they find it useful, they can refer to it. You can also propose where they could link to it.
Guest posts

These are blog articles that you share on third-party websites. As a result, certain businesses often allow you to include one or two links to your website in the content and author bio.
Profile links

Many websites provide the option to build a link. A good example is online profiles. Often, when creating such a profile, you can also provide a link to your website. Some, but not all, of these links have a lot of weight behind them. And, considering how simple they are to make, they’re worth pursuing.
Analyze the competition

Many SEOs study their competitors’ backlinks on a regular basis to see which ones they can replicate for their own pages.
Navigation/Hierarchy

There’s no need to get complicated with internal linking. The basic idea is that every page on your website should have some link to and some link from another page on the website. Your navigation should accomplish internal linking to the main categories and subcategory pages, but you should also make sure that leaf-level pages have internal linking as well.

If you have any other questions don’t hesitate to contact us.

For more checklists, you can visit our resources page.

SEO Checklist

Technical Search Engine Optimization

Adaptability of mobile devices

Speed

Quality of code

Schema.org

Content Optimization

Page Titles

The content's copy

Multimedia

Internal linking

The content's length

Outbound links

User interface

Keyword Optimization

Post titles

URL

H1 Tag

The first paragraph of content

Meta title & meta description tags

ALT tags & Image file names

Link Building

Backlinks from editorial, organic links

Reaching other websites

Guest posts

Profile links

Analyze the competition

Navigation/Hierarchy

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