How to Make SEO Work For You

What is SEO and How Do I Use It?
The purpose of SEO is to prove to Google and other search engines that your site (and your business) is a credible, relevant source of information and entertainment. The name of the game with SEO is to optimize your site so well that it lands you in the first 3 search results for a given keyword.

What’s a Keyword?
A keyword is the golden snitch of SEO elements. Your goal is to rank number one for keywords that are relevant to your brand. Customers use keywords to find relevant information that is associated with your business/website.

How to Get SEO to Work For You
SEO is meant to work for you, but it can work against you if it’s not set up properly. Typically people hire SEO specialists like our Santa Rosa SEO team to keep things running smoothly. If you’re hell bent on doing it yourself though, make sure you follow these tips for getting SEO to work for you.

1. Use one primary keyword per page - Google doesn’t like when you stuff web pages with keywords. It sees your game, so don’t bothering playing it.
2. Use Meta-tags and ALT-attributes - When optimizing your page, make sure you write meta-descriptions for each page and pimp out your photos and graphics with ALT-attributes.
3. Take advantage of Title Tags - Your page title shouldn’t be the only title if you want to optimize your site. Use title tags as an additional way to insert your keyword and provide additional information about the page to your visitors. Make sure it’s short, catchy, and memorable. It should also appear on several areas of your website.
4. Remember to use location in keywords - Using location helps to optimize your business for your area, rather than casting a wide net with a vague keyword like “Donuts”.
5. Place keywords in headings and subheadings - Headings and subheadings are prime real estate for keywords. They reassure your web visitors that they are getting what they searched for. This also helps search engines know you are relevant.
6. Act natural - As you write keywords throughout your content, make sure they blend in naturally with the rest of the text. Reading clumsy text that is clearly pointing to the keyword is like listening to your mom drop hints about marriage and babies at a family dinner. It’s not as subtle as you think it is.
7. Optimize each page with keywords - Proper SEO strategy means using a different keyword for each page. Don’t use the same keyword for several pages, otherwise this will force your pages to compete against each other, which is a waste of everyone’s time.

Feeling overwhelmed by this whole SEO thing? We get it. There are so many rules to satisfy both search engines and your site visitors. Sometimes it’s better to leave it to the experts. Get in touch with K2 Santa Rosa Search Engine Optimization specialists for a free quote.

SEO Decisions You Need To Make Before Wordpress Website Development

The Importance of SEO in Web Development - Sonoma County Wordpress Website Developers

Developing a website is the digital version of building a brick-n-mortar storefront from the ground up. Before you break ground, you need a clear blueprint. For your website, that blueprint is your Search Engine Optimization plan (SEO). 

SEO saves you time and money by targeting your ideal audience and improving site rankings. Without SEO, it won’t matter how beautiful or user-friendly your website may be. You can contact to our Santa Rosa SEO experts in Sonoma County for more information.

Whether you’re building a website DIY-style or you plan to hire a professional Wordpress website development company, there are some details to consider when incorporating SEO into the overall website development process. 

1.Keyword Research

You want your website to rank on the first page of Google, and the way to do that is to rank for terms that your users are searching for. Market research and analytics will improve your keyword list so you can optimize content based on these keywords. 

2.Wordpress Website Architecture and Internal Linking

Proper Wordpress website information architecture makes it possible for crawlers to scan your website for credibility and relevance. Site architecture is also helpful for your human visitors, as they can browse your site and find what they need easily. 

The ideal website architecture puts human needs first while also making the site crawlable. You can use canonical tags and redirects (if you have an existing website) to streamline your linking structure.  

3.Website Content 

 Decide what type of content your site will have. Will you have blogs, ebooks and white papers or videos, infographics and large images? Your professional website developers can design your website according to the content that you produce. This is essential for both user-function and overall site performance.

4.Page Loading Time

Gone are the days we would patiently wait for a site to load to get the information we need. Users expect fast website loading time (according to recent research from Google, 1-3 seconds is ideal). A long page load time could lose you leads, but if you have a clean SEO plan and solid website structure your site will load faster.   

5.Security  

Before building your Wordpress site, you will want to decide whether to use Hypertext transfer protocol or Hypertext transfer protocol secure (HTTP or HTTPS). Until recently HTTPS was only a concern for ecommerce sites, but because HTTP sites are not encrypted, it is encouraged to choose HTTPS so all data that passes through this connection is secure. 

6.Responsive Design

As more and more people use their smartphone or tablet to browse the web, it is essential that your website is responsive to all devices types. In other words, your website should be just as user-friendly on a smartphone than it is on a desktop computer.  

7.Website Development and SEO Maintenance

Once the site is live, you will need to track performance, fix bugs and re-strategize keywords when it makes sense. Google Analytics is the most popular tracking software, but Screaming Frog and Big Web Master Tolls work great too. If maintaining your website sounds like a massive headache, it’s better to hire professional Wordpress website developers to take care of updates and keep your site running smoothly. 

Conclusion

When it comes to building a website, the “If you build it, they will come” mentality is only true if there’s a strong SEO plan amplifying the site. Investing in SEO for your Wordpress website will ultimately set you up for a more profitable website in the long run. But, just like building a brick-n-mortar storefront, the website needs effective blueprints and regular maintenance to work well for your customers. 

Need a website that performs as beautifully as it looks? Get in touch with our Sonoma County Wordpress website developers for a free quote!

7 SEO Tips to Improve Your Website Rankings

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is an essential tool for increasing page ranks on search engines, attracting your ideal customers, and establishing credibility online. As Sonoma county’s SEO professionals, we’ve assisted many businesses with SEO and backend web maintenance to save them time and the overall headache of web development.

Some customers prefer that we do everything (which is fine by us, SEO is our specialty!), but other clients have asked to learn the basics of SEO as they add more content to their website.  If you’re preparing to build a website or want to keep up the good SEO work as you add more content to your site, use these SEO tips from the professionals here at K2 Sonoma County SEO and Web Development Services.


1. Choose The Right Keywords - While it’s tempting to try and attract everyone, this is not a realistic method for converting viewers into customers. The more you settle into your niche, the easier it will be to attract the right customers to your website. Whether you have a website already or you’re preparing to build one, make sure your website reflects the specific problem you are solving for your customers.

2. Focus Your Website On 1 Purpose - When a viewer lands on your website, they should be able to understand what you’re all about with a single glance. Keywords can help you do that. As an expert in your field, you’re bound to include other topics related to your expertise throughout the site, but ultimately these are only supplemental to your website’s larger purpose.

3. Include Your Keywords In Prime Locations - Your keyword should show up in your headline, taglines, home page, domain name, page content, and blog categories. This helps site crawlers identify you as credible and relevant to viewers searching for your keywords.

4. Include Keywords in URLs - URLs are another great place to insert keywords. You should be able to edit your URLs before you publish the page, however this is not advised if the page is already published, as it can lead to broken links through the site.

5. Take Advantage of Alt Text - Did you know you can optimize your images? When you’re using a Wordpress site, you have the option to include a keyword in the Alt text of the image. This can help increase your SEO status for the page.

6. Take Advantage of Internal Linking - Once viewers land on your site, the goal is to keep them there. The best way to ensure this is to link pages to one another through internal linking. Link important articles and other pages to your home page so viewers are able to easily navigate through your site and gain more value from you.

7. Keep Up With Website Updates - Wordpress websites update frequently, and it is extremely important you stay consistent with your updates. Sometimes when website updates occur, information on the site can get messed up, so you need to make sure everything still looks good from the front-end as well. If you don’t want to deal with this, it’s best to hire a web developer to maintain the backend of your website for you.

Feeling overwhelmed with SEO? Give K2 Sonoma County SEO services a call to take care of it for you.

The Real Difference Between Web Designer and Web Developer

People often confuse web designers and web developers, which can result in some major problems if business owners ask for certain deliverables that don’t line up with the professional’s expertise. Before you put up a job posting for a web designer or web developer, know what you’re looking for so you attract the right professionals.

The Main Differences Between Web Designers and Web Developers

The Role of Web Designers - Web designers use graphic design to create the overall look for the website, landing page and other web elements. Their designs become functional with the help of coding. Web designers often also work as graphic designers for branding, printed pieces and other graphic marketing materials.

Web designers often work in advertising agencies and creative houses or as freelancers. They often work alongside developers and copywriters to produce full scale marketing collateral.

The Role of Web Developers 

 

Web developers are often able to do many of the tasks that web designers can do, but they can also do more on the technical side of things. However, web developers are able to build websites from scratch, working with codes like Javascript, CSS and HTML. Web developers can put web designer’s work into action on websites and other digital platforms.

Web developers are typically more analytically inclined than web designers, having backgrounds in computer science and programming.

How Web Design And Web Developers Work Together

 

Web developers and web designers are often confused because they frequently work on the same projects and, depending on the professional, can have different skills that cross into the other’s expertise (design, coding, SEO). To be fair, the job roles of web designer and web developer continue to blur as they both adopt different skills. You will often see web designers with developer skills and web developers with design skills. Many people in this profession call themselves web designer/developer. However, this only emphasizes the fact that employers should be clear about their needs and make sure to hire a professional with the specific skill set they are looking for.

Looking for a web designer or web developer in Sonoma County? Contact K2 for a free quote!

5 Reasons to Use Wordpress for your Website Design

WordPress is a content management system (CMS) and blogging platform used by 24% of website owners across the globe. But why is WordPress so popular? There are many other CMSs out there, including Shopify, Wix, Weebly, Squarespace, Jumla, and Drupal. With our experience as Santa Rosa WordPress Website Designers, we’ve had clients start with one platform only to get frustrated and switch over to WordPress. When you boil it down, WordPress is the most human-friendly platform. And not just business owner humans, web designers too! If you ask any credible web designer about WordPress, they will probably sing these 5 praises. 

It’s extremely easy to use. From software updates and SEO to the design and content editing, WordPress is is incredibly easy to understand, even when you have a bunch of people with various WordPress competency levels working on the site simultaneously. It’s also very manageable for the one-man-show running everything on his own, if he has the right plugins. WordPress Web design is the easiest way to bring your dream website to life.

WordPress is the bridge between search engines and humans. WordPress is hands down the best platform for websites that need SEO (that’s all websites). The backend is user-friendly and comes equipped with measurement tools to let you know how your SEO will rank and what you can do better.

It’s the universal platform. We always recommend choosing WordPress on the backend because so many people know how to use it, even if it’s just elementary knowledge. This makes things easier when you hire different freelancers tinkering in the backend throughout the life of your website. WordPress can handle it and communication between you and your web development or creative team is likely to be easier. You won’t have to teach a designer or copywriter how to use WordPress.

You have more creative flexibility. Whether you want an opt-in to pop up as your viewers hover over the exit button or a beautiful slideshow of your best work, there’s a plugin for that. You have the ability to optimize your pages, add call to actions that link to your email marketing platform, embed forms, and even make your website load faster.

WordPress is massively supportive and secure. Over the 10 years since its launch, WordPress has gained an incredible amount of support from users, developers, and designers. This community is responsible for making all these plugins and maintaining the usability  on the platform. WordPress also stays current on updates and always informs you when another update is due. Many people who use WordPress as their CRM use WP Engine to host their site. This is a very secure hosting service and offers outstanding integration options.

Interested in designing your site with WordPress? Call our Santa Rosa WordPress Website Design team to set up an introductory call and receive a free quote.