Learn SEO Through Forums

I had someone who was reading my previous entries in my Learning SEO series ask about using forums to learn SEO. I promised that I would write a post about the value of forums in learning SEO.

Back in 1998 I became a moderator of a couple of forums on small business and website promotion on Yahoo Groups. Those lead to me becoming a moderator at Cre8asiteforums, joining forum owner Kim Krause Berg along with a number of other moderators such as Ammon Johns and Jill Whalen.

Cre8asiteforums was (and still is) a tremendous place to talk about SEO and web design and usability and accessibility. One of my favorite individual forums on the site was one called The Website Hospital, where people would bring their site’s URL and concerns about it, and ask questions. That was were I learned a lot about auditing sites, and seeing what worked well on them, and what might need some help. This thread is a good introduction to it: Getting Started in the Website Hospital.

Here’s a thread I started in November of 2005 that was an interesting read, on SEO Myths.

Another forum that I have gotten a lot of value from over the years is one call Webmasterworld. Most of the members of this forum are practicing SEOs or siteowners, who enjoy sharing their experiences. It reminds me of a weather vane, in that people are often open with information about changes that they experience to rankings and traffic to their sites. You can see changes taking place on the Web from what they write.

Another place that can be informative about how search works is the Google Webmaster Help Forum. If you experience problems with a site, it is often a good place to search to see if anyone else has experienced something similar – it is possible that someone has, and the answers they received may help you as well.

There are other forums on the Web that focus upon SEO and Search. I’ve included the ones that I am most familiar with. There were some others that I participated on, that aren’t very active anymore. It doesn’t hurt to start off as a lurker, and learn about the customs and culture of a forum before you start participating in it. You may find some that you enjoy participating in very much.

When I started going to conferences and events after being involved in forums for a few years, I finally had a chance to meet in real life many people whom I had only met in discussions at forums. It was nice getting a chance to do so.

You can learn a lot through forums.

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Adding JSON-LD structured data with Google Tag Manager

You’ve probably heard us talk a lot about structured data, Schema.org and JSON-LD. Schema structured data on your site can result in highlighted search results. In this article, we’ll show you how to implement structured data using the JSON-LD Schema.org markup on the pages of your site. Here, we’ll take a closer look at how to implement structured data with Google Tag Manager.

We’ve just launched a brand new training on structured data and SEO. This training has an introductory price of $119. On July 2, this will jump to the regular price of $149.

Want rich snippets for your site? Try our Structured data training »

$ 119€ 119 - Buy now » Info Structured data with Google Tag Manager

Google Tag Manager is a tool that can take your marketing to the next level without the need of a developer. It’s a tool that can easily add scripts or pieces of code to a page. There are several advantages to using Tag Manager to implement structured data.

For one, you can generate tags, triggers, and variables, which means that you can apply the same code again and again on different pages. For instance, if you have loads of recipes, you can create a tag with the variable “preparation time”, so the preparation time of every recipe will be taken from a recipe page. This means you won’t have to add the preparation time manually to the code of every single page. In the end, this will save you a lot of work.

In addition, Tag Manager features a preview mode, which allows you to check whether you successfully implemented your data immediately. Read the post Google Tag Manager: An Introduction to get started.

How Google Tag Manager works

First, you need to know about three important elements: Variables, Triggers and Tags. You can find these elements on the left-hand side of your workspace. A workspace is a place where you work on creating and adding pieces of code to your pages.

Tags

A tag is a piece of code that can be fired on a page of your website. You can put many things in a tag. For instance, you can add the Google Analytics tracking code in a tag. This tag will enable Google Analytics to track your website. Similarly, you can put your structured data code in a tag. In other words: a tag contains information as to what you want to add to a page.

Triggers

Tags only work when there’s a trigger attached. You need a way of telling Google Tag Manager under which condition a tag must be used, or fired, as we call it. If you have a structured data tag, the trigger tells Tag Manager on which pages to fire that tag. This is because it’s possible that not all your pages need a recipe structured data markup, for instance. Simply put, a trigger tells Tag Manager: “Please fire this tag on these pages, but not on these pages”.

Variables

Variables serve two functions. Firstly, triggers need variables to know whether or not to fire. Suppose Tag Manager runs on your page. If the value of the variable meets the conditions you set, the trigger will fire. This, in turn, allows the tag to work. Secondly, the variable provides Google Tag Manager with variable information. This means that the information can be different in different contexts. A Date Published, for example, will be different for every eBook you publish. If the trigger fires, Google Tag Manager will then fetch the specific value from the specific page it visits.

An example of a variable is the URL of a page, but you can use any element of a page as a variable. It could be an ‘Add to cart’ button, or the H1 of a page, for example. The most commonly used variables are predefined in Google Tag Manager. But things like buttons or the H1 are variables you have to define yourself. With variables, you can edit your code in such a way that it will take elements from the current page to use in a tag.

Adding JSON-LD to your site step by step

We’re going to guide you through implementing structured data on your pages. We’ll take the Schema.org type Course as an example. As stated, we’ll use JSON-LD markup. There are five steps to take:

1. Make structured data
2. Create tags and triggers
3. Create variables
4. Trigger your code
5. Validate and publish

Step 1: Creating the structured data code

Produce structured data JSON-LD code, either by hand or by using Google’s Markup Helper. In this example, we’re using Course markup, which looks like this:

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "Course",
  "name": "Site structure training",
  "description": "Learn how to create site structure for your site that makes Google understand your site and makes visitors go where they need to be",
  "provider": {
    "@type": "Organization",
    "name": "Yoast",
    "sameAs": "https://yoast.com/"
  },
      "offers": {
        "@type": "Offer",
        "price": "99",
        "priceCurrency": "USD"
  }
}
</script>

After you’ve created your markup, you have to get it ready for Google Tag Manager with Yoast’s JSON-LD Script Helper tool. Paste your code and hit Submit. The tool will create a piece of code you can use in Google Tag Manager. Copy it. You’ll need it for your new tag.

Step 2: Creating tags in Tag Manager

You’re ready to make your tags and triggers. Follow the steps below:

• Make a new tag and give it a name (Site structure training, for instance)
• Click Tag Configuration and choose tag type: Custom HTML
• Paste code from the script helper tool
• Check Support document.write
• Hit Save

Step 3: Creating triggers

You need to add a trigger, so it knows when to fire the tag. You can do this on the same screen you see in the screenshot above, or directly from the Triggers screen in the Workspace. Click on the Triggering space in your new tag and choose the correct Page View. Hit Save. Your snippet is now implemented as is (see below for working with variables).

If there are no triggers yet, you can add them on the same screen. If you want a trigger to a specific page, you can copy the relevant piece of the URL and add it to a new trigger. So if you only want to trigger a tag on this page: http://ift.tt/2hzOAEA, you need to copy the part /academy/course/site-structure-training/.

Hit the New or + button to add a new trigger. Give it a name and click on Trigger Configuration. Choose Page View from the list of trigger types and click on Some Page Views. You can now choose when the tag should trigger and which conditions should be met before it’s possible. In our case, we want to trigger the tag on http://ift.tt/2hzOAEA. That’s why we’ll choose Page Path and Equals from the dropdown, and paste the URL into the empty box.

Step 4: Creating variables

Variables make it much easier to implement the same structured data on many different sites. The variables can be found on the left-hand side of the workspace as well. You’ll see all predefined variables. There’s also an option for user-defined variables. To create a variable, click on New. After that, take the following steps:

• Name the variable
• Click on Variable Configuration
• Choose Variable type
• In this example: DOM Element

The fourth step depends on the type of tag or trigger you want to create. In this example, we’ll use a DOM Element. A DOM Element is a piece of your page, like a DIV, HTML and BODY. In this example, the DOM Element is the H1, which is the most important heading of the page.

Once you’ve clicked on the DOM Element, you need to choose which method you want to use to select a page element with. In this case, we’ll use a CSS Selector. By simply entering h1 into the Element Selector, you’ve created a variable that takes the H1 of a page.

If you want to use the meta description of a page, enter meta[name=”description”] and that variable will add the meta description of your pages.

Once you’ve created these variables, you can use them in your tags.

As you can see, you can use the H1 variable for the “name” and Meta description variable for the “description”. Now, the Course Schema.org markup sends the right name and description to Google.

Variables make this method of implementing structured data flexible and scalable. This way, you produce code that can be used in many places, without having to add it manually or change it for every instance. You only have to set up the tags once.

Want rich snippets for your site? Try our Structured data training »

$ 119€ 119 - Buy now » Info Step 5: Test, saving and publishing

You’re ready to test your code. Tag Manager has a Preview mode that lets you test code before you publish it on a live site. Go to your Workspace to activate that mode.

In your browser, go to the page you’re implementing structured data on and refresh. You’ll see the Preview tab appear and this should show you the tags that fired. If you want to know more, you can go to the Window Loaded screen to see if your variables were executed properly. If all is well, your H1 variable should now show the same value that’s visible on the site (the title). Always test your code before publishing!

If all the information displayed on this screen is correct, you can publish your tag. If there are still some flaws, go through the steps again.

To publish your tag, hit the Submit button you see at the top right. Give your version a descriptive name and press Publish. Once you’ve published your structured data tag, go to the Structured Data Testing Tool and enter the URL of the page that should now contain structured data. With this tool you can check if the structured data is implemented correctly:

See no errors and warnings? Well done! If you do see errors, dive in more deeply and read what Google has to say about it.

Want to learn more about structured data? Try our brand new Structured data course!

Read more: ‘Structured data with Schema.org and JSON-LD: the ultimate guide’ »

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How to Alter Your Campaign Values Using Google Tag Manager

Campaign tagging is an important aspect of your analytics setup. It’s one of the critical elements in reducing your dark traffic. But sometimes, the tags on the url don’t pull into Google Analytics perfectly, and require a little finesse on the back end to populate your reports properly.…

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Earn Links from Influencers with 3 Simple Tactics

Have you ever wondered how people get noticed by their idols? By influencers that normal people can only look up to from afar? Well, wonder no more. Here’s a little secret strategy that I myself used when I was just starting out and it’s worked out well for me so far.

Links are undeniably one of the main components of an SEO strategy. It does not matter if it is an external or internal one – your link building campaign is as important as your site’s generated content. The majority of successful SEO campaigns have three kinds of links in use. 2 out of these 3 can be attained by having your content catered to influencers or authoritative websites.

Today, I will be enumerating some tactics that will help you generate the content that you need to have digital influencers and other authoritative sites link to your site or pages. This will also help you gain the attention and boost that you need to reach your goals. Let’s get started.

The Three Types of Links

As an SEO practitioner for many years, I sometimes like to create ‘stories’ or ‘characters’ that I associate with some elements of SEO. In this case, for the three types of links that you can rely on for your content, I sometimes envision them as the Powerpuff Girls.

As I have mentioned before, there are three types of links that can help your SEO campaign succeed. These campaigns are used to help webmasters and SEO specialists earn the rankings that they want. For most SEO practitioners, they try to grow their Domain Authority or to rank some keywords for their pages. Additionally, the three types of links that most campaigns need are as follows:

1. Links from Extensive and High Domain Authority Sites

This type of link could point to any part of your site, and it would be perfectly fine. Here’s an example: You would want Rappler to link to your site for the purposes of having the influence and authority of a link that came from their authoritative domain. Hopefully, you would have numerous links coming from very high domain authority sites.

For me, these links are like Bubbles. They’re sweet and what you see is what you get. I know that this is an oversimplification but sometimes that’s what you need to remember the important stuff. 

2. Links to Pages with Highly Valued Keywords

This will greatly help your campaign if there is also a specific anchor text that is the same with your page’s keyword. It will help boost your individual page’s rankings by having a link that says “mobile accessories” from an external page to your individual page that targets the keyword “mobile accessories”.

These links for me are like Blossom. They’re the leaders among leaders (influencers, in this case) and they are really reliable.

3. Links from Related Authoritative Domains

Whenever you have this type of link, it will provide Google and the other search engines the knowledge of what your website is all about. These links will tell Google that your website belongs to this specific area of influence, and you are topically related to the words and phrases that this area of influence dabbles in. So, you want Unbox.ph to link to your site if you are trying to rank for the most recent mobile gadgets and other mobile-related objects.

Obviously, these links would be Buttercup. They’re tough but they’re a solid foundation that you can always rely on. Anyway, that’s enough of that and let’s move on to the really good stuff.

For today, we’ll only be talking about numbers 1 and 3. These two types of links generally target the industry influencers which may include a large number of people. This number would normally include bloggers, journalists, content marketers, event speakers, and leading authorities of a variety of fields. One thing that connects all these people is that they are all constantly producing content for their respective fields. They are actually not that different from us. They also want to produce the best content that they have, and they need other people to fill in the gaps of their efforts, and that is where you come in. Whenever you notice that these influencers are looking to fill in that gaps of their campaigns, you can take advantage of this and earn some links from them.

Tactics You Can Use

1. Statistics and Data

This may be one of the most powerful tools that can aid you in generating your influencer-targeted content. Whenever you create or collate data and statistics, it can be deemed as unique because you are the only person that has collected that specific group of data. No one else can create and collect this specific set because you can be considered as its one and only editorial administrator. Every person that is publishing content on a regular basis needs this because they can use it to support their arguments, challenge someone else’s claims, and assert something about their field of expertise.

• Why it can help you 
  • Remember the gap that we’ve talked about above? Well, you can use statistics and data to fill it. Whenever the influencers need some statistics that they can use to support their content, the data you have collected might be of some use for them. Normally, the numbers and data that you have incorporated in your content are easy to cite, so you can freely tell the influencers to easily cite the data that you have collected.
• Remember: 
  • The most important thing to take note of is that you have to be visible or searchable whenever they need these statistics. This entails that you should rank for hard to discover keywords such as “statistics”, “graphs”, “charts”, and much more.

This will be challenging, to say the least, because there are only a small number of people that look for these type of gap-filling data. That is why you have to be smart when you are producing a title because it has to be easily searchable. One way you that can ease your title production is through putting yourself into the shoes of the influencers, and start by asking yourself “What would I search for if I was them?”.

2. Visuals

This is helpful because it can fill the gaps that influencers have. If you are a blogger or content marketer, you will need visual content to retain the focus of your audience. Oftentimes, it is easier to just get someone else’s image and to simply cite it in your published content. More often than not, influencers do not have the sufficient time to create their own image which opens new opportunities for you.

• Why it can help you 
  • As mentioned, most of the content generating people do not have time for creating an image which is why they opt to look for pre-made images and cite them. So, when you create an image that they think can be incorporated into their content, then you will fill the influencer’s gaps in content, and earn a link from them. 
• Remember:
  
  • To be successful in this endeavor, you have to be visible in different image search websites that influencers often use. These sites are as follows: 
    • Google Images – the most obvious choice for people
    • Pinterest – Second only to Google images
    • Slideshare – you can make your visuals into some kind of slide format and upload it here. The great thing about this site is that it reproduces some slides to become visuals and posts it in Google images.
    • Flickr – another image search website that a large number of people still use. The great thing about Flickr is that it gives people a Creative Commons search license, and people can use this to require those who get their photo to attribute a link to their respective sites. The Creative Commons license can also allow you to get on other image search websites that require the license – which would mean a larger reach.

3. Controversial Opinions

The last thing that can help you generate influencer-targeted content is to talk about controversial opinions about prevailing beliefs. An example might be “Mobile phones with keypads will be obsolete by 2020 because of reason X”.

• Why it can help you
  • This works really well in the current social setting because most modern journalists or content generators have this prevailing idea that they should create some sort of conflict, and choose a side regarding the current issue. In most areas of influence, this occurrence often leaves a gap in the content published by influencers. By proposing an opposing idea to the conventional belief, you will be able to fill that current gap. 
• Remember: 
  • To be successful in using this tactic, you should rank for mid to long tail keywords in the SERPs. Obviously, this will be challenging, but it is undeniable that this will be an effective “clickbait” that can help in earning a LOT of links.
  • Another important point is to make a habit out of comment marketing in social media platforms. This is to make your brand a known name for your controversial opinions – so that people could endorse you to influencers whenever they look for someone that produces the content that you have.

Key Takeaway

Your SEO campaign will be a hard road to traverse, but being smart and hardworking with it will be the key point in being successful in this endeavor. Always remember that link building is an integral part of an SEO campaign – no matter how hard it is.

Using the tactics that I have mentioned, I do hope that you can use them to achieve your SEO goals. Reaching out to influencers can definitely help you satisfy two out of the three kinds of links that can make your SEO campaign successful.

P.S.

We’ll be hosting the SEO Summit 2017 – an annual event that gathers SEO specialists, enthusiasts, bloggers, business owners, and much more. The speakers of the event will be talking about how people can use SEO to grow their businesses to greater heights. You can learn more by clicking here. 

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New online SEO training: Structured data

If you want your search results to stand out from your competition’s, you’ll need rich snippets. You’ll want to pimp your results with 5 star reviews, stock information or location, for example. To get a rich snippet, you have to learn to implement structured data. Our latest SEO course will teach you exactly how to do just that! If you buy the online structured data course now, you’ll receive a major discount. You’ll only pay $119 instead of $149.

$ 119€ 119 - Get the Structured data training now!

Want rich snippets for your site? Try our Structured data training »

$ 119€ 119 - Buy now » Info Practical course

The structured data course is a very practical course. We’ll first teach you some theory about SEO and why structured data is important, but then we’ll quickly dive into the practical implementation. If you buy our course, you’ll receive lots of screencasts and step-by-step examples on how to implement structured data on your own site. We’ll teach you the fancy (but hard way) to do it, but also the less elegant, quick-and-easy way. Everyone – you don’t have to be a developer! – will be able to get going with structured data after they’ve completed this course.

Watch the first video of the structured data training if you really want to know what this course has to offer:

What does the structured data course contain?

The Structured data training consists of three modules. In the first module, we explain what structured data is and why it’s important. The second module is by far the largest and most important module. In this module, we explain exactly how to implement structured data on your site. The third module teaches you how to evaluate structured data and provides you with some useful tips.

The online course contains 6 training videos, lots of reading material and challenging questions after every lesson. The questions will test whether you really understood the material. We estimate that you’ll spend 8 hours (on average) on our course. You’ll really need to dive into the subject to fully understand this SEO topic. At the end of the course, you’ll receive a certificate and a badge to put on your site!

$ 119€ 119 - Get the Structured data training now! http://ift.tt/2tnp4Y8

SEO basics: What are rich snippets?

Maybe you’ve heard about the concept of rich snippets. SEO experts seem to think everyone knows exactly what rich snippets are. But, for SEO newbies, a rich snippet is a really vague term. What are rich snippets exactly? Time to explain what rich snippets are, why they’re important for SEO and how you can get them for your site.

What are rich snippets?

A snippet is a result Google shows to the user in the search results. An example: I was searching for a good recipe for homemade ice cream and googled it. Google showed me a results list with normal snippets and rich snippets. A normal snippet usually looks like this:

Google shows the title in blue, the URL in green and a description of what the page is about. This is what we call the snippet, the thing Yoast SEO helps you to optimize with our snippet preview.

A rich snippet shows extra information between the URL and the description. A rich snippet looks like this:

In this snippet, a picture of the ice cream is added, you can see the rating of the recipe, the time it takes to prepare this type of ice cream and the number of calories it contains. A rich snippet contains much more information than the normal snippet does. That’s why we call it a rich snippet.

Why are rich snippets important for SEO?

Rich snippets stand out from the other snippets. They look much nicer and you’ll instantly know more, just by looking at them. You’ll know whether other people liked the homemade ice cream and how long it’ll take you to make it. Rich snippets are snippets that have a higher click-through rate. People like to click on rich snippets.

If the click-through rate of a snippet increases, you’ll get more traffic from that search result. Not because your position in the search engine changed, but just because more people click on your result. In the long run, rich snippets will have an effect on your ranking as well. As more people click on your result, Google will notice that people prefer your page above other ones. That’ll definitely improve your rankings in the long run!

How do you get rich snippets?

Google can show rich snippets if you add structured data to your site. Structured data is a piece of code in a specific format, written in such a way that search engines understand it. Search engines read the code and use it to create rich snippets.

Read more: ‘What is structured data’ »

Adding structured data to your website can be quite daunting. But we’re here to help! As of tomorrow, Yoast offers an online training to teach you how to implement structured data so Google can show rich snippets. We’ll show you different strategies (from beginner to more advanced levels), so that everyone will be able to get started with structured data and get those rich snippets!

Keep reading: ‘Structured data with Schema.org: the ultimate guide’ »

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Ultimate guide to small business SEO

SEO isn’t just for large companies. As a small business or local business, there is actually a lot you can do to achieve local goals yourself. Many of these things relate to focus. In this ultimate guide for local and small business SEO, we’ll tell you about finding your niche, optimizing pages and social media efforts.

Way back in 2014 we promised you in our post on local SEO that we’d be writing a bit more about local and small businesses. Considering that local SEO is basically the optimization process for the local results in search engines, we can say that local SEO is often closely related to small business SEO. This is why we decided to discuss both in this article.

In this article, you’ll find a variety of related topics:

• Finding your shop's niche
• Low budget branding
• Share your content on social media
• Local ranking factors that help your small business SEO
  • Adding ratings and reviews
  • Links from related small businesses
  • Near me searches
• In conclusion

Make sure your customers find your shop! Optimize your site with our Local SEO plugin and show you opening hours, locations, map and much more! »

Buy now » Info

As long as Google’s local search result pages continue to grow and improve, we’re not done with this subject. But in the meantime, we’d like to present you our ultimate guide to local and small business SEO. Let’s start at the beginning of your SEO process.

Finding your shop’s niche

Especially for local or small businesses, determining your niche is very important. When you know your niche, you can emphasize what makes your products or brand unique, therefore improving your odds to rank well for them. If you have a clear niche, you can locally compete with large national brands in spite of their multi-million advertisement budgets.

Find out who your customers are and what words they use to describe your product, because people will use the same terms to find your website. Using these terms, often made into long-tail keywords, can really help you optimize your local business SEO. Make your keywords as specific as possible.  Once you’ve done all this, don’t forget to monitor your niche as it evolves with the growth of your company.

Find your shop’s niche

Low budget branding

We have mentioned this over and over: branding is very important for SEO. Branding deals with things like your logo and your tagline. How do they represent your company without further context? What do your logo and tagline reveal about your values and your field of expertise? It’s all about recognition.

Read more: ‘Low budget branding tips for small businesses’ »

A tip for branding: share your expertise! You can do that in blog posts and on social media. We’ll talk about this some more, further down this guide.

Start writing great content

Your small business SEO will get a significant boost from the right content. Many small business owners put products and contact details on their website and that’s basically it. But there is so much more to tell and share!

Focus on making an awesome first impression on your potential customer. Write about your business, your business goals, how great your products are and things like that. You can also discuss market developments or local events that relate to your business. These are just a few tips for your local SEO content strategy.

When writing your content, be realistic about the chances of that content to rank. If you are in a highly competitive market, content works very well as a marketing tool and/or as input for social media. But it will probably not get you that number one spot in Google, and that’s fine. Manage your expectations.

Picking the right keywords to optimize for is very important. Usually, it’s a good idea to pick mid-tail keywords, including the local area you are focusing on. It really doesn’t matter if you add this content to your site as a page or blog post. Just make sure that you write about things that people want to talk about or that make people talk about your business in a positive way.

Keep reading: ‘Improve your small business SEO today’ »

Share your content on social media

Did you know you can actually sell your products on social media itself? While that’s very cool, in most cases social media are used for brand awareness or to lead potential customers to a sale. Using social media as a small business is all about promoting your brand, your company, and your products to establish a certain image and to get the right traffic to your company website. Social media, used in the right way, can contribute to small business SEO.

I tend to compare social media to a marketplace where all the stand owners know each other and customers browse among the products. At some point, someone will tell other visitors where to go to for a product: “The cheese over there is delicious”, “you should really check the fruit over there”. This is what real life social media are like. So make sure people start talking about you. And start talking about yourself online, to make others start talking to you on social platforms. Lastly, actively engage in social media conversations, to let people know you are listening.

Use Social Media to increase your sales

Local ranking factors that help your small business SEO

There are many things that influence your local rankings, but there is one very obvious one: your address details (NAP). Make sure to add these in the right formatting (in code), using schema.org details. You can use our Local SEO plugin for that. Furthermore, ask your web developer to dig into AMP, like Joost mentions in this Ask Yoast about AMP for small businesses. Besides that, it may help to add your city, and perhaps your state, in the title of your pages for easier recognition as well.

Google My Business

Make sure you use the exact same NAP details on both your website and your Google My Business listing. This is the only way for Google to understand the relationship between them. Add these details for instance in your footer and of course, on your contact page. Google My Business really is your friend if you want to rank in your specific geographical area, so get your details right!

Improve local SEO with Google My Business

Adding ratings and reviews

Google My Business, like Facebook, allows others to leave a review of your company. If your company has a good rating, people will be more inclined to click to your website from any of these two websites. Be sure to monitor and maintain these reviews.

If you get a negative review for some reason, react by solving your customer’s problem. Ask them to change their review afterwards. In other words, turn that dissatisfied customer into a brand ambassador!

It’s not that hard to get involved in these reviews and ratings. Find more information on that in the article below.

Read on: ‘Get local reviews and ratings’ »

Links from related small businesses

Social ‘proof’, like the ratings and reviews mentioned above, should be backed by a sufficient amount of links from local directories like:

1. Yelp
2. SuperPages
3. YP.com
4. ReferLocal.com
5. Yahoo
6. Bestoftheweb
7. etc.

You should be mentioned on these pages, for the obvious reason that this means your website is linked. If you manage to get some links from the related local websites in that directory, that will also help your site’s findability. Note that the last category of links has to be from websites that are in a related profession. It’s of no use to have your bakery website linked from an accountant’s website. 

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If your small business is closely related to other businesses that are not located in the same area, you should definitively also ask these businesses for a link. Google spiders the web link by link. If your business is linked from a website that is in the same field of business, that link is extra valuable to you.

Near me searches

When speaking about local rankings, we also have to mention near me searches. These are searches and search suggestions that include words like “near me”, “closest”, “open” and “nearby”. Optimizing for these searches is similar to optimizing for local, but applies for global brands as well (“buy legos near me”). So you’ll have to think a bit outside of your usual box – there’s probably more to optimize for. Google really focuses on search terms like these, as you can read here:

Is that a Possum near me?

In conclusion

As we’ve seen, there are many things you can do as a small business to improve your site and rank better. You should start by focusing on your niche and emphasizing your uniqueness. Think about how you present your brand: logos and tag lines are important to give your customers an idea of who you are as a business.

You can increase your visibility by creating great content on your site, optimized for the right keywords. Also, it always helps if you present yourself actively on social media. There are several factors related to local SEO that help small businesses. Make sure Google My Business has the right details, keep track of your ratings and reviews, and try to get linked by related small businesses. Finally, try to optimize for ‘ near me’ searches.

Read more: ‘5 questions: Talking local SEO with David Mihm’ »

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Incorrect Application of Javascript in Your Site Is Ruining Your SEO

Knowing and understanding Javascript, and its underlying potential to affect your SEO campaign is an essential skill that a modern SEO expert should have. Javascript – among other components – lets search engines crawl and analyze a website. Hence, if a webmaster fails to properly incorporate Javascript into their website, it will lead to a failure of indexing and ranking.

The most important part about Javascript’s impact on SEO is whether the search engines can locate the content and understand its meaning. Also, webmasters should be mindful of their website’s ability to be indexed in mobile platforms. If search engines could not, then what should you do? But, before we get into optimizing your Javascript, let’s start with the basics.

Back to Basics

When webmasters are creating a website, there are 3 major components that they need to take note of, namely:

• HTML

Also known as Hypertext Markup Language, it serves as the structure, backbone, and the “skeletal system” of the website. It serves to organize the content, define the static content, make the headings, list elements, paragraphs, etc.

• CSS

The Cascading Style Sheet, or otherwise known as CSS, is in charge of the website’s design, aesthetics, and style. Basically, it is the page’s layer of presentation.

• Javascript

This is the component that is in charge of interactivity and the main element related to the dynamic web. It is either placed inside the HTML document in the <script> tags, or it is linked or referenced to. With today’s progress, a variety of Javascript frameworks and libraries are now available such as jQuery, ReactJS, EmberJS, etc.

• What You Need To Know About AJAX

Asynchronous Javascript and XML, when combined form AJAX. It is a set of techniques for web developers that enables web applications to communicate with a server while not disturbing the current page. The word “Asynchronous” means that lines of code and other functions can still run while the “async” script is currently active. In the past, XML used to be the primary language used by web developers to pass data, however, AJAX is now used to pass numerous types of data.

The most commonly known use of AJAX is to update the content or layout of a web page without causing a refresh on the current page. Historically, whenever a user loads a page, all the elements of the page must be transported from the server to the page, and then the process of rendering begins. However, with the introduction of AJAX, only the elements or assets that differ between the pages need to be loaded, which means that user does not have to refresh the entire page. This entails that the overall experience of users will improve drastically.

The best representation of AJAX is to think about it as calling mini servers. Also, the best example of AJAX in use is in Google Maps, wherein you do not have to refresh the entire page just to get the right place – instead Google maps call the mini servers to get the different element/assets needed, and the page updates without an entire page reload.

• The DOM (Document Object Model)

Being an SEO professional, you might have known what DOM already is, but if you do not, DOM is what Google uses to analyze, inspect, and understand web pages. You can see the DOM whenever you go to the “Inspect Element” in a browser. A simple way of looking at DOM is that this is the process the browser does whenever it receives the HTML document so that it could start rendering the page.

The entire process – not just the DOM – starts with the browser receiving the HTML document. Afterward, it will start parsing all the content of the received document and all the additional resources such as CSS and Javascript files are also transported into the page. The DOM is created from the parsing of all the content and resources. It could be understood as the structured, organized, and systematically arranged version of the page’s code.

Today, the DOM is usually very different from the initial HTML document due to the existence of dynamic HTML. This kind of HTML is the page’s ability to change the content it shows depending on the user’s input, environmental conditions, and other variables. Simply put, Dynamic HTML leverages HTML, CSS, and Javascript.

• Headless Browsing

This process is basically transporting web pages without the user interface. Its importance has recently been noticed because Google and Baidu use headless browsing to better understand the content of the page and the user’s experience.

Examples of scripted headless browsers are PhantomJS and Zombie.js. It is commonly used to automate web interaction for research purposes and to render static HTML snapshots for the purpose of initial requests.

Javascript, SEO, and Fixing the Issues

Usually, there are 3 main reasons why you should be concerned about the Javascript on your site:

• Crawlability – The capability of bots to crawl your website.
• Obtainability – The capability of bots to access your site’s information, and to parse through its content.
• Perceived Site Latency – Also known as the Critical Rendering Path

• Crawlability

One of the main jobs of web developers and webmasters is to make sure that bots could find their URLs and understand their site’s structure. Two key elements are in play:

1. Blocking the search engines from your site’s Javascript
2. Proper internal linking – which means that you did not leverage your Javascript as replacement for HTML tags

Why You Should Unblock Javascript

As mentioned, when Javascript is blocked, search engines are unable to receive your site’s full experience. This means that the search engine could not see what the end users are seeing on your site. This will lead to a reduction of your site’s allure to search engines, and can even lead to search engines interpreting it as cloaking.

One of the best ways to see if there are things that Googlebot is blocked from is to use Fetch as Google, Fetch and Render, and TechnicalSEO.com’s robot.txt testing tools to identify those that are blocked. After researching the things that are blocked, the best thing that any web developer or webmaster can do is to unblock those resources and give Google the access that they need.

Internal Linking

Internal Linking should be one of the webmasters top priorities whenever they are making or cleaning their site’s architecture. So, when internal linking is made, it should be used with regular anchor tags within the HTML or the DOM.

More importantly, do not use Javascript’s onclick events as a replacement for internal linking. Although end URLs might be crawled through Javascript and XML sitemaps, they will not be included in your site’s global navigation.

Internal Linking is one of the main signals for search engines to understand your site’s architecture, and for them to know the importance of your pages. You should not underestimate the power of internal links because sometimes, they can override “SEO hints” like canonical tags.

URL Structure

Normally, AJAX sites or the Javascript-based websites are using fragment identifiers (the hashtag symbol – #) within their URLs

• Not Recommended
  • Only the Hash (#) – This is not crawlable. This is mainly used for identifying anchor links – these are the links that allow a user to jump to a piece of content inside a given page. The important thing to remember is that anything after the Hash (#) of the URL is never sent to the server, and it will cause the page to immediately scroll to the first element with a matching ID. Also, Google recommends avoiding the use of “#” in the URLs.
  • The Hashbang (#!) – Hashbang URLs were originally a hack to support crawlers. A few years back, Google and Bing developed a complex AJAX solution wherein the Hashbang (#!) in the URL with the UX co-existed with an escaped_fragment HTML based experience for bots. Google has now rescinded this recommendation, and have preferred to receive the exact experience users have. Inside escaped fragments, there are two experiences:
    • Original Experience – This URL must either possess a Hashbang (#!) within the URL to indicate there is an escaped fragment or a meta element which indicates there exists an escaped fragment.
    • Escaped Fragment – This replaces the hashbang (#!) in the URL with “_escaped_fragment_” and serves the HTML snapshot. It is also called the Ugly URL because it is long, and somehow looks like a hack.

• Recommended
  • pushState History API – Pushstate is navigation-based and is usually a part of the History API (your browsing history). Normally, pushState updates the URLs in the address bar and only the necessary changes are updated. It also allows Javascript sites to leverage URLs. It is currently allowed by Google, only when supporting navigation in the browser for the client-side or hybrid rendering.
    • A great use of pushState is the process of “infinite scroll” or the process wherein when the user reaches a new part of the page, the URL automatically updates. Essentially, if the user clicks refresh on the page, they will land on the same part once the refresh is finished. However, with pushState, they do not need to refresh the page because the URL is automatically updated when they reach new content.

• Obtainability

Search engines have been known to make use of headless browsing to render the DOM to obtain a better understanding of the content of the page, and the user’s experience. This means that Google can still process Javascript and use the DOM – instead of the HTML document.

On the other hand, there are still situations wherein search engines have difficulty comprehending a site’s Javascript. It is definitely important for a webmaster or web developer to understand how bots crawl and interact with their site’s content. If you are not sure, then conduct tests.

For search engine bots that execute Javascript, there are a few elements that they need for them to be able to obtain a site’s content:

• If your site requires some actions from the users, search engines probably don’t see it.
  • Google’s bots do not have the capability to click, write, or do any other activity that requires a user’s actions. So, if your website has elements like this, Google probably does not have the same experience as the end user. That is why it is important for you to be mindful that both the bots and actual users should have the same experience.
• If your Javascript loading time takes more than five seconds, search engines may not be seeing your page.
  • It has been known that there is no timeout value for websites, however, they should aim to load in 5 seconds or less.
• If errors exist inside your Javascript, both browsers and search engines have a possibility to miss out on sections of your page if the code is not executed properly.

Making Sure Search Engines Get Your Content

1. Test

The most commonly used solution to resolve Javascript is to just let it be. Just let Google’s algorithm do its work. Giving Google the experience that the users have is naturally its preferred choice. 2014 was the year that Google first announced that they were able to better understand the web regarding Javascript and other elements. However, experts in the industry have speculated that Google could crawl Javascript websites way before their 2014 announcement. Hence, if you could see your website’s content in the DOM, there is a high probability that it is being parsed by Google.

A recent study conducted by Barry Goralewicz tested a combination of different libraries and frameworks of Javascript to determine how Google interacts with them. The test eventually concluded that Google has the capability to interact with varying Javascript forms, and has showcased that some forms of Javascript are more challenging to interact with than others.

The studies conducted by different experts help SEO practitioners understand how they can effectively make their websites, and take on a more proactive role in the overall scheme of their website. However, it is still better for webmasters and web developers alike to make a habit out of testing and experimenting with small sections of their website – this is to find the appropriate solution for them. You could test and examine through:

1. Affirming that your site’s content can be viewed in the DOM
2. Testing a group of pages to check if Google can index its content

• Check some quotes from your content
• Fetch it with Google and see if content appears.
  • An important note to remember when using Fetch with Google is: when you use Fetch with Google, it usually occurs during the load event or before timeout. This is definitely a great way to check if Google could see your content, and whether your Javascript is blocking the robots.txt. This way is still subject to error, however, it is a really good first step.

After all the testing, what should you do if there is an error, and search engine bots still could not index and get your content? Well, if any errors are found in your testing, you can opt to try HTML snapshot.

2. HTML Snapshot

These are basically completely rendered pages that could be returned to search engine bots. HTML Snapshot is a controversial topic when it comes to Google, however, it is important for you to understand it because there are cases when using it is your only option.

HTML snapshots could be used when search engines and other sites such as Facebook cannot get ahold of your Javascript, then it is better to return an HTML snapshot than to not get your content indexed – or not even understood at all.

Additionally, take note that Google wants the same experience that the users have. So, only provide them with snapshots if it is absolutely necessary, and other experts or forums could not be of help to you.

Whenever you consider using HTML snapshots, always remember that Google has already “devalued” the use of this AJAX recommendation. Although they still support it in some ways, they still recommend avoiding the use of AJAX. The direction that Google wants to walk on is understandable because they want to have the same experience as the users.
The second thing to take note of is the possibility of cloaking. If ever you have returned an HTML snapshot, and the search engine found that it does not – in any way – represent your website, it is already considered a cloaking risk.

Despite all the drawbacks, HTML snapshots have their own advantages:

1. It will help search engines and crawlers understand the experience on the website. This is because some types of Javascript are harder to understand.
2. Other search engines and crawlers should be able to understand user’s experience. Bing, like some search engines, has not announced that it has the capability to crawl and index Javascript. The only solution that Javascript-heavy websites could do is to make use of HTML snapshots. However, you have to be wary if this is really the case before using HTML snapshots.

• Site Latency

Whenever browsers receive the HTML document and proceed to create the DOM, most of the resources included in the page is loaded as they appear in the document. Simply put, if your HTML document has a large file at the top, the browser will prioritize that file first.

Google’s critical rendering path is catered to the improvement of user experience because the concept behind it is that the browser loads whatever the user needs as soon as possible. However, if your HTML document has an unnecessary amount of resources or Javascript files blocking the page’s ability to load you are getting “render-blocking Javascript”. This means that your Javascript is impeding the page’s capability to appear as if it is loading faster (the appearance is also known as perceived latency).

Using page speed measuring tools, test if you have render-blocking Javascript issues, there are three potential solutions:

1. Inline: You should add the Javascript into the HTML document
2. Async: add the “async” attribute to the HTML tag to make your Javascript asynchronous
3. Defer: Lower the placement of the Javascript in the document. However, it is important to remember that the scripts should be arranged in terms of priority. So, if your Javascript is among the top priorities in your page, avoid deferring it to a lower position.

Key Takeaway

The most important aspect of any practitioner’s SEO campaign is to have their website crawled, indexed and ranked. Additionally, one of the main components of a website is its Javascript. However, elements like Javascript can also break your website’s goal of ranking on the first page of the SERPs.

Always make sure that the content of your website is crawlable, obtainable, and is producing the optimal site latency. Although this is more inclined on technical SEO, the content of this article could still be immensely helpful for your SEO campaign. Keep all the things mentioned here in mind, and you will have a great time optimizing your website.

Are you now able to properly use your Javascript? Do you still need help in any other issues of your website? Tell me in the comments below, and let’s help each other out.

P.S.

SEO Hacker will be hosting a no-nonsense SEO conference and it’s none other than the SEO Summit 2017. I want to invite you to attend the Summit if you want to improve your business’ online presence. Renowned experts will be sharing their in-depth knowledge of SEO, digital marketing, conversion rate optimization, and much more. Interested? Click the link for more information

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Ask Yoast: Use a 302 or 307 redirect?

Redirects serve multiple purposes. For every occasion there’s a specific redirect that works best. Some redirects seem quite similar though, for instance, the 302 or 307 redirect. You can both use them to temporarily point users to another URL. So we’re not surprised some people wonder what’s the exact difference. Let’s clarify this here!

WordPress specialist Marcel Bootsman, also known as Nostromo on Twitter, has send the following question to Ask Yoast:

Can you explain when to use a 302 or a 307 redirect when temporarily redirecting a URL?

Watch the video or read the transcript further down the page!

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Let me explain when to use which one, if you need a temporary redirect:

“Well it’s actually quite simple. If the URL is really, really temporary
please do use a 307. Only use a 302 if you want the URL that you are redirecting
to show up in the search results with the content of the page that you are redirecting to.

So you have page A with a URL and you have page B with a content. You want the URL of page A to show up with the content of page B in the index. If that’s what you want use a 302. If that’s not what you want use a 307. And if something is not temporary but permanent use a 301 redirect and not anything else.

Good luck!”

Read more: ‘Which redirect should I use?’ »

Ask Yoast

In the series Ask Yoast we answer pressing SEO questions from followers. Need advice about the SEO of your website? Let us help you out! Send your question to ask@yoast.com.

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Avoid these site structure mistakes!

If you take your SEO – and users – seriously, you’ll be working on a kick-ass site structure. Setting up a decent site structure is rather hard. Maintaining a solid site structure if your site is growing is even harder. Mistakes are easily made. In this post, I will share 5 common site structure mistakes people often make. Make sure to avoid all of these! 

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$ 99€ 99 - Buy now » Info #1 Hiding your cornerstones

Your most important articles – your cornerstones – should not be hidden away. Cornerstone articles are the articles that your most proud of, that most clearly reflect the mission of your website. Some people forget to link to their most precious articles. If an article receives no or few internal links, search engines will find it less easily (as search engines follow links). Google will regard articles with few internal links as less important, and rank them accordingly.

Solution: link to those cornerstones

Ideally, you should be able to navigate to your cornerstone articles in one or two clicks from the homepage. Make sure they’re visible for your visitors, so people can easily find them.

Most importantly, link to those cornerstone articles. Don’t forget to mention them in your other blog posts! Our internal linking tool can really help you to remember your cornerstones at all times!

#2 No breadcrumbs

Breadcrumbs are important for both the user experience and the SEO of your website. And yet, some people do not use them. Breadcrumbs show how the current page fits into the structure of your site, which allows your users to easily navigate your site. They also allow search engines to determine the structure of your site without difficulty.

Solution: add those breadcrumbs

No excuses here! Just add those breadcrumbs. Yoast SEO can help you do that!

#3 HUGE categories

Categories should be relatively similar in size. But without even noticing it, people will sometimes write about one subject much more than about another. As a result, one category can slowly grow much larger than other categories. When one category is significantly larger than other ones, your site becomes unbalanced. You’ll have a hard time ranking with blog posts within a very large category.

Solution: split categories

If you’ve created a huge category, split it in two (or three). You should check the size of your categories every now and then, especially if you write a lot of blog posts.

#4 Using too many tags

Don’t create too many tags. Some people want to make tags really specific. But if every post receives yet another new unique tag, you are not structuring anything, because posts don’t become grouped or linked. So that’s pretty much useless.

Solution: use tags in moderation

Make sure that tags are used more than once or twice and that tags group articles together that really belong together. You should also ensure that your tags are in fact available to your visitors somewhere, preferably at the bottom of your article. Tags are useful for your visitors (and not just for Google) to read more about the same topic.

Read more: ‘Using category and tag pages for SEO’ »

#5 Not visualizing your site structure

A final site structure mistake people make is forgetting to visualize the site structure. Visitors want to be able to find stuff on your website with ease. The main categories of your blog should all have a place in the menu on your homepage. But don’t create too many categories, or your menu will get cluttered. A menu should give a clear overview and reflect the structure of your site. Ideally, the menu helps visitors understand how your website is structured.

Solution: dive into UX

In order to create a good and clear overview of your site, you should really dive into some aspects of User eXperience (UX). Think about what your visitors are looking for and how you could help them to navigate through your website. You could, for instance, start with reading our blog posts about User eXperience (UX).

Fix your site structure mistakes!

Site structure is an essential aspect of an SEO strategy. The structure of your website shows Google what articles and pages are most important. With your site’s structure, you can influence which articles will rank highest in the search engine. So, it’s important to do it right. Especially if you’re adding a lot of content, the structure of your site could be changing quickly. Try to stay on top!

Did we forget a site structure mistake that you encounter often? Please share it with us in the comments!

Keep reading: ‘Site structure: the ultimate guide’ »

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Coming soon: Structured data training!

Do you want to increase chances people click on your page in the search results? Want to learn how to get those awesome rich snippets? Next week, we’ll launch our Structured data training. In this new training, you’ll learn how structured data can influence the appearance of your pages in the search results. After completing this course, you’ll be able to add structured data yourself, so Google can show a rich snippet.

Why take our structured data training?

A normal snippet of a recipe looks like this:

You see a title, a URL and a description of a page. If you add structured data to your page, Google (or another search engine) can transform your snippet into this:

So the structured data you add can show up in the snippet. For recipes you can add ratings and reviews, cooking time, calories and an awesome picture. Not only for recipes, but also for books, movies, articles, products etc. structured data exists.

Rich snippets let your page stand out from the other search results in Google. And if your page stands out in the search results, chances are much higher people will click on it.

Is adding structured data hard?

Adding structured data is not very hard, but you do need to know what you’re doing. After some training, everyone should be able to add structured data and get rewarded with those desired rich snippets!

We’ve created a very practical online training in which we take you through all the steps of adding structured data to a site. We’ll first explain the theory and then we’ll show you screencasts that will guide you through the steps you need to take. We’ll discuss multiple strategies you can use to add structured data to a website. Some strategies are more advanced (and more daunting) than others. At the end of the course, you’ll be able to add structured data in multiple ways. Just choose which strategy fits you best and start working on those awesome rich snippets yourself!

Want to buy our course?

The structured data training will be available as of June 29. You can purchase the course for the introductory price of $119 until July 2. You’ll get access to over 75 minutes of training videos, lots and lots of reading material and challenging quiz questions. If you finish our course, you’ll receive a certificate and a badge to put on your site. If you buy one of our courses, you’ll also get access to the Yoast Updates. These updates keep you in the loop about new trends in SEO and WordPress every 3 months.

Want to know more?

Check out the Structured data training and make sure you won’t miss the launch by subscribing to our newsletter!

Not the right training for you? We offer lots of other SEO courses. See which one fits your needs best!

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Google Search Console and structured data

Google Search Console is an incredibly important tool for website owners. This tool shows you how your site appears in the Google search results. It also shows you what to improve to make the most of your listings in the results. One of the many cool features of Search Console is the structured data analyses found in the Search Appearance section. Let’s dive into that!

In this post, we’ll cover the Structured data tab in GSC, the Rich Cards tab and the Data Highlighter. If you don’t have Search Console yet – and you really should -, sign up on Google’s website.

Search Appearance

First, log into Search Console. On the left-hand side of your screen, you’ll find the Search Appearance menu item. This tool gives you insights into how your website appears in the search results. You can click any item to see how Google treats your site.

Structured Data

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Buy now » InfoIn this post, our main focal point is structured data, so we’ll jump to the Structured Data section of GSC. Clicking on Structured Data will show you an overview of all the pages that have some kind of structured data attached to it. This could be in any form, like RDFa or Microdata, but usually, it will be in JSON-LD.

Structured data is all the extra information you give search engines to understand what a page is about. For instance, as the writer of this article, I am both a Person and an Author. If I add this data to the source code of this page, search engines can use that data to do cool things. If you sell products, you can enhance your search listings with reviews and ratings, prices and availability. These might all become visible in the search results.

Google Search Console shows a red line for the pages on your site that have incorrectly implemented structured data. Red indicate items with errors. You’ll notice that Search Console automatically sorts the list by the number of errors on a page. This way, you can start by fixing the most important issues first.

Click on the lines in the table to see which pages have errors with the selected data type. Use these errors to prioritize your work. The big graph shows the progression of your structured data implementation as seen by Google. Let’s see how that works.

We’re going to take a closer look at the data. Above the graph, we see how many structured data items Google has found on how many pages, in this case, 218 items on 56 pages. Look closely at the left and right-hand side of the graph. The left side – in blue – goes from zero to 240 and this shows the number of pages with structured data items. The right side – in red – goes from zero to sixteen and shows the number of errors. At the bottom of the image, you see all the different data types Google has found on your site and all the items that have errors.

Errors

Now that we’ve analyzed all the different data on the structured data tab, it’s time to look at our errors. So click on an item with errors.

After clicking on an error you’ll see this screen. This is where all the errors are listed individually. It’s the same kind of information as the screen before this one, so I won’t cover it again. However, now click on the individual error to see what happens:

When we clicked on the individual error, a pop-up appeared. It shows information of the domain we’re on, information about the data item that gives an error and a button to test it with the Structured Data Testing Tool. Try to test with live data because GSC might give you an incorrect message. Also, the Structured Data Testing Tool allows you to tweak the code until it doesn’t give an error anymore. This way, you can safely test and improve on the error. Let’s move on to Rich Cards.

Rich Cards

Rich cards are new ways of presenting search results. These results are often amended with special, rich search features that make the results more interactive. For instance, a recipe site might get swipeable cards in the search results or a restaurant might get an option to immediately reserve a seat from the results. These are just a couple of examples. And since this is one of the areas Google is increasingly focussing on, you’ll see a lot more of these in the coming years.

Rich cards aren’t that different from structured data types. You can see structured data as the language used to describe the content on a page, while a rich card is a visually compelling way to present search results. And yes, more often than not, rich cards rely on the structured data that Google finds on a page. That’s why the Rich Cards tab is kind of complementary to the Structured Data tab instead of it superseding it. 

By the way, these are all the rich cards Google creates.

Add structured data to your site, validate it and you’re ready to get rich cards. If Google deems your site the best possible result, that is. In Search Appearance, you can check if your implementation is correct and if Google has already awarded you rich cards.

Click on the Rich Cards tab and you’ll see a graph like the one above. On top of the graph, you can tick and untick the boxes. We’ve got invalid cards, cards that can be improved and correct cards. You can probably guess that each box shows a different graph. Also, our issues are sorted by severity. First, we’ll try and find out what our critical issues are by clicking on them.

Now we see all the individual URLs with errors. We know that these are all image-related problems because that’s mentioned in the previous screenshot. Just click on one of the URLs.

A pop-up will appear, similar to the one in the Structured Data tab. It gives you the option to test your live data and read the card documentation. You always want to double check your live data with the Structured Data Testing Tool. As said before, you can edit the code right away and see whether your changes validate. All good now? Great, you can start to implement your new code.

Data Highlighter

The Data Highlighter is a tool within GSC that allows you to markup your pages without any knowledge of coding. There are a couple of things you need to know before you start marking up your structured data with Google’s Data Highlighter. Firstly, your highlighted data is stored in Google’s databases, not on your site itself. Since the data is stored externally from your site, other search engines won’t be able to benefit from it. Ask yourself if you want this. Secondly, Data Highlighter only offers a limited set of schema you can implement. So it won’t be for everyone.

The Data Highlighter does make fixing the issues you’ve found in the Structured Data section easier. For instance, choose one of the URLs that had a faulty Structured Data setup and tell GSC what kind of information you want to highlight.

This will bring you to a live view of that page and you’ll be able to select any element on the page. By selecting an element you’ll be given a choice of what you want to highlight that specific element for. For example, for a Product, you’ll be given these markups to add to the corresponding element on the page:

This makes adding Structured Data, for Google at least, as easy as a few clicks.

You can find the Data Highlighter under the Search Appearance section. Click on the “Start highlighting” button and you’ll see a new screen. Now we can fill in the URL (a product page, for example), select the type of markup we’d like to implement (Product Schema.org) and select if we just want to markup this single page or similar pages like it as well. We’ll only show multiple pages because marking up single pages shares the same core functionalities – only with fewer steps.

You can easily select elements on a page. Google automatically shows the available Schema.org you can select, see the first arrow. Once selected, you’ll see an overview of the data items on that page, check the second arrow. When you’re done, you click on finished – it’s the big red button in the top right corner.

In the end, Google shows you random pages from your selection to check the implementation. You can verify whether the information holds true for all of your products:

● Did Google unexpectedly include a page it shouldn’t have? Click Remove page.
● Did Google mistakenly apply the wrong Schema? You can correct it by selecting the element and change the Schema.
● Did Google do it right? Just click Next.

The Google Data Highlighter is just one of the tools that helps you implement structured data with Schema.org. It is, however, fully tied into the Google ecosystem and might not be the best option when you want to keep full control over your data.

You’ve reached the end…

Structured data gives you an excellent opportunity to open a conversation with search engines. By adding structured data, you make your site instantly comprehensible for engines. This way, they can use your data to present your content in innovative, highly visible ways that are guaranteed to catch the eye of your customers or readers.

Structured data is becoming so important that we’ve developed a course to educate you on this subject. In this course, we’ll show you exactly what structured data encompasses, what it can do, how to implement it using JSON-LD and Google Tag Manager, and how to check its performance in Google Search Console. This course will be available from June 29.

We hope you’ve enjoyed this article! Keep an eye on yoast.com for more articles on structured data and SEO. And don’t forget to sign up for our brand new Structured data course!

Read more: ‘Structured data with Schema.org: the ultimate guide’ »

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3 Tricks to Rank for Multiple Keywords Easily

Normal SEO practitioners will start their projects with keyword research which is basically them looking for targeted keywords that fit their niche. Afterward, they will try to get ranked for their target keyword. Sound familiar right? Because this is what EVERYONE is already doing. Let me tell you a little-known secret: I bet you didn’t know that you can also rank for multiple keywords right?

The better method starts with looking for “related” keywords with your target keyword. These are the keywords that are the same concept which is technically a variant of the targeted keyword. So, how do you find these “related” keywords? Well, it starts with:

Knowing what your subject matter is, then looking for related topics. Afterward, you can use tools such as Keyword Explorer to look for keywords with the best possible qualities like difficulty, opportunity, search volume, and relevance. Here’s an example:

Let’s say my subject is: “Why are dogs such loyal creatures?”

Some related topics may include “Signs that your dog loves you”, “a dog’s body language”, and “should I get a dog?”. Then, you could proceed to the keyword research process; organizing the keywords in accordance to the best possible qualities is aligned with Google’s Hummingbird algorithm’s search logic. Once this is done, we can now proceed to rank opportunities for specific keyword variants.

Should You Optimize for Multiple Keywords?

The answer, of course, is definitely yes. If you opt for the traditional approach to optimizing a page for only one keyword, this may possibly lead to a number of issues. One of which is when a content writer feels restricted because of the individual keyword; which will result in a below-average content that could have otherwise been avoided if there was a broader keyword. Also, by having too thin a content, the marketing manager might spread information to multiple pages to compensate which will reduce the possible authority of the pages. This will also make your site architecture much bigger than it was intended to, and make the search engine less likely to notice your unique values.

A study by Ahrefs has shown that a single high-ranking page can show in multiple SERPs (search engine results pages) – from hundreds to thousands of results. A good strategy is to research some relevant search queries related to your topics and use those queries as your H2’s.

If you are wondering how you could look for these related keyword topics, you can take advantage of a relatively recent feature of search engines; the “People also ask” box.

Finding Related Keywords

1. Enter Your Question

Question format queries are the best kinds to use when searching because there are higher chances of showing a featured snippet. These featured snippets are the little boxes that usually have one to three sentence answers. In recent times, whenever featured snippets are displayed, there is also an additional box named “People also ask”. This box enables you to better understand the logic of the search engine’s algorithm. This box shows you what the search engine “believes” to be related to your initial query.

2. Choose the most relevant “People also ask” query

Focus on the queries inside the “People also ask”, and notice that they are basically a variant of your original query while having a mildly different search intent. Now, choose the one that is closely related to the search intent of your targeted users. When you choose, there will be more queries related to the one that you chose. With every selection that you make, you will be diving deeper into the topic as understood by the search engine.

3. Find Topics with Below Average Featured Snippets

In the “People also ask” boxes, there are also featured snippets that describe the page that is shown. As you go deeper into a topic, be wary of featured snippets that are below average that does not entirely describe the page’s content. This is basically the search engine’s attempt to provide a featured snippet, but quite noticeably fails. You, as the webmaster, could take advantage of this. If you find a below average featured snippet, it gives you a chance to improve the content on your own page. You will be providing an article that fully answers the given topic, which will possibly give you an increase in traffic.

4. Make a Compilation of Your “Related” Questions

Once you have noticed you are in too deep and have noticed a rise in unrelated topics, you can now make a compilation. This compilation is basically everything that you have deemed as helpful for your initial question. Every topic that you have found in the “People also ask” boxes that are highly related to your topic, you can compile them into an excel file, and go back to the excel file when you need it.

5. Analyze Them Using a Keyword Research Tool

Since you now have a compilation of all highly related topics, you can use your preferred research tool to look for the best possible keywords. When you see the keywords, apply your standards for keywords such as the volume of searches, relevance, competitiveness, etc.

6. Apply the Keywords

Once you have found the best possible keywords for your website, you can now start generating improved content for these. Then, you can incorporate the keywords into your page title and headings. Use those keywords as headings (H2, H3) then adding a relevant content after the headings.

Measure the Performance of Your Keywords

Obviously, after you optimize for numerous keywords, you can start measuring its performance. One of the best tools you can use is the Moz Pro campaign. Incorporate the keywords to your campaign, and it is important for you to label them appropriately. The labels that you will use should be related to the topic/keyword that you used.

For example, your blog revolves around the subject of dental health. One topic you can write about and optimize for is dental clinics in your city. Let’s say that you write a great article about different dental clinics in your city; the labels for your keywords should be something in the lines of “Dental clinics in the city” in your Moz Pro campaign.

Once the article has been published, you can report on the success of the multiple keywords by selecting the label “Dental clinics in the city”. If it is successful then you should notice an increase in rank, which would mean you are successful in ranking for multiple keywords.

Key Takeaway

Your keywords are one of the oldest and most essential parts in your campaign for higher rankings. I am not saying that optimizing for individual keywords is bad, however optimizing multiple keywords is one of the most efficient ways you can rank for.

This article will definitely help you in learning how to optimize pages using multiple keywords. This will definitely help you in your SEO campaign and learn something new. The pursuit for high rankings will definitely be filled with learning experiences, and being able to learn something new and helpful is an important experience.

Can you now rank for multiple keywords? Do you still need some help? Tell me in the comments below, and I’ll be happy to help.

P.S.

We’ll be hosting our annual innovative and no-nonsense SEO event that gathers both local and international SEO experts to have them share their knowledge. I’m inviting you to attend so that you can the ins and outs of the SEO industry from some of the movers and shakers that helped make it what it is today. You can click here to find out more.

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