The year is about to end, but it is not too late to make it big this year because the holiday season is not yet over. But for you to be able to have your fair share in the skyrocketing sales around the holidays, you will need to boost your marketing initiatives.
And among the areas of marketing that you should put your efforts into is search engine optimisation. With a lot of your competitors fighting for the top spot in the search engine results page for related searches, it is essential for you to come up with the best strategies so that you will not be left behind.
Here are 5 of the most effective SEO tips to ensure that you can make it big in this year’s holiday season:
1. Analyze your performance last year
The first thing that you should put your thoughts on is your performance in the previous year. It is essential for you to have a background on what you did last year, and what results you have achieved.
With this knowledge, you will be able to have an idea as to what you should continue to do, what you should improve on, and what you should avoid doing again. Experience is indeed the best teacher, and it is a must that you learn from your experience and not just leave it for naught.
Generally speaking, some of the things that applied to everyone last year is that the part that mobile played was gigantic. That is also why mobile was the focus for this year. You should then ensure that you put on a lot of effort into ensuring that your mobile performance is impeccable.
2. Target keywords with high ROI
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With a lot of attention being given to other aspects of SEO, especially those that relate to user experience, some forget that when it comes to searches, your keyword plays one of the most vital roles.
One of the leading digital SEO agencies, Web Services CT recommends “It is very important that you think your keywords through. It is advisable that your keywords themselves have the potential to help you realize the returns you have in mind.”
For you to get the right keywords, research is essential. A lot of keyword research tools are available online such as Google Keyword Planner. You should also check your site internally for search terms that your visitors are using to search within your site.
If you can capture the right keywords, you will also have more chances of capturing the right customers.
3. Add new content for the Holidays
It is also critical that you publish content that is relevant for the holidays. By doing so, you are putting yourself in a better position to attract the attention of your potential customers.
Some of the effective content pieces that you can come up with that is perfect for the holidays are gift guides for various types of customers. In the process, you can also feature a couple of your products for sale. Keep in mind, however, that it is best to come up with materials for each of the holidays and not go for a general content for the whole season.
Furthermore, content does not solely pertain texts. You should also come up with graphical content such as images and videos that can help you grab your customers’ attention even more. But when you do so, make sure that you keep them light as to not affect your site’s performance.
Just make sure that you optimise all types of content that you plan to create. This way, you can truly make the most out of them.
4. Reorganize your internal links
One of the techniques that you should practice to help improve your SEO efforts is internal linking. But to make your internal linking work, you should keep in mind the following:
- There should be a lot of quality content to link to. Your internal linking efforts wouldn’t do so much if there are not much to link.
- Links should primarily focus on anchor texts as opposed to image links. But image links are still helpful given that you properly make use of alt tags.
- Avoid linking to the superficial pages such as the homepage and the contact us page. Instead, link to pages that are deeper into your site.
- Make sure that you naturally link two content pieces together. Don’t force two pieces that do not have a natural connection.
- Practice judgment as to how much links you should put. There is no limit to the number of links you can put into your content, but when you put in too many, then it might not look too good, especially when this is achieved in such a way that the material doesn’t sound natural as well.
5. Optimize your speed
Finally, with all the expected traffic to come in over the holiday season, it is paramount that your site can take it on, and with optimal performance at that. It should be able to retain loading speed to a maximum of 3 seconds.
User experience has indeed become one of the most important ranking factors and sites that load slowly are usually frowned about. These sites usually get high bounce rates and even lower conversion rates. Not only will these lower your sales, but it will also further be seen by search engines as negative signals and would further lower your ranking.
With this in mind, make sure that you keep your site light so that it remains nimble. Also, make sure that your server can accommodate all the incoming traffic without compromising the performance of your site.
Boost your SEO now with these last-minute tips
Search engine optimisation is indeed an essential tool for you to make it big for this year’s holiday season. To help you improve your SEO initiatives, the five tips above can help you out. So practice them now, and be ready to face the holiday sales that are bound to come raining down on you.
Author Bio:
John Vuong is the sole owner of Local SEO Search Inc. that also offers Hamilton and Burlington SEO. John’s mission is to help local business owners improve their online influence so they can dominate their industry. With his business acumen and innate understanding of the local business landscape, John writes blogs that delve on how to customize SEO campaigns based on client needs.
