I hear often “SEO is techie and too hard”, but I promise you don’t need to be scared!

If you feel like SEO is a different language, I have a course that guides you through how to DIY it for your Squarespace website, but if you want to go the free route first, read on…

Remember SEO is the PROCESS of improving your website for search engines. It takes time. It isn’t a quick one and done, but if you are consistent, you WILL get leads and clients from your website doing the hard work.

What’s the process for SEO?

1. Keyword research to find keyword phrases your audience is *actually* searching for
2. Optimize your website; Here’s how to update the SEO settings on Squarespace
3. Edit your photos to be SEO-friendly: Here are some tips!
4. Blog consistently; check out this post with my top 7 tips to improve your blog for SEO
5. Get your website to load faster by following these tips

When writing the content should I use the same keyword phrase?

Worry less about using the keyword phrase exactly as you found it and instead write for the people reading it. Search engines are smart! You don’t need the perfect keyword phrase! Just start. SEO is all about trial and error. Test and learn what people end up searching and finding you for and then use those phrases!

What should I look at to measure success?

Organic Keywords – how many times has Google seen keywords on your website (indexing) – my answer? 6,481 (remember I have been posting consistently on my website for 6 years)

Traffic (non-paid) from search engines (My monthly traffic = 6,677 for Sept. 2024)

Backlinks – how many times have people mentioned your website (mine = 1,081)

Domain authority – search engines give you a ranking between 0-100 (mine = 29) – this is a very slow metric to grow (many years)

The goal is to be continually growing with QUALITY! Don’t focus on quantity, but high-quality website content that people truly like. Also think about content you have already written and re-write or fix it instead of writing new content.

You WILL see growth in one of these metrics in 4-6 months (yes MONTHS – it takes time).

Want to check your numbers? You can use Moz’s free domain authority checker or my favorite SEO tool, Ubersuggest’s traffic overview.

Tools for SEO & Keyword Research

Some people classify me as a “SEO expert” and probably think I spend multiple hours a week doing SEO and spend tons of money on tools… WRONG! I literally use just 3 tools and they are all free! Since step 1 for the process to SEO is keyword research, I would suggest using these tools:

1. Ubersuggest to understand your SEO success metrics as well as competitive keyword research.
2. Google Search Console (search engines crawl, search, and rank your content – you can use this tool to crawl and index the content)
3. Google Analytics (track the performance of your website like which pages are performing the best, how people find you, who your audience is, etc.) >> How To Set Up Google Analytics

In summary…

SEO may seem daunting, but it’s a manageable process that involves improving your website for search engines over time, not a one-time task. With consistent effort, such as keyword research, website optimization, and quality content creation, you can enhance your site’s visibility and ultimately attract leads and clients, using just a few free tools to measure your progress.

More Blog Posts About SEO

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