All Things SEO This Week & Content Tags
What do you know about SEO? My knowledge would have fit into a thimble. I sought to correct this. This week saw the creation of no less than four posts on SEO from four different angles. Niche SEO, SEO Research, SEO Content Creation, and On-Page SEO. I was in full-on research mode.
You should know by now that if I want to understand the world around me, I am going to dig in. It all started with a question that I was answering on Reddit, no, it was on Quora. The question was (link included). Check out Quora and Reddit if you haven't already.
Which one is better, a multi-niche site or a niche site?
Niche SEO All the WayThis led to the first post - The Key To Connecting With Your Audience Is Mastering Niche SEO.
It has been drilled into us that a single niche is better than a multi-niche blog. Do you believe what you are being told? You should!
And I went on to explain why. So you think that because something is “niche”, it must be insignificant in scope. But many niches represent large, passionate audiences willing to spend money on solutions. I've got a perfect example of this.
Reptile Breeding
How many people would this niche attract and is a niche like this worth considering? Seriously, there can't be that many people right? While it may seem "niche" on the surface, reptile breeding has a massive global following of dedicated enthusiasts.
These enthusiasts spend thousands of dollars annually on reptile-specific supplies, enclosures, heating/lighting setups, live feeders, veterinary care, and, most importantly, acquiring new and unique reptile genetic morphs or species for breeding and collecting purposes. High-end morphs of popular reptiles like ball pythons can sell for $10,000 or more.
Ball Pythons
If Reptile Breeding is a great niche, then Reptiles will garner more attention and be more profitable, right? Nothing is further from the truth. First, your blog on reptiles in general will never outrank National Geographic. When someone wants “general” information, they go where the pros are. Nat Geo will win every time. Have you seen their beautiful photographs? What do you have to compete with that? Stay in your lane and take a shotgun to it like I did! Four posts on SEO this week.
SEO Keyword Research
Niche SEO is a proven winner. Wouldn't it be grand to have a complete SEO understanding? This led me to The Niche Master’s Guide To SEO Keyword Mastery. It seems inevitable. New posts never rank. Google has it out for fresh content. Do you give up? I would hope not.
Take my niche for example. The retirement crisis is real. Forbes is ranking for it. Don't get discouraged, Just dig deeper. New blogs like Setting Points? Well, we better do our research.
My first tip is this: focus on long-tail keywords. While longer, more specific keywords may draw fewer visitors, you will rank up more easily. I started at How to Master Niche Blogging for Retirement. As Partha would say, go ahead and write “How to Murder Your Children & Get Away With It”. Sure it will rank, but who is looking for that? Great point. But knowing some of the kids I know, some of the parents may be looking for this. When they do you got them.
Moving On Up -> Shorten It
But my rationale is slightly different. Let's keep with the keywords and slowly improve our rank up the SEO Tree. How to Master Niche Blogging for Retirement becomes Master Niche Blogging for Retirement, shortens to Niche Blogging for Retirement. I have all of these covered. I am up to Blogging for Retirement. I have a plan and I am sticking with it. I have done the research and will continue to look for angles to exploit. One day I will be right behind Forbes.
I covered Niche SEO and SEO Research. On to post number three.
SEO Content Strategy
Are you pouring your heart and soul into writing, only to have your posts disappear into the black hole of obscurity? You’re not alone. I have been there. The sad truth is that the vast majority of niche blogs out there will never gain any real traction. I bet you would like an edge to make a difference.
Cluster Bombs
Here it is. Follow a strategic content creation tailored to your niche audience. The Hubs will give you a great leg up in organizing your content creation process. Think of it this way, you selected your niche, did the research, and now need a solid strategy to create content. Scattering yourself out about like leaves in the wind is futile. You want to remain focused on creating content in a solid niche lane that is not well represented. This is where Topic Clusters comes into play. Cover your topic from every angle, and let Google know that you have this covered in spades. Everywhere you go, every topic you cover, nail it to the floor. As you write your posts, remember everything that goes on the page to enhance the indexing.
On-Page SEO
The fourth post. Do you know what I mean when I say “On-Page SEO Optimization”? This is where most people fail. The correct answer covers eight distinct things. Can you list all eight of them?
These are in no particular order (yet). I will provide you with a quick top-to-bottom checklist at the end of this exercise.
Most people know:
- Proper Keyword Usage
- Quality Content
- Internal and external links???
Was that a guess? If it was you are correct!
This is where people stop and start guessing. What about you? Do you know the rest of them? If you did, pat yourself on the back. If you don’t, you are like 90% of the niche bloggers, copywriters, website administrators, and anyone else who desires an excellent online presence, but doesn't have one.
Here are the 8 you definitely need to know. I have a detailed checklist with descriptions and definitions on my blog.
- _____URL Structure
- _____Title Tag
- _____Heading Tags (H1, H2, etc.)
- _____Quality Content
- _____Keyword Optimization
- _____Internal and External Links
- _____Optimized Images
For extra credit, you won’t see this one on your webpage. But it is probably more important than what is on your webpage. Any Idea?
- _____Meta Description:
This is not an exhaustive list. But it covers everything that you can control from an on-page content standpoint. If you have installed an SEO plugin like Rank Math, you don't need to worry about all the automated items, as it takes care of them for you.
If you have not installed a plugin yet, do it now. You can head over to my blog to read about all the automated on-page items that a plugin eliminates. Just be mindful of these factors and use an SEO plugin to streamline the process.
There you have it. Four SEO Mastery posts that entail more than you think. Or maybe it was just more than I thought?!? Either way, it was enlightening.
What About You?
Did you already have a solid grasp of these ideas? Do you include WordPress Content Tags in the On-page SEO? I did not. I am considering another post to address content tags. However, I created an AI prompt to update my content tags. DM me if you would like the prompt. But do let me know if you consider tags as part of on-page SEO.
Thanks for reading about what I learned this week.
MrDon
Recent Comments
13
I happen to have a couple of friends who are reptile breeders, so this was pretty interesting, Don!
Jeff
Jeff,
I had no idea until I did some research. I wanted something small, and profitable that did not scale up. If you like this snippet, you will love the complete post on my site.
But do you consider WP Content Tags to be part of on-page SEO?
It is something that you can add in the editor, just as Meta Descriptions. I included Meta Descriptions even though it is mandatory and it is usually auto-generated. But Tags?
Unfortunately, I am behind on a lot of that, but it was still a very compelling article, Don!
Jeff
Yes, indeed, Don! I came here for the excellent webhosting and site support years ago to promote my books, but I might move forward at some point.
I still have a physical business where I live in Kansas, but it has not done too well either.
Jeff
Tim, Thanks for the read. All Things SEO helped me reinforce my knowledge and learn more.
I am back to asking everyone, would you put Content Tags in the category of On-Page SEO?
Thanks Tim. This post will raise awareness of the importance of Tags. But will update my post.
See more comments
Another great and informative post, Don.
I do all 8 of the on-page SEO that you list. This is one of the things that takes me so long to do a post. Looking for or making the best images to compliment my writing can take me a while, too.
I also use content tags. I had read way back that tags are important to SEO. And, I work on my meta tag to make it look like a sentence someone would use in a search that matches my content.
I like your writing, too :)
Teri
Thanks Teri,
I am glad that you like my style and found this post useful.
The On-Page SEO Post caused me to create a prompt to go back and collect the tags for all of my published posts. I was severely lacking in that piece. But they all have tags now.
For all of my images, I use https://designer.microsoft.com/
For images, this is a free DALL-E 3.0 designer from Microsoft. I use it and the Designer Tool for all of my posts.
The Featured Image and the robot hand are DALL-E Creations. The featured image was edited with the Designer to add the words. DALL-E spells like a public school dropout.
It takes no time at all to crank out the 5~7 images that I use in each post.
The rare occasion that I liked both images.