A Beginner's Guide To On-Page SEO

One-page SEO: Quick Tips Guide

On-page SEO is a key part of improving your website's rankings in the search engines, and this guide will help you understand how to best optimize your webpages for better visibility and higher rankings. Learn about the factors that influence on-page rankings, what actionable steps you can take, and​how to use the SEO tools like Semrush site audit to boost your site’s performance.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

What is on-page SEO?

On-page SEO (also known as On-site SEO) is the process of optimizing content and HTML source code to define clearly what your web page is about and what information it provides.

Certain aspects of your web page that can be optimized include the page title, headings (h1 and h2 tags), URL, text content, meta descriptions and internal links, and others in order to rank higher and earn more relevant traffic from search engines.

What on-page SEO ranking factors should I optimize?

on-page SEO ranking factors

With on-page SEO, you have many different on-page ranking factors. So, you naturally want to optimize all of these factors. Taking the time to optimize each of these factors will improve your ranking in search results and make your website both more competitive and more difficult to beat.

The on-page optimization factors you should focus on here include:

  • The Title tag 
  • URL 
  • Meta description 
  • Keywords 
  • Heading tags 
  • Internal linking 
  • Content 
  • Alt tags 
  • Speed 
  • Mobile-friendliness
  • Images

Here are some examples of on-page SEO efforts you need to do:

  • Writing in-depth, quality content 
  • Optimizing your title tags and meta descriptions
  • Cleaning up your site’s code 
  • Streamlining your site’s navigation 
  • Speeding up your website

How to optimize your on-page SEO

Anyone new to the world of search engine optimization may want to start with the fundamentals. To rank higher in Google searches, the structure of the web page will need to be optimized from both a technical and copywriting viewpoint.

These are the aspects of on-page optimization:

Title

The best authors understand the power of a good title. It's at the top of our on page SEO health checklist and is critical to capturing the user's attention and increasing the page's CTR.

If you want to display your web page in the search engine results pages (SERP), Google needs to know what your page is about. Using specific keywords in the title tag of each page (<title>, </title>) helps search engine crawlers understand your website.

The title should be there not only for users, but also for crawlers. So, make sure you have title tags on your page. Also keep in mind that while the H1 tag and the title should NOT be repeated but it is a good idea for them to be related.

Example, if you are targeting the keyword "One Page SEO Optimization Tool", you can create the following title tag: " One-page SEO Optimization Tool | Company Name". For best results, limit your title tag to 55 characters to prevent Google from cutting it off in search results and use your target keyword at the beginning.

Related Tools

  • On Page SEO Checker gathers information about the correct H1 and title tags and checks the keyword stuffing in them. 
  • Topic Research gives you the most resonant headlines, with the most backlinks, related to your topic.

URL

The URL of your web pages should include the main keyword of the page's topic.

Example, if you want your website to rank for "Top Wireless Headphones 2022", you can make your title "Top Wireless Headphones 2022" and the url slug /top-wireless-headphones.

A tip: avoid putting the year in your URL when you display a product category. better use this only when you want to display a specific product.  

Related Tools

  • SEMrush Site Audit tests the length of all your website URLs, underscores and ensures that none of the URLs have too many characters.  

Meta Description

Your meta description does not directly impact the optimization of your page. But it is a feature that helps users learn more about your page.

A well-written meta description can help you stand out in the SERPs and engage people browsing the results page.

Keywords and related words

Each page of your site should include text content that is about the topic of the page. Typically, smaller businesses will focus on long tail keywords or keywords with 3-4 words.

Keyword research and keyword queries should be collected for each page of your site. The keyword research tools like SEMrush and Spyfu can give you insights into the keywords that people are searching keywords related to your products and services.

Related Tools

  • The SEMrush SEO content template gives you a complete list of all semantically related keywords for which you plan to create content. Also, you get examples of content that top 10 ranking websites put on their pages.
  • SEMrush SEO Copywriting Assistant checks if your text is optimized with your target and related keywords and can connect directly to a Google document, WordPress, or check it within SEMrush.
  • SEMrush Keyword Magic Tool gives you a massive list of keyword ideas based on your single primary keyword.  

Header tags (H1, H2, H3, etc.)

Header tags are convenient to use for search engines and users. Include heading tags throughout your content to break it up and make it more readable and easier for users to read.

You can also add your main or some related keywords to provide search engines with richer context for your page.

Heading tags have to be arranged in descending order from H1-H6, with H1 being the most general heading and H6 being the most detailed subheading.

As an example, a blog post about On-Page SEO might use the following headings:

  • What is on-page SEO?
  • On-page SEO basics tips.
  • One-page SEO guide... etc.

Related Tools

  • SEMrush Site Audit can help you prevent many problems with H1-tags: it will tell you if any of them are duplicated, missing, or abundant on the page. Any of these things can become a problem with Google's crawling robots.  

Internal Linking

Internal linking is frequently an overlooked area when it comes to on-page SEO. But as your site grows, it's critical to develop an internal linking strategy.

That' s because internal linking helps crawlers explore your site, discover new content and understand the context of different pages.

If you don't have time to deep into internal link building, then internal linking can be a good starting point to help your pages get found.

As an example, a blog post about On-Page SEO might use the following headings:

  • What is on-page SEO?
  • On-page SEO basics tips.
  • One-page SEO guide... etc.

Related Tools

Content

Each page of your website has a chance of ranking in the SERPs for specific keyword phrases.

Although search engines absolutely love fresh and original content, they also look for signals such as content quality and relevance, which means creating substantive, well-written content that is relevant and timely for site visitors.

On-page SEO for content turns around using the following practices:

  • Use keywords in headings and paragraphs
  • Divide the content into easy-to-read headings
  • Supplement content with good images
  • Making sure your content uses correct spelling and grammar
  • Make your content reliable and authoritative

Duplicate Content

A study discovered that over 45% of websites had some pages with duplicate content, and 50% of websites had duplicate titles. This doesn't get your website a penalty, but it is a signal to search engines that your website has low or no value to your readers.  

Related Tools

Alt tags

Every time include an alt tag for your multimedia content. In addition to Google, alt tags also help users who cannot see or interact with your content. Using alt tags makes your content easily accessible to everyone who browses your site.

Pagespeed

When it comes to SEO, page load speed plays a crucial factor. It's not even a second: it's a delay of milliseconds that can force a user to close your article and go to another web page.

A study demonstrates that 50% of users abandon a page if it takes more than three seconds to load. Users want to get information fast.  

A quick list of possible points that could slow down your pagespeed:

  • Having a high amount of HTML on the page
  • Redirect strings and loops
  • Uncompressed Javascript or CSS files
  •   Large Javascript or CSS files  

Related Tools

  • Using SEMrush Site Audit will check the loading speed of your website's pages and identify related errors and give you advice on how to fix them. 
  •  Use Google page speed free tool to analyze the load speed of your webpages.  

Mobile Friendliness

Search engines, such as Google, use mobile compatibility or responsiveness as a ranking factor. What this means is that if your site is not optimized for mobile users, you are losing out on valuable leads and revenue.

According to Google'sanalysis, the majority of sites appearing in search results are suitable for mobile-first indexing, and 70% of those appearing in Google's search results have already changed.  

Sure, responsive design and mobile website deployment takes time and effort. It's not a one-day thing, but it's worth every second you put into it.

  • Having a high amount of HTML on the page
  • Redirect strings and loops
  • Uncompressed Javascript or CSS files
  •   Large Javascript or CSS files  

Related Tools

  • Google Mobile Friendly can checks your website compatibility with mobile devices.
  • SEMrush Site Audit can crawl the mobile version of a website and checks for more than 40 potential AMP-related issues.  

Images

Images are important for SEO as well as for users. Images can break up content. You can also provide context, such as for complicated processes or hard-to-describe features. Include images in your content, from stock photos to custom graphics to screenshots.

But images that is too large can slow down the speed of your site, one of the most important components of a good user experience. So, make sure to reduce the size of your image files as much as possible while maintaining a clear image.  

Also make sure to include usability features, such as video transcripts and alt text for images, and include target keywords in alt images.

Related Tools

  • SEMrush Site Audit tests the presence of ALT attributes on all images in the page code.
  • SEO Writing Assistant can check for the presence of ALT attributes in a new piece of content you are writing.