SEO
15 Quick SEO Wins (To Improve Your Rankings)
Trying to boost your rankings on the SERPs? You’re in the right place.
Implement these 15 quick SEO wins to rank higher on search engines and get more traffic.
You should be able to do each within an hour.
Let’s get to it.
Internal links are often overlooked. But when used correctly, they can help boost the performance of your pages in Google.
Why are they important? There are two major reasons:
- They aid the flow of PageRank around your site. And PageRank is a confirmed Google ranking factor.
- You direct PageRank to your site by building or earning quality links. But most webmasters will rarely want to link to your most important pages, as they are usually transactional in nature. You can “bypass” this by using the middleman method—building links to informational content, then linking to your money pages via internal links.
How do you do this? First, make a list of all your “money” pages, i.e., those pages that make you money. These are likely your product, service, and category pages.
Next, you’ll need to find relevant, contextual internal linking opportunities. The easiest way to do this is to use the site:
Google search operator. For example, if we want to add internal links to our free backlink checker tool, we’ll likely search for this:
Then we’ll go through each of these pages and add internal links to our backlink checker with relevant anchor text.
Of course, that won’t be the only search we’re doing. Get creative here and use different searches to surface pages where you can potentially add internal links. As an example, we can search for “backlinks,” “links,” “link building,” “link building tools,” etc.
Alternatively, you can simply sign up for the free Ahrefs Webmaster Tools (AWT) and run a crawl on your site. When the crawl is done, go to the Link opportunities report in Ahrefs’ Site Audit.
This report will show you relevant link opportunities on your site. Set the filter to Target page and search for your money pages.
Then look at the suggested internal link opportunities. Where relevant, add your internal links.
Recommended reading: Internal Links for SEO: An Actionable Guide
Not only is page speed a Google ranking factor, but slow pages are also bad for business. According to Unbounce, nearly 70% of consumers admit that page speed impacts their willingness to buy from an online retailer.
One way to improve your website speed is to install a caching plugin. Caching is basically a way to temporarily store copies of files so they can be delivered to visitors in a more efficient way.
If you’re using WordPress, we recommend installing a plugin like W3 Total Cache to enable caching.
If you have a page that’s dead but there are backlinks pointing at it, then those links are wasted. It can’t rank (because it’s dead), and it can’t help your other pages rank better too.
Therefore, you should be fixing these pages.
Here’s how to find these pages on your site:
- Enter your domain into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Go to the Best by links report
- Set the HTTP code filter to 404 not found
Redirect these pages to the most relevant, current ones. Or consider reviving them (if they’re still relevant).
Google may now rely less on title tags, but our study found that Google rewrites title tags only 33.4% of the time.
In other words, the title Google shows on the SERPs is the same as the page’s title tag two-thirds of the time.
Translation: You still need compelling title tags. But let’s prioritize them for pages that are already ranking high.
Why? Because if a page is already ranking high enough (and therefore actually seen by searchers), a compelling title tag can make the difference between searchers clicking your page versus the others.
Here’s how to find these pages:
- Enter your domain into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Go to the Organic keywords report
- Set the Position filter to 2–5
Some of these pages can be given a boost with improved title tags. Use these tips to make a title tag more enticing:
- Add power words – Power words tap into people’s emotions. Examples include “rock-solid,” “remarkable,” and more. Check this list and see if you can add one or two to your title tag.
- Add parentheses – Parentheses work like the final salt sprinkle in your dish. See the title of this blog post for an example. 😉
- Use curiosity – Curiosity makes people want to click and learn more. But don’t overdo it! Clickbait is bad. So is dishonesty.
Recommended reading: How to Craft the Perfect SEO Title Tag (Our 4-Step Process)
Google anything these days, and you’ll likely come across a featured snippet:
They’re excerpts from top-ranking pages that Google uses to show the “answer” right within the SERPs. The best part? You can often jump ahead to position #1 simply by grabbing the featured snippet.
That’s in theory. In reality, some are easier to win than others, so we’ll want to prioritize those. Specifically, we want to target these opportunities: keywords with decent monthly search volumes where you currently rank in the top 10 and Google already shows a featured snippet.
Here’s how to find these keywords:
- Enter your domain into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Go to the Organic keywords report
- Set the Position filter to 1–10
- Use the SERP features filter to filter for keywords that trigger featured snippets “where target doesn’t rank”
Look through the list to find opportunities where you can potentially capture the featured snippet.
Next, check out what the featured snippet is like. See if you can include or change up the content on your page to make it eligible for the featured snippet. For example, we rank #2 for “google operators” after the snippet:
We can see that the snippet is a definition, which we didn’t include on our page. So we can try adding a definition and hopefully win the featured snippet for ourselves.
Recommended reading: How to Optimize for Google’s Featured Snippets
Help a Reporter Out (HARO) is a free service that matches journalists with experts.
Here’s how it works:
- You sign up for HARO.
- HARO sends you three emails a day with requests from journalists who are looking for expert quotes.
- If a journalist chooses your quote, you’ll (usually) get a mention and a backlink from the site.
It’s an easy way to get high-quality backlinks from authoritative websites.
However, most of these emails will likely be irrelevant to you, so we recommend setting up some Gmail filters so you see only the relevant ones.
Here’s how:
- Click the search options filter
- Set the “From” field to [email protected]
- Set the “Subject” to “[HARO]”
- Set “Has the words” to keywords you want to monitor (you can use the OR operator to list multiple keywords here)
Once the filter is set up, it’s simply a matter of looking at your inbox and checking to see if there are any stories you can be a source for. Make sure to only respond to queries where you have relevant expertise. That’ll give you the best chance of standing out and being featured on these websites.
To boost the rankings of your content that’s ranking decently but can be better, sometimes all you need to do is to give it a quick refresh by filling content gaps.
What is a content gap? It’s basically keywords that competing pages are ranking for but not yours. And sometimes, they’re important subtopics that you did not include in your original post.
Here’s how to find content gaps:
- Enter your domain into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Go to the Content Gap tool
- Add a few competing URLs in the top section
- Add the URL of the post you want to boost in the bottom section
Look through the results and see if there are any subtopics you’ve missed out on.
For example, in our post on evergreen content, it appears we’ve missed out on two subtopics:
- Evergreen ads
- Evergreen content on social media
Sidenote.
If your content is not ranking well at all, then you may want to consider rewriting it.
A content gap analysis isn’t only useful for improving your rankings. It’s also useful for finding keywords your competitors are ranking for but you aren’t.
Do the same as the above tactic. But this time ‘round, fill in your competitors’ homepages (or blogs if you’re specifically targeting informational content) in the top section and your homepage (or blog) in the bottom section.
Look through the list and see if there are any relevant keywords you can target.
Because of the presence of competition, some keywords are harder to rank for and some are easier. You should be on the lookout for keywords that have lesser competition so you stand a higher chance of ranking.
Here’s how to find these keywords:
- Enter one or a few relevant keywords into Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer
- Go to the Matching terms report
- Set the Keyword Difficulty (KD) filter to a maximum of 10
Look through the list and pick out those that are relevant for your site.
The Google Business Profile is a local listing with information about your business. After claiming it, the information you add can show up in Google’s web search results and in Google Maps.
If you’re a local business, this is especially important. In fact, many SEOs think it’s the most important ranking factor for local SEO.
Claiming your Google Business Profile is pretty easy, and you can do it in 30 minutes (or less). Follow the step-by-step guide below:
Recommended reading: How to Optimize Your Google My Business Listing in 30 Minutes
A table of contents links to important subsections of your post and helps visitors find the information they’re looking for.
Here’s an example from our SEO mistakes post:
Adding a table of contents can often trigger sitelinks, which can potentially help you win even more organic clicks.
Our table of contents is custom-coded, but yours doesn’t have to be. You can use a free plugin like Easy Table of Contents to add a table of contents to any of your posts.
When you’re researching a topic, you’ll probably come up with more related questions you want answers to. Other people are the same as well.
For example, if we search for “kefir grains” in Keywords Explorer and switch to the Questions tab, here’s what we see:
By not answering all of these questions in your post, you’re likely missing out on long-tail traffic. So rather than shoehorn these questions unnaturally in your post, the easiest solution is to add a FAQ section at the end of your post.
Because we answered a common question related to H1 tags—the length—we now rank on Google when people are searching for this answer:
Recommendation
Mark up your FAQs with structured data, and your page may be eligible for a rich result. This gives you more SERP real estate and may lead to more traffic.
Recommended reading: Mark Up Your FAQs With Structured Data (Google)
Guest blogging is an important link building technique. In fact, Aira’s State of Link Building report lists guest blogging as the third most popular technique:
But finding good guest blogging opportunities can be a chore. So here’s how you can find good ones fast:
- Find a prolific guest blogger in your niche and identify their Twitter account
- Enter the URL of their Twitter account into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Go to the Backlinks report
This list will show you all the sites that have linked to their Twitter account—some of which are guest blogs. Go through each site and see if it is a relevant guest blogging opportunity for you.
If a website is linking to a few of your competitors but not you, then it’s reasonable to assume they may be willing to link to you too.
Here’s how to find these opportunities:
- Enter your domain into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer (set it to Exact URL)
- Go to the Link Intersect tool
- Add a few competing homepages in the empty fields (set them to Exact URL too)
Look through the results to see if there are any links you can potentially replicate.
For example, the website below links to two of our competitors. If we look at the links, we see that they’re both podcast interviews.
Given that this host has interviewed two of our competitors, they may be interested in interviewing us too.
According to our study, the average #1 ranking page will also rank in the top 10 for nearly 1,000 other relevant keywords.
Most of them will be different ways of searching for the same thing. However, some of them will not be. And if you can target these long-tail keywords with a separate article, you can potentially rank higher for them.
We did this recently on the Ahrefs blog. We noticed that we were ranking for the keyword “on page vs off page seo” with our post on off-page SEO. But we were only ranking in the lower positions (30+) for that keyword.
So we decided to create a page more targeted toward the query.
Doing that shot us to position #1:
How do you find these keywords where you should create a better page? Here’s how:
- Enter your domain (or blog) into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Go to the Organic keywords report
- Set the Position filter to minimum 20
Look through the report, manually analyze each keyword, and see if you can better target them with a new article.
Learn more
Looking for more tactics that can boost your rankings on Google but aren’t necessarily “quick” wins? Check out these articles:
Did I miss out on any quick SEO wins? Let me know on Twitter.
SEO
How To Write ChatGPT Prompts To Get The Best Results
ChatGPT is a game changer in the field of SEO. This powerful language model can generate human-like content, making it an invaluable tool for SEO professionals.
However, the prompts you provide largely determine the quality of the output.
To unlock the full potential of ChatGPT and create content that resonates with your audience and search engines, writing effective prompts is crucial.
In this comprehensive guide, we’ll explore the art of writing prompts for ChatGPT, covering everything from basic techniques to advanced strategies for layering prompts and generating high-quality, SEO-friendly content.
Writing Prompts For ChatGPT
What Is A ChatGPT Prompt?
A ChatGPT prompt is an instruction or discussion topic a user provides for the ChatGPT AI model to respond to.
The prompt can be a question, statement, or any other stimulus to spark creativity, reflection, or engagement.
Users can use the prompt to generate ideas, share their thoughts, or start a conversation.
ChatGPT prompts are designed to be open-ended and can be customized based on the user’s preferences and interests.
How To Write Prompts For ChatGPT
Start by giving ChatGPT a writing prompt, such as, “Write a short story about a person who discovers they have a superpower.”
ChatGPT will then generate a response based on your prompt. Depending on the prompt’s complexity and the level of detail you requested, the answer may be a few sentences or several paragraphs long.
Use the ChatGPT-generated response as a starting point for your writing. You can take the ideas and concepts presented in the answer and expand upon them, adding your own unique spin to the story.
If you want to generate additional ideas, try asking ChatGPT follow-up questions related to your original prompt.
For example, you could ask, “What challenges might the person face in exploring their newfound superpower?” Or, “How might the person’s relationships with others be affected by their superpower?”
Remember that ChatGPT’s answers are generated by artificial intelligence and may not always be perfect or exactly what you want.
However, they can still be a great source of inspiration and help you start writing.
Must-Have GPTs Assistant
I recommend installing the WebBrowser Assistant created by the OpenAI Team. This tool allows you to add relevant Bing results to your ChatGPT prompts.
This assistant adds the first web results to your ChatGPT prompts for more accurate and up-to-date conversations.
It is very easy to install in only two clicks. (Click on Start Chat.)
For example, if I ask, “Who is Vincent Terrasi?,” ChatGPT has no answer.
With WebBrower Assistant, the assistant creates a new prompt with the first Bing results, and now ChatGPT knows who Vincent Terrasi is.
You can test other GPT assistants available in the GPTs search engine if you want to use Google results.
Master Reverse Prompt Engineering
ChatGPT can be an excellent tool for reverse engineering prompts because it generates natural and engaging responses to any given input.
By analyzing the prompts generated by ChatGPT, it is possible to gain insight into the model’s underlying thought processes and decision-making strategies.
One key benefit of using ChatGPT to reverse engineer prompts is that the model is highly transparent in its decision-making.
This means that the reasoning and logic behind each response can be traced, making it easier to understand how the model arrives at its conclusions.
Once you’ve done this a few times for different types of content, you’ll gain insight into crafting more effective prompts.
Prepare Your ChatGPT For Generating Prompts
First, activate the reverse prompt engineering.
- Type the following prompt: “Enable Reverse Prompt Engineering? By Reverse Prompt Engineering I mean creating a prompt from a given text.”
ChatGPT is now ready to generate your prompt. You can test the product description in a new chatbot session and evaluate the generated prompt.
- Type: “Create a very technical reverse prompt engineering template for a product description about iPhone 11.”
The result is amazing. You can test with a full text that you want to reproduce. Here is an example of a prompt for selling a Kindle on Amazon.
- Type: “Reverse Prompt engineer the following {product), capture the writing style and the length of the text :
product =”
I tested it on an SEJ blog post. Enjoy the analysis – it is excellent.
- Type: “Reverse Prompt engineer the following {text}, capture the tone and writing style of the {text} to include in the prompt :
text = all text coming from https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-bard-training-data/478941/”
But be careful not to use ChatGPT to generate your texts. It is just a personal assistant.
Go Deeper
Prompts and examples for SEO:
- Keyword research and content ideas prompt: “Provide a list of 20 long-tail keyword ideas related to ‘local SEO strategies’ along with brief content topic descriptions for each keyword.”
- Optimizing content for featured snippets prompt: “Write a 40-50 word paragraph optimized for the query ‘what is the featured snippet in Google search’ that could potentially earn the featured snippet.”
- Creating meta descriptions prompt: “Draft a compelling meta description for the following blog post title: ’10 Technical SEO Factors You Can’t Ignore in 2024′.”
Important Considerations:
- Always Fact-Check: While ChatGPT can be a helpful tool, it’s crucial to remember that it may generate inaccurate or fabricated information. Always verify any facts, statistics, or quotes generated by ChatGPT before incorporating them into your content.
- Maintain Control and Creativity: Use ChatGPT as a tool to assist your writing, not replace it. Don’t rely on it to do your thinking or create content from scratch. Your unique perspective and creativity are essential for producing high-quality, engaging content.
- Iteration is Key: Refine and revise the outputs generated by ChatGPT to ensure they align with your voice, style, and intended message.
Additional Prompts for Rewording and SEO:
– Rewrite this sentence to be more concise and impactful.
– Suggest alternative phrasing for this section to improve clarity.
– Identify opportunities to incorporate relevant internal and external links.
– Analyze the keyword density and suggest improvements for better SEO.
Remember, while ChatGPT can be a valuable tool, it’s essential to use it responsibly and maintain control over your content creation process.
Experiment And Refine Your Prompting Techniques
Writing effective prompts for ChatGPT is an essential skill for any SEO professional who wants to harness the power of AI-generated content.
Hopefully, the insights and examples shared in this article can inspire you and help guide you to crafting stronger prompts that yield high-quality content.
Remember to experiment with layering prompts, iterating on the output, and continually refining your prompting techniques.
This will help you stay ahead of the curve in the ever-changing world of SEO.
More resources:
Featured Image: Tapati Rinchumrus/Shutterstock
SEO
Measuring Content Impact Across The Customer Journey
Understanding the impact of your content at every touchpoint of the customer journey is essential – but that’s easier said than done. From attracting potential leads to nurturing them into loyal customers, there are many touchpoints to look into.
So how do you identify and take advantage of these opportunities for growth?
Watch this on-demand webinar and learn a comprehensive approach for measuring the value of your content initiatives, so you can optimize resource allocation for maximum impact.
You’ll learn:
- Fresh methods for measuring your content’s impact.
- Fascinating insights using first-touch attribution, and how it differs from the usual last-touch perspective.
- Ways to persuade decision-makers to invest in more content by showcasing its value convincingly.
With Bill Franklin and Oliver Tani of DAC Group, we unravel the nuances of attribution modeling, emphasizing the significance of layering first-touch and last-touch attribution within your measurement strategy.
Check out these insights to help you craft compelling content tailored to each stage, using an approach rooted in first-hand experience to ensure your content resonates.
Whether you’re a seasoned marketer or new to content measurement, this webinar promises valuable insights and actionable tactics to elevate your SEO game and optimize your content initiatives for success.
View the slides below or check out the full webinar for all the details.
SEO
How to Find and Use Competitor Keywords
Competitor keywords are the keywords your rivals rank for in Google’s search results. They may rank organically or pay for Google Ads to rank in the paid results.
Knowing your competitors’ keywords is the easiest form of keyword research. If your competitors rank for or target particular keywords, it might be worth it for you to target them, too.
There is no way to see your competitors’ keywords without a tool like Ahrefs, which has a database of keywords and the sites that rank for them. As far as we know, Ahrefs has the biggest database of these keywords.
How to find all the keywords your competitor ranks for
- Go to Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Enter your competitor’s domain
- Go to the Organic keywords report
The report is sorted by traffic to show you the keywords sending your competitor the most visits. For example, Mailchimp gets most of its organic traffic from the keyword “mailchimp.”
Since you’re unlikely to rank for your competitor’s brand, you might want to exclude branded keywords from the report. You can do this by adding a Keyword > Doesn’t contain filter. In this example, we’ll filter out keywords containing “mailchimp” or any potential misspellings:
If you’re a new brand competing with one that’s established, you might also want to look for popular low-difficulty keywords. You can do this by setting the Volume filter to a minimum of 500 and the KD filter to a maximum of 10.
How to find keywords your competitor ranks for, but you don’t
- Go to Competitive Analysis
- Enter your domain in the This target doesn’t rank for section
- Enter your competitor’s domain in the But these competitors do section
Hit “Show keyword opportunities,” and you’ll see all the keywords your competitor ranks for, but you don’t.
You can also add a Volume and KD filter to find popular, low-difficulty keywords in this report.
How to find keywords multiple competitors rank for, but you don’t
- Go to Competitive Analysis
- Enter your domain in the This target doesn’t rank for section
- Enter the domains of multiple competitors in the But these competitors do section
You’ll see all the keywords that at least one of these competitors ranks for, but you don’t.
You can also narrow the list down to keywords that all competitors rank for. Click on the Competitors’ positions filter and choose All 3 competitors:
- Go to Ahrefs’ Site Explorer
- Enter your competitor’s domain
- Go to the Paid keywords report
This report shows you the keywords your competitors are targeting via Google Ads.
Since your competitor is paying for traffic from these keywords, it may indicate that they’re profitable for them—and could be for you, too.
You know what keywords your competitors are ranking for or bidding on. But what do you do with them? There are basically three options.
1. Create pages to target these keywords
You can only rank for keywords if you have content about them. So, the most straightforward thing you can do for competitors’ keywords you want to rank for is to create pages to target them.
However, before you do this, it’s worth clustering your competitor’s keywords by Parent Topic. This will group keywords that mean the same or similar things so you can target them all with one page.
Here’s how to do that:
- Export your competitor’s keywords, either from the Organic Keywords or Content Gap report
- Paste them into Keywords Explorer
- Click the “Clusters by Parent Topic” tab
For example, MailChimp ranks for keywords like “what is digital marketing” and “digital marketing definition.” These and many others get clustered under the Parent Topic of “digital marketing” because people searching for them are all looking for the same thing: a definition of digital marketing. You only need to create one page to potentially rank for all these keywords.
2. Optimize existing content by filling subtopics
You don’t always need to create new content to rank for competitors’ keywords. Sometimes, you can optimize the content you already have to rank for them.
How do you know which keywords you can do this for? Try this:
- Export your competitor’s keywords
- Paste them into Keywords Explorer
- Click the “Clusters by Parent Topic” tab
- Look for Parent Topics you already have content about
For example, if we analyze our competitor, we can see that seven keywords they rank for fall under the Parent Topic of “press release template.”
If we search our site, we see that we already have a page about this topic.
If we click the caret and check the keywords in the cluster, we see keywords like “press release example” and “press release format.”
To rank for the keywords in the cluster, we can probably optimize the page we already have by adding sections about the subtopics of “press release examples” and “press release format.”
3. Target these keywords with Google Ads
Paid keywords are the simplest—look through the report and see if there are any relevant keywords you might want to target, too.
For example, Mailchimp is bidding for the keyword “how to create a newsletter.”
If you’re ConvertKit, you may also want to target this keyword since it’s relevant.
If you decide to target the same keyword via Google Ads, you can hover over the magnifying glass to see the ads your competitor is using.
You can also see the landing page your competitor directs ad traffic to under the URL column.
Learn more
Check out more tutorials on how to do competitor keyword analysis:
-
PPC6 days ago
19 Best SEO Tools in 2024 (For Every Use Case)
-
SEARCHENGINES5 days ago
Daily Search Forum Recap: April 19, 2024
-
MARKETING6 days ago
Ecommerce evolution: Blurring the lines between B2B and B2C
-
SEARCHENGINES6 days ago
Daily Search Forum Recap: April 18, 2024
-
WORDPRESS5 days ago
How to Make $5000 of Passive Income Every Month in WordPress
-
SEO6 days ago
2024 WordPress Vulnerability Report Shows Errors Sites Keep Making
-
WORDPRESS6 days ago
10 Amazing WordPress Design Resouces – WordPress.com News
-
WORDPRESS7 days ago
[GET] The7 Website And Ecommerce Builder For WordPress
You must be logged in to post a comment Login