007: 7 Simple Steps to Boost Your Website Traffic with SEO

In this episode of The Website Success Show, host Jules White shares seven places to focus your attention to improve your website's organic visibility and attract more visitors.

Jules emphasizes the importance of understanding why your website matters and how increased traffic can translate to more sales and email signups. She guides you through the process of identifying your target audience, aligning your content with their search intent, and conducting keyword research to discover untapped opportunities.

Key Takeaways:

• Think about why organic visibility matters: Understand the impact increased website traffic can have on your business goals.
• Focus on your audience: Create content that addresses their needs and solves their problems.
• Align your content with search intent: Use keyword research to understand what your audience is searching for and tailor your content accordingly.
• Establish content pillars: Organize your content into key topic areas to build authority and expertise.
• Optimize your content for search engines: Learn where and how to strategically incorporate keywords into your website and content.
• Build your authority and expertise: Share your knowledge and experience to establish yourself as a trusted resource.
• Bring it back to your domain: Make sure all your content leads back to your website to maximize traffic and conversions.

Tune in to this episode for practical tips and strategies to enhance your website's SEO and drive more traffic to your business.

Bonus Resource: Download Jules' free SEO getting started checklist here 

Get your free website SEO report here at The Website Success Hub and start making changes for a more sustainable marketing strategy!

Transcript

AI-GENERATED TRANSCRIPT - MAY CONTAIN ERRORS

Introduction and Importance of Website Traffic

So this morning, this morning, this afternoon now, where's today going? I wanted to talk about the seven things to focus on to get more traffic to your website.  So the first thing I was, I was sort of sitting down and thinking about this earlier today.

Understanding the Value of Organic Visibility

The first thing that I came up with is it's really important to think about your website and think about why organic visibility matters. So why does your website matter to your business? I think it's something that We, it can often get put on the back burner that we forget about the power of our website and how much of a difference it can make as well.

You know, it can really make a big difference to the amount of sales that we're making, the amount of email signups that we're getting, and essentially can make a massive difference to the success of our business.

So number one, think about why it matters to you. Definitely.  What does getting more visitors to your website mean for your business?

So what does, if you get more traffic coming to your website, what does that mean for your business? So more traffic can mean more email signups. If your website is set up for people to actually convert and take the action that you want them to take, then that essentially that's what that will mean. It will mean that you can get more people on your email list.

Which then means they're in your world. You can nurture them. You can build that relationship with them and then get more sales. So send them back to your website from your email list to make more sales. And hopefully before that, before they even get on your email list, that they come to your email list because they're buying from you.

So.  That's the goal really is that if you can have your website set up where it does that job for you of actually nurturing people or just being that right solution right at the moment, they're looking for it. And that's where the organic search can really make a big difference. So if you're connecting with people right at the moment, they're searching for what you do, then.

You can make a sale straight away. So that's why that's, that's really important. So just thinking about that, thinking about what, you know, what is the most important thing when you're  thinking about your website and what it needs to do for your business. And what it can also do is then your website, even if they don't come in and immediately buy from you, or they don't join your email list straight away.

So you don't, you're not nurturing them there. Just having the right content on your website can make a massive difference so that people are.  Getting to know you and actually getting to trust you before they even join anything, join your list or buy from you or anything. 

Focusing on Your Audience

Number two is focus on your audience.

So thinking about who you're selling to, thinking about how, what you, what you sell and how it makes their life better, what problem it solves for them.   is a, is a key thing to think about before you think about anything else around creating content for anywhere, whether that's content for your website or content for social media or anywhere else.

If you can  think about that person and think about creating your content from that point of view, then that makes a massive difference as well. So think about when somebody is  typing something into Google or any kind of search engine or AI or anywhere, whenever somebody is typing something in, when they're looking for a solution to their problem, then what is the intent of that?

So what are they actually looking for? And how can you align that page that they come into on your site? How can you align that with your content? And whenever you're creating content, always think about the user first. So thinking about,  , What kind of content are they looking for? What solution are they looking for?

And how can the content you're creating help them with that? So that doesn't necessarily mean just creating content, like delivering information or creating content for free. It can also mean  that the content you're creating  is solving their problem and how, how can what is on the page helps them along that journey of understanding that what you're selling, if, if you're, if they're coming into a sales page, how can they understand what you're selling on that sales page is going to make their life better.

So how can you help them along that buyers journey of understanding how your solution solves their problem and is the best solution for them because what you're selling you, you know, you believe in that, that what you're selling is going to help people. So how can you help them to get to that decision as well?

And whether that is knowing, they already know that they've got a problem. So they are looking for a solution to buy right at this moment, which ideally that's the kind of keywords we want to go after. If we are, if we are thinking about people coming into our website through search that they're great keywords to go after the ones where people are already know, know they need a solution to their problem.

They know that  your solution is the kind of thing they're looking for.  That's where we can optimize our sales pages around that,  but also for the people that don't know that yet. So what content can you create for those different stages of that buyer journey that can help to lead them along that journey and help you then be their trusted guide to help them along the way so that they understand they have, have this problem and they need a solution and you're.

Product or your service or whatever you're offering will help that. So definitely think about that first, before you start thinking anything further around content creation or, um, optimizing for SEO or anything. 

Aligning Content with Search Intent

Number three is aligning the content you're creating with what people are looking for. And this is the key.

Well, the,  the big thing around. SEO is for me anyway,  you're already creating content. How can you make the most of it? So we're out there creating all this valuable stuff, often for social media that then just disappears into the ether or creating stuff for our podcasts and then not bringing it back to our own website and our own domain and,  aligning that with what people are actually searching for.

So we, we can end up talking about the same things and we should be talking about the same things over and over again. But if we can then work out, okay, what's the most important  Topics around that and align our content to how people are, are actually searching. Then that  is so valuable in our business.

And the way that we do that, the way that we align our content with what people are actually searching for is.

Keyword Research and Content Planning

Through doing some keyword research and don't run away. It doesn't have to be this big thing and it doesn't have to be a big monster, but even just some basic keyword research can help us when we're, whenever we're creating any content.

And this isn't just about our website. This isn't just about SEO  doing keyword research can help with our whole business. So we can think of this. If you don't like the term keyword research, think of it as market research. It can really help us to understand. What people are looking for, the demand for what we're selling.

And even if  you start out and you, and it makes you think,  okay, people aren't looking for this. Then it can give us that, that shift. So it can either give us a big lift. I had this yesterday where I was looking at some keywords around SEO  and there's been a massive increase from this time last year, a massive increase on the amount of people that are searching for SEO for website optimization or SEO optimization for websites. I think it was. And it, this time last year, it was like 3000 people a month searching for that. Last month, , it was 18, 000 people and that makes a massive difference  when I get a lot of industry stuff saying there's less demand or that things are changing or SEO is dead and all this kind of thing that you do, it does chip away at you there when you hear this kind of stuff. And then you look at the facts of actually no, more and more people want some help with the SEO at the moment and want to use SEO as a way to make the most of all of this content that we're creating.

We're all creating this content for social media and other places. And the reach of it and the results from it just aren't what we want 'em to be. So people are looking for it. And it does, it gives you a lift. Suddenly you can see this little nugget of something that you can, you can start using within your business.

Not that I'm going to be using. SEO optimization as trying to rank for that, because my small business is not going to show up on the front page of Google or the first page of Google or wherever  for that term,  but it does mean that there's opportunity there. So it can be that it is a, the keyword research can give you a lift, or it can just give you a little nudge in a direction.

Different direction. And that might only be a different direction around the language you're using around what your customers are looking for, or it could be that you find an emerging trend that you can then get ahead of the curve with that and create some content around this emerging trend. Search term or search trends, and that can be really valuable in your business.

And as I say, it can just be that, that little course correction that it gives you just from understanding what people are searching for the volume of people that are searching for it and what the nuances around that are as well, really. And you can work it out in your customer's language as well. So that's how it can be really helpful.

If you're looking at. The search engine. So if you just literally start off with some research of typing some terms into Google and see what comes up, see what comes up in the people also ask section, see what comes up in the,  this, the suggestions. So as we typed out, as we start typing, we can see what Google is already associating with those terms and  what there's the potential is there for other topics around our main topic there really.

And  a big part of this is being organized with the content we're creating as well. So making sure that what we are creating.  Is put together in a way that people can find it easily. People can navigate your website easily and  not having everything competing against itself as well within our own content.

So we understand what our key.  Articles are our key content is and how to serve that up as the best results for the search engines such as Google. And I'm still talking more about general search engines because it, whether it is Google, whether it's the podcast player apps that you're optimizing for, whether it's AI that you're starting to think about optimizing your content for.

And I think a lot of people are kind of focusing on that at the moment of actually, okay, I need to, I need to organize or I need to optimize rather for. AI, but if you haven't put the basics of SEO in place, then you're not going to be showing up on AI just because you try and do some tricks. I guess this is kind of the, that SEO thing of bringing it back to trying to work the algorithm and trying to like trick the system.

Whereas actually the best thing to focus on is just creating content that people are going to want to read and use and find helpful and not trying to game the system really. 

Content Pillars

Number four is thinking about your content pillars. So thinking about your business as a whole and the, the  key topics, the seed keywords, you could call it that.

It's essentially what are the things that your business talks about? What are those broad terms that your business talks about? So for my business, the main thing that I want people and Google to understand about my business is that it's about websites. So it's all about making websites better. And within that I have the topics of SEO and conversion rate optimization and content organization.

And so those are the things that those are the kind of the big areas where I can kind of put my content into those kinds of buckets. And there's lots of overlap between them and there will be other things that I'm talking about as well. But those are kind of my areas where this is, these are the important things that I need to get across on my website.

So that helps people and. The bots that are ranking our content helps them to understand what my content's about.  And it's not, again, I'm not going to be ranking for those terms. I'm not going to be showing up on the first page of page of Google for the term SEO, unless somebody is literally, you know, it's a local search and somebody happens to be next door or something.

But I can look for again, those, those. Longer keywords that I can try and rank for within that.  It just organizes my content so that I know where things go in the, in the, in the buckets and I can create more content around that so it helps me to then become an authority on those topics, even if it's not directly trying to rank for those particular terms.

But what it means I can then do is create cornerstone content around that so. That's where the, I, I create some key articles around those main topics. And this is what you can do in your own business, obviously, is create some key art, create key articles around those cornerstone topics that everything else that you create then links back to and links out from as well.

So those become almost like the cities within your, if you think of your content as a map, those are the cities. And there's lots of towns that then link in and out from there. But those are the main places. Those are the ones that are going to get the most amount of traffic that are going to probably generate the most amount of traffic for your whole website, realistically, really.

So you can use this content plan as well. If you, if you're creating a content plan, so you're starting to think about these topics, starting to think about the subtopics within that, that you need to create to create this plan, and you can use it in lots of different places as well. So you can use it, obviously, to create.

Content for your website. You can use it to create content for your landing pages as well. And. If you missed last week's episode about , what the difference is between websites and landing pages, then go and check that out. Um, essentially what I was saying was, it's not, not really a difference. They're all web pages, basically.

So whether you call it a landing page, sales page, website, whatever you call it, they're all just landing pages. So  you can use it around that, use your content plan to, so that everything you're creating for your website is planned and is strategized and you, you know why you're doing it essentially.  You can use it within your podcast plan as well.

So when you're planning episodes for your, your podcast, when you're planning your blog topics that you want to create,  or your blog articles that you want to create, then you can use it for that as well. And it's really important for that. And then also you can use it for your social media as well.

So if you're, if you're using social media, making the most of it and having that as part of that main content plan that you are creating content specifically with that plan in mind. And then you know where your social media content is , bringing people back to your website.  And , the other good thing of doing it that way as well, is that then those social media posts don't just stand there as a standalone post.

They're posts that then you can repurpose, you can use them over and over again, and they will always bring people back to your website. Always be relevant because they're about your core topics. And that's one of the big things on building a sustainable business is that you can then make sure that you're not just creating posts for the sake of it, that then just disappear and don't do anything really for your business.

And the thing I would say about those number three and number four about keyword research and establishing your content pillars and getting that content plan is they're very much interlinked.

And you may find it's better to start off thinking about your content pillars before you start doing some keyword research. And I definitely would say to do that, just at least have a rough idea of those main things that your business talks about. And maybe that's talking about what you sell. Maybe that's part of your content pillars.

I would say to try and at least try and get your content into three to sort of five main topic areas, and then break it down within that. So like for me with within SEO, I would then be talking about SEO, SEO for podcasts, SEO for websites, SEO for blogs.  Those different sort of areas, really. So I would  interlink the two.

So, and  doing some keyword research with those content pillars in mind will make it a lot easier as well, but it may also, when you do your keyword research, that may then make you adjust those content pillars that you're thinking about anyway.

So then where to optimize for

Optimizing Your Content

that's number five.

If you're creating this content, and I think this is the big thing, is if you're creating content anyway, just a little bit of optimization can make a massive difference. And it's something where  often  I'm asked when I do, if I do any podcast interviews and things like that, one of the questions that I'm often asked is what's the big mistake that people make around SEO.

And I think my biggest answer to   that question and I stand by really is just ignoring it. I think that's the thing is we're all out there creating this content and actually just by ignoring SEO, we're just missing out on such a fantastic opportunity. I was talking with somebody yesterday about the fact that there's so many big names out there who.

don't do anything with their SEO from outside appearances anyway. So obviously I've got tools that I can look at how people's websites are doing for organic traffic. And I look at them, I think, Oh my God, there's so many opportunities there where they could Just a little bit of optimization, just optimizing a few things.

And actually, if they could then get so much more traffic because they're already known as well, that actually  just by optimizing for some of those key things that they talk about,  I think that, you know, it's a lot of potential there that.  Doesn't necessarily involve investing a massive amount of time.

If you're creating the content anyway, just adding a few strategic places where you actually are talking about that content and making that within, in your content plan, because especially the big names, I'm sure they're creating content plans anyway. So just adding in a couple of extra steps to your.

Standard Operating Procedure, your SOP, of how you, how you actually create that stuff. Make a massive difference, really.

So, where to optimize? So, if you're thinking about where you need to actually put these key terms, so you, you decide you're going to create an article, and you've decided on the key term, or you're going to create a podcast  episode, or whatever you're going to create, basically.

Where do you need to actually optimize for those terms?  One of the big ones is in the URL. So when you're creating a new page on your website, that URL  can be a really powerful place to get your keywords. And it's one of those things that often I hear  it said that it doesn't make that much difference, but I see it time and time again, when I'm doing these keyword research and doing research around websites and how they're doing.

Where this, they are showing up for search terms and it's related to the URL. So there's not necessarily,  not necessarily something where you would expect them to be showing up for that keyword, but because the URL contains it, it makes a massive difference. So I would say if you've already, if you're thinking about.

Optimizing articles for or optimizing for articles that already exist on your website or pages that already exist on your website. Obviously, don't change your URLs, you're going to do a lot more damage, especially if you're already ranking for those terms. If it was an article you wrote, you wrote and you released last week, then yes, maybe you would think about it but Ones that are already ranking or already been on Google for a while may have backlinks that you don't realize about.

Don't start changing those URLs just to get the keywords in there. But for ones when you're creating new articles, definitely have that in mind when you're thinking about creating a new new page and have that keyword in the URL. And with the URLs, you want to try and make them as  natural as possible for humans to read, try and keep them as short as you can, but for it to still contain that keyword.

And you don't need to use the stop words necessarily in there, like for at, and those kinds of things you can take out, but it, that, that makes a big difference. And when you're creating that use dashes between the words as well. So if it was, SEO  tips for podcasters and I was creating a page around that it would be seo-tips-podcasters  I would use for that.

The second place within that is your page title so using that within the page title normally most website builders either give you the option of page title or seo title or something along along those lines. Sometimes web builders have that as two Option so it's worth just checking that out making sure that you are using that correctly using that keyword with in that and ideally you want that keyword front loaded that you want that to be at the front of your page title the keyword about that page.

The page description as well. This is often called meta description and you want that to also contain your keywords. It doesn't have to be towards the front there, but essentially what you're wanting your meta description to do is both or page description, whatever way you want to call it.  is both to entice people to come into that page.

So the page title, you want to try and catch people's attention with that, but it with the keyword, you know, ideally, and with the description, you want to try and entice people in. So help them understand why clicking on that result is the best option for them coming off of a search result page. And when you do that, bear in mind that Google does sometimes change them.

So you do want to keep it relevant for what the content is on the actual page, because if Google looks at that meta description or page description and decides, no, that's not quite what this page is actually about, then it will rewrite them and just take either the first bit of the page or better content or a snippet from the page and put that in there.

So it's, it's. Definitely a good practice to make sure that what you're putting in there also aligns with the content as well.  And then throughout the content is a big thing. So if you're writing an article, if you're writing a sales page or wherever you're writing, ideally about every 200 250 words, you want to try and bring it back to the topic that you're talking about.

And it can be that you then use similes or related terms to do that as well.  So for example, if you were writing an article about dogs, then, and you've got dog as part of your keywords within that keyword, whatever you're trying to run that page for, then you could also then use the word pooch or her pup or fur baby, or something along those lines to then bring it back to the fact that it's about dogs.

And you can use related terms as well that people would also associate with dogs to just help to keep it on topic, essentially.  So if you were thinking about this for a podcast episode that you were creating and how you wanted to optimize for,  keywords, you would be thinking about this in things like your show title and your description, making sure that that's in your show notes as well.

Those, those keywords are in there as well. And ideally then link in that to a URL on your own website, where you're also optimized for the keywords as well. 

Building Authority and Expertise

Number six, nearly there is build your authority and expertise.

So it's really important if we're trying to, to show up as the most relevant and the most, the best, essentially the best article about what people are actually searching for, then we need to build our authority in the search engines eyes, and especially as more AI search engines are coming out.

Even as Google is. Relying more on AI search generated content, then.  it's really important  that it understands why we're trustworthy. It's a big part of Google's ranking algorithm that we are trustworthy and we have expertise, we're an authority on the topic. So this can be really helpful if you're then talking about why you're the expert.

And it doesn't have to be that you're talking about your qualifications or,  your years and years of experience and everything. Think about what your audience needs to understand.  about why you're the expert on a topic. And I've definitely had to kind of battle my own imposter syndrome around this, because especially with SEO,  it's ever changing.

There's always new things to learn, especially at the moment. There's,  it's,  it's tech. So it's, it's, can feel complicated. It can feel overwhelming. And  because  Because of that, yeah, you, you do end up sort of feeling like you don't quite know enough. And so we, when we can end up not shouting about the things that we do know, or not realizing that value of being at the, at the point that you are at in your own business.

But I've, one of the things that's helped me with that is I've,  been on a few panels where I've heard  people or heard SEO experts who have been SEO experts for a long time. And I've heard those people trying to explain SEO and  the host will maybe ask, you know, we'll explain the basics of SEO.

And They'll explain it in a way that to me feels really overcomplicated, sometimes a bit out of day, overly technical. And  I have felt like, you know, I could have explained that better. The question was how, for a beginner, what does SEO, you know, what is SEO about? How does it, how does it work? And I felt like, yeah, I could, I could have explained that better because I'm not 20  years down the line.

I, you know, I. I can understand the struggles. I can understand that, how to explain things in simple ways, really.  So thinking about that, thinking about how does, how do you being in your position, how does that help your audience? And how can you share your authority?

So think about ways as well, you can inspire your audience. So part of actually being that expertise is how you can  Be that inspiration for your audience as well. So talking about the struggles that you've had can be helpful. Talking about the great feedback that you've had from clients as well. So if you, if people are finding your content helpful and you're getting great reviews, making sure that you are sharing that in different places.

So especially on your website and especially sharing that in a way that's text format. So there's the, there's sometimes the, um,  I see a lot on websites actually, where people are sharing.  images of their reviews, but then don't actually have that in a written form. And so that's something that the search engines can't necessarily read.

And they are getting cleverer, but let's make it as easy as possible for Google to understand those key reviews. So if you get reviews that, that really demonstrate your authority on a topic, making sure, even if you just made sure that those ones were in a, in a written format, then that can make a big difference as well.

Also, you can use things like As Seen In, As Featured On, any awards that you've, you've had, anything that actually does help you to, To show you as an authority within your industry. And that's not necessarily, you can add your qualifications in there, but think about what, what do people care about? And people care about those kinds of things.

That's social proof is what people care about here. And if we can then get that across, and that will really help as well with the search engines, understanding that. So with Google understanding that we're that authority, if you've had any PR and things like that, you can also have that here. And with the as seen in and the PR staff, add in details, so if you've had a fantastic PR article, having that as a, as an individual URL on  or an individual page on your website the URL on that has your name- industry award or whatever it is,  or your name and the name of the magazine or wherever you've been featured an article or expert or something along those lines, really, I think sometimes we forget that actually we need to shout about our own achievements on our own websites as much as possible.

Cause it helps Google understand that. And you can use it also across your social bio. So using that in, in your LinkedIn about section or on your Facebook page or those kinds of places as well, just all helps build up your authority across the internet and bring it back to your own domain.  One of the things I  realize that I need to talk about more things like I've been building websites since 2007.

And I don't really have that in a lot of places. I think I've got it on my, I have got it on my about page and I've got it in my bio snippet in my homepage,  but I think I have, I'm not even sure I have now, I'm going to have to go and check afterwards, but things like that, that. You know, I, my background obviously is in beauty and holistic therapy, but I always have done marketing as well.

And I think not. Playing that down for me, making the most of that and really stepping into that myself of understanding. Well, yeah, no, this is, I've been doing Google profiles since back when it was Google plus. And so I think talking about that can really help us to get that authority across as well, really.

So the other thing is, is being a thought leader. So if you have opinions and your own opinions matter, and It might be that  something is happening within your industry that you feel differently about, or that you feel is right or feel is wrong or whichever way, but your opinion does matter.

And so actually getting that across as well. And I think as women, we are often,  our opinions haven't always mattered and haven't, and certainly  they, they don't matter in general  as much as we would like to think that they do in because of the, the amount of men that are in positions of power.  Women's opinions don't matter so, so much or are thought to have not matter so much.

So actually, if we can step up and give our own opinions, then we're helping. We're helping to change the world, helping people to understand and helping you to then get your, you know, get, be that, that inspiration to other women, to other people who need to hear. Different arguments and this will become more apparent.

I think as as more AI comes out and as people are using AI search engines where the, the  AI will will be taking lots of articles and making their own opinion about it, basically. So I think it's really important that we make sure that our opinions are do come across as well and that's why that can also help grow our authority of being that thought leader within our within our own space really.

Bringing It All Back to Your Domain

And then finally, number seven, how can we bring this back to your own domain? And this is really important. So making sure that everything that we're creating, we create content with our own domain in mind first.

So. Thinking about, okay, what can I create on my own website from this piece of content that I'm creating? And ideally you're thinking about that content, you're planning it, you're creating that content, and then you're, you're using that to maximum effect elsewhere. So if you're creating a podcast, you're thinking about, okay, what's the URL that's going to be on my website from this particular episode?

How does that tie in with my content pillars? How does it then Allow me to build that trust and authority. , what query  am I solving by creating this content and make sure that you're sort of planning how you can bring that back to your own website. And then you can circle between your email list, which is how you can then reach out to people.

That is your database. That's, that's your gold in your website or in your business, rather your email list.  You can then reach out to people and sell through your email list, but essentially then your email list is going to circle background to your website. And that's how your customers can not only find you and join you,  but they can make that purchase as well.

So if your website is then set up for optimized for conversions, then that's where you make those sales. So thinking about that, just thinking about how can I then raise my own authority? With my own domain, which is the content that I, I own and no algorithm can take that away from me.  How can you bring everything that you do back to your own website and your own email list, essentially.

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

So hopefully that's been helpful. I just wanted to really identify some of the key places to focus on first. It feels like there's, there's quite a bit there, but it's a lot to digest, but it doesn't have to be. a big monster. So SEO  and getting your, getting more traffic to your website doesn't have to be such a big monster.

And especially if you're already creating content, you're doing the hard part. Creating content is, is really tough.  If you can create it with the long term in mind, as well as hopefully those short term wins. And I think this all will help in terms of  long term and short term.  If you're creating any kind of content with a plan in mind, the chances are you're going to get better results from that because you're just having that strategy and that,  that, that plan around it really.

And then just that little extra step to optimize it to make sure you give yourself the best chance of showing up in the search results for that and wherever that search result might be. Um, then I think, you know, hopefully that that's helpful in terms of just thinking about things slightly differently and thinking about how you can make the most of what you're creating.

So if you want some help with sort of getting started with organic visibility, then head to my website. I've got a free SEO getting started checklist there. If you haven't got that already. It's just literally a checklist to  some of the things to  consider when you're first getting started with this, or if you're, even if you're not, and you just want a little reality check of, okay, I'm creating content.

Am I doing as much as I can to get the most out of that? So if you, if you want to have a look at that, then head to my website and you can get that free checklist there and I will see you soon. Bye.