Entrepreneur

From Zero to Hero — How to Build an SEO Strategy From Scratch

By Nick Zviadadze,

4 days ago

Despite creating content, most website owners don't have an SEO strategy. As a result, their efforts don't produce the results they want, and 96.55% of pages receive no traffic.

It's hard to see your hard work and creativity go unnoticed by your target audience. But the truth is, your potential customers aren't ignoring you — they simply don't have the chance to see your content.

Without a proper SEO strategy in place, the chances of your content ranking well are low. As a result, your latest blog posts will stay hidden under millions of other pages, never reaching the top of search results.

In this article, I want to show you how to create an SEO strategy from scratch to ensure your content gets the attention it deserves and starts driving organic traffic.

Why is SEO important?

According to recent data, 70% of business owners say SEO generates more sales than paid strategies. So, SEO is important because it helps increase your profits. But that's not the only reason.

A well-executed SEO strategy enhances your website's visibility, making it easier for potential customers to find you. It can also drive more organic traffic, improve your website's authority and boost conversions.

But enough about the theory. Let's dive into the practical SEO tips to build your strategy from scratch and turn these benefits into reality.

How to build your SEO strategy from scratch

Building an effective SEO strategy from the ground up can seem daunting, but it's essential for driving organic traffic and improving your online presence. Here are the key steps you need to take to develop a great SEO strategy:

1. Research keywords

Comprehensive keyword research helps you understand what your potential customers are looking for, allows you to tailor your content to meet their needs and improves your chances of ranking well in search results.

So, how do you do keyword research the right way?

You can use an SEO tool to identify 200-300 keywords that include a mix of high-volume and low-competition terms. This SEO hack allows you to uncover niche keywords with less competition that can help you gain traction more quickly and start driving organic traffic to your website.

2. Create SEO content that makes a difference

Writing content that stands out in search results takes more than simply using the right keywords. Sure, including your main keyword in the title, introduction, subheadings, conclusion and the URL is important. However, good SEO content is also about providing value, ensuring readability and optimizing for search engines and users.

The most important thing is to provide real value to the user. That usually means offering practical advice, tips or suggestions to make the reader's life easier.

To understand their pain points and needs, start by researching extensively on forums like Reddit. You should also read the latest industry news and expert insights to ensure you know enough about the topic. Lastly, include compelling data to make your points more credible.

Still, it's not just about what you write — it's how you write it, too.

For example, you need to structure your SEO content with clear headings and subheadings. Make your content easy to read by using bullet points, short paragraphs and bold key phrases.

Keep all these SEO content tips in mind, and you'll create content with the potential to outrank your competitors in no time.

3. Build high-quality backlinks

Back in the day, SEO experts used to build hundreds of backlinks to a website, helping propel its search rankings. Today, however, Google's algorithms are more refined and only need a few backlinks to rank your website.

So, what does this mean? Can you just pay somebody $10 on Fiverr and be done with it?

Unfortunately, no.

Today, the quality of your backlinks is the most important factor, while getting quality backlinks is one of the most challenging parts of SEO.

For example, Google prefers that you gain all your backlinks organically, meaning you create content that's so good that others want to link to it naturally. While this may be easy for big websites, you'll need to focus more on active link-building strategies if you're just starting.

The best active approaches include guest posting on relevant blogs, getting niche edits where your link is added to existing content and reaching out to competitors' backlink sources.

4. Track and analyze your strategy's performance

If you want to understand what's working and what needs improvement, you need to track and analyze your SEO strategy's performance. Here's how you can do that:

Set up Google Analytics: Use Google Analytics to monitor your website traffic, user behavior and conversion rates, focusing on metrics like page views, bounce rates and average session duration.
Use Google Search Console: Track your website's search performance, including keyword rankings, click-through rates, indexing status and SEO issues.
Monitor keyword rankings: Use tools like SEMrush or Ahrefs to track how your target keywords rank over time.
Analyze backlink profile: Regularly check your backlink profile using tools like Ahrefs or Moz to track the quality of new backlinks and identify opportunities for acquiring more.
Review content performance: Evaluate individual pieces of content in terms of traffic, engagement and conversions using insights from Google Analytics to see which content resonates most with your audience.

Building a good SEO strategy is crucial for getting the results you want. You can do it by researching keywords, creating valuable content, building high-quality backlinks and tracking your strategy's performance. That way, you can boost your website's visibility and drive more organic traffic.