Search Engine Optimization helps your business establish a digital presence. Through content marketing, backlinks, and website content, SEO places your online storefront in view for your target audience.
A strong SEO strategy will position your business on the front page of Google for terms and phrases potential customers are inputting into the search engine. And the more your business can communicate its relevance to these searches, the more your organic traffic will rise. Which means your conversions will as well.
Essentially, proper SEO will illustrate to search engines that your website is valuable to visit for a specific query. Through high-quality blog content, good backlinks, and optimized website copy, over time you can claim keywords of your choosing. However, some keywords are much more difficult to rank for than others.
Nonetheless, depending on the competitiveness of the keywords you’re targeting, you can see noticeable results from SEO tactics within months.
But how do you know what kind of SEO strategy to follow? What’s more important for long-term success versus quick results?
Read on to learn more about SEO, how to distinguish between On-Site and Off-Site SEO, and what strategy is best for your business’ success.
And if you’re looking for professional SEO analysis and implementation, reach out to DGL Media Services. We create unique campaigns to help your business grow. Whether that be through lowering your PPC advertising, developing your business website, or increasing your lead generation, we bring quality solutions to your business that help you scale while delivering meaningful ROI. Let us focus on the backend so you can allocate your valuable time towards building your business.
What Is The Difference Between On-Page and Off-Page SEO?
So how does on-site seo differ from off-site? And should you utilize both to see the best results? We’ll go ahead and answer your question first.
Yes, your business should strive to integrate both on-site and off-site SEO.
But some SEO practices take longer to utilize than others. And there are important things to consider when using both SEO strategies.
Why You Need On-Site SEO And How To Integrate It
In short, on-site seo is exactly what it sounds like. Content, website copy, and elements like metadata encompass SEO that is, well, on your website.
One way to think about on-site SEO, is that it is where search engine algorithms and a user’s web browsing experience intersect.
For example, if a user was looking for an answer to a question online, websites that have content topics centering on the question and answer will appear. Even if the order of the words is different or the phrase is a slight variation, the main keywords within that search query will lead to what Google deems the most relevant content.
If you were looking for more information about “on-site seo”, and you were to enter that exact phrase into Google, the results you see will most likely be blog articles (like this one!) that discuss what on-site seo is about.
It’s important to remember, however, that if you want to see good results from on-site SEO content, your content should be unique to the online space. Nothing should be plagiarized or copied from other parts of your website.
And, your business or brand needs to appear as an authority figure on your content topics. Achieving this through blog content often means that partnering with a professional copywriter or SEO specialist will yield the best results.
Either way, blog content is a powerful tool for raising your SEO. And you’ll see the best results from long-form content, meaning articles that are 1,200 to 3,000+ words. But what’s most crucial to your SEO strategy when it comes to blogs specifically is that while results from consistently posting each month may be slow at first, you’ll see a huge gain to your SEO over the long-term.
Besides just helping you build SEO, blog content actually delivers value to your audience, and often acts as part of your sales funnel.
But beyond content itself, on-site SEO can also entail site elements like the loading time of your site on both a desktop and mobile device.
Slow loading times can hinder your SEO significantly. And with over 90% of the world’s global population using their mobile phones to browse the internet, you should take extra time and consideration to implementing optimal mobile speeds.
Small things like your URL that can be easily changed also impact your on-site SEO. A key detail that is often overlooked are your website’s image metadata. Sometimes metadata for images are auto-generated, or even end up repeating themselves, which can actually cause your SEO to suffer.
Giving unique descriptions for your images on the backend of your website is a quick way to boost your on-site SEO.
Here’s a quick list of on-site SEO for your reference:
- Blog Content (1200+ words especially)
- Metadata and descriptions
- Unique URL
- Load Time Optimization
Why You Need Off-Site SEO And How To Integrate It
Can you guess what off-site SEO is about? In the same way that on-site SEO refers directly to SEO on your website, off-site SEO is everything that is happening off your website and is linking back to your page.
This could be social media, press releases, or other sites referring to your content in their own content.
Off-site SEO benefits your business by communicating to Google that others are finding your content valuable. The more reputable websites are linking to your site, the better your SEO will be.
The same goes for social media. If you bring in traffic from your social media page, search engines begin to recognize your website as valuable to users.
Off-site SEO takes a little more time to build, usually. And the process is a little more complex. But reaching out to other thought figures in your industry to collaborate, or working on your social media presence can yield good results.
One key difference between on-site and off-site SEO, is that the timeline for seeing results is much more varied and dependent on several factors. While you can rise on Google with consistent on-site SEO efforts, off-site SEO can take longer.
The good news is that increasing your on-site SEO can help speed up your off-site results.
Here’s a quick recap of some off-site SEO builders:
- Social Media
- Press Releases
- Link Building
Why On-Site And Off-Site Are Better Together
As it turns out, a well-rounded approach to SEO is the best strategy for your business. While on-site SEO is always a good starting point, increasing your reach and brand visibility requires you to also be casting nets out into the online space.
And if you focus solely on on-site SEO, you could potentially end up with outdated or cannibalized keywords. When cannibalization occurs, search engines don’t know how to rank you for certain keywords since you have a lot of repeated phrases.
Furthermore, old and less relevant content can easily start to accumulate until your content is no longer reflective of your brand. Or helpful to your audience.
However, amassing low-value or paid links can lead to penalties as drastic as removal from Google’s index.
In the end, finding a good balance between the two SEO strategies is the best solution. Take a little more time and careful consideration when you’re building SEO. The goal is often to achieve quality rather than quantity.
DGL Media Services: Your SEO Experts
Building an effective SEO strategy to see the best ROI is a huge undertaking. But when you turn to professionals with extensive SEO experience and knowledge, your business can grow exponentially.
At DGL Media Services, we establish a foundation for a successful SEO plan unique to your business, industry, and goals. Starting with competitive analysis and keyword research, we help your business rank higher on search engines so you can connect with your target audience.
We know how to implement the best on-site and off-site SEO solutions so you can start seeing results from our work within the first month.