Search Engine Optimisation or SEO is a term that is quite prominently used among users trying to build and rank their websites by attracting organic traffic. Especially all the digital ninjas are most likely to be thorough with this term as it is one of the core elements of the digital marketing field. But for all the new learners, here we have curated a fully comprehensive course detailing every aspect of SEO.

What exactly is SEO?

SEO is a vast term but to sum up in a few words, it’s the various techniques that you need to incorporate in your website to improve its ranking on the SERP (Search engine result page). The higher your website is placed in the SERP, the better its visibility and hence more will be the traffic directed towards it. One of its benefits? More the traffic, the better the chances of lead conversion ( A potential customer converting into a customer buying your services).

It is rarely seen that people go past the first result page on the Search engine. Relevant keyword optimization, better user experience, meta description, H1, schema markup, and backlinks are some of the various well-known SEO practices that can help you stay on the first result page.

4 Main Classification of SEO Techniques

• On-Page SEO
• Off-page SEO
• Technical SEO
• Local SEO

You must have read various theoretical definitions of all the above terms but we would like to explain it to you in a rather easy way with a practical example.

Mr. Mahajan opens a new general store called Provision store in a new colony in Faridabad. It’s obvious that Mr. Mahajan wants more customers to visit his store. To achieve that he uses techniques like messaging in the various WhatsApp groups he is a part of and printing an advertisement in the newspaper, highlighting the offers he is providing at his store. Now his son tells him that their neighbor, Pooja is an influencer with 1 lakh followers and they can ask her to come to their shop, make a video and post it on her account.

Later Mr. Mahajan realizes that when people shall come to his store, all the things must be properly organized beforehand. For instance, there has to be one section kept for cosmetics, one for stationary, one for dairy products and so on for better accessibility. He has also put a hoarding outside his store with the name Provision store and its opening and closing times.

Did you realize that all of the above measures taken by Mr. Mahajan are basically SEO techniques? We’ll explain how –

• The WhatsApp messages and newspaper advertisements can be called as a Local SEO technique so that if anyone is looking for a general store in Faridabad, Provision store is at the top of the list. This helps in improving your website’s visibility among the users who search for an XYZ service in the nearby areas.

• Now asking Pooja to make a reel and posting it on her account would result in all of her followers becoming aware of the opening of a new store. Out of her 1 lakh followers, if 5000 people live in Faridabad, maybe 2000 out of those might end up visiting the Provision store. So this is an activity that is done through external resources and hence is called an Off-page SEO technique. Additionally, backlinks, guest blogging, responding to reviews are some other methods of doing Off-page SEO.
• The segregation of all the products in an organized manner in his store is similar to technical SEO. The clear bifurcation of all the data on the website, fast loading of the website, and all mediums like mobile, iPad, laptop, etc friendly websites are some of the technical SEO measures.
• The fact that differentiates the products that Mr. Mahajan is selling from the other competitors and constant emphasis on its qualities is a form of On-page SEO. For instance, if he is selling garam masala, the benefits of his product over the others would result in more customers visiting his store. This helps in making your website stand out from the rest. Some of the examples of On-page SEO with respect to website optimisation are relevant linking, alt text for images, meta tags, header tags, meta description, etc. Furthermore, it is of utmost importance to make sure that your URL has the keyword and is descriptive in nature.

Quick Overview of The Anatomy of Working of Search Engines

The search engine works in 3 steps –

Crawling

This is the first step in the working of search engines. Google sends crawlers to skim through the content of a website by following links and then recording the found information. These crawlers are also called spiders/google bots. This step is done with the motive of exploring new web pages and also to periodically check if the content of already visited web pages has been updated.

Indexing

In indexing, the data collected by crawling is categorized based on URL, text, media, and title to help Google provide relevant results easily for a search query.

Ranking

After your content is crawled and indexed, the most important step comes up i.e. ranking. The ranking is based on various factors that are all a part of the foundation of SEO like –

• Keyword in H1
• Backlinks
• Loading speed
• Mobile-friendliness

What Does a Good SEO Strategy Consist of?

1. Understanding the three main aspects of the working of search engines i.e. Crawling, Indexing and Ranking.
2. Researching factors like –

• Keywords to be added
• Audience requirement
• Analysis of competitor websites
• Search intent (informational, transactional, etc)

3. Implementing techniques like adding content based on the research done in the above point and updating any old content that needs to be improved. You can also consider removing the content that is no longer relevant.

4. Monitoring your website from time to time to prevent any mishappening like falling out of index, slow page loading, etc.

5. Frequently analyzing your website with tools like Google Analytics, Google Search Console, etc.

Lastly, SEO is an ongoing process because the guidelines keep on changing every now and then so one must mold his approach accordingly.

Things You Also Must Know

What is Grey hat SEO?

Just to mention briefly about two main types of SEO that exist — White Hat SEO and Black Hat SEO and there is also a pathway in the middle of it which is called Grey Hat SEO.

White Hat SEO refers to ethical practices being used for the optimisation of the website.

For instance,

• Keyword research
• On page optimisation
• Link Building
• Social media marketing
• Content optimisation

Black hat SEO refers to unethical techniques being used to improve the ranking on SERP.

These include –

• Article spinning
• Keyword stuffing
• Link farms
• Cloaking

So in Grey Hat SEO, one uses techniques that are mostly ethical but along with it also a few techniques which are manipulative and come under Black hat SEO.

Some of the example of it are –

• Duplicate content
• Clickbait
• Paid links

Every business needs to know about the types of SEO so that they can make decisions that align well with the results expected by them from their websites.

Major SEO Tools in the Market

For Ranking

• SemRush
• GA4
• Google Search Console

For keyword research

• UberSuggest
• Google Keyword Planner

For Audit

• Screaming Frog
• Moz

Impact of AI on SEO

AI is a term which is not alien to anyone in the present world. Artificial intelligence indeed has helped in easing out a lot of complicated tasks but we still believe, alone it cannot compete with the authentic creativity of a human brain. One must know how to strike a balance between the two to have a long-term horse in the race.

We can’t ignore the fact that AI has made tasks like keyword research, content optimisation, On-page SEO easier than what it was before. So it’s very important to know where to use AI technologies like machine learning and where to use your own mind’s learning. In the present day, we cannot predict that AI will be a boon or bane but we can say that it might be better if SEO experts instead of competing with it, try collaborating with AI for best outcomes.