The digital landscape is dominated by Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Getting visibility for your content is the most critical aspect of any marketing strategy and crucial to any business plan in general. Learning the fundamentals is accessible thanks to programs via Google Certificates or courses on YouTube. However, there is a lot to master and a lot of concepts to sift through. We’ve broken down some fundamental pieces anyone interested in mastering SEO must know to give you the right start.
The Fundamentals
The most basic understanding you need to have when starting SEO is that search engines, like Google, have algorithms that rank content, which is how search results are ordered. Learning how these algorithms are weighted and what may cause a web page to be penalized and drop in rank is crucially important. The exact algorithm is kept secret. However, there are plenty of books on SEO with information that has been learned from trial and error that will help you along the way. Reading and absorbing this information will allow you to skip months of beginner errors and mistakes.
These books will also introduce you to the terms for the basic strategic SEO concepts like on-page SEO vs. off-page SEO or white-hat vs. black-hat vs grey-hat SEO and the more complicated offshoots that branch out from them. Once you understand these broad approaches, it’s time to move to the fundamentals and tactics that build these strategies. Learning how to link-build, do keyword research, find page rankings, understand what types of traffic can be generated, and understand and drive a consumer’s intent.
Finding The Right Resources
The best part of the internet is the availability of information and resources. The downside is that there may be hundreds of opinions to sift through, but everything you need to know about SEO can be found online. A good strategy is to learn from SEO academies. These places will condense the information into manageable learning segments and save you from sorting through dozens of YouTube channels searching for reliable sources.
Some proven academies are HubSpot Academy, Google Analytics Academy, Ahrefs, and Semrush Academy, which provide free training and certification. When starting, places like Yoast, Google SEO Fundamentals, and BlueRay Academy provide excellent beginner learning materials. Here you will learn from experts on SEO tactics such as Local SEO, advanced link building, Technical SEO, and dozens of more concepts.
Another good way to learn is by hands-on experience. Start by searching for products within the field you are interested in working in and look through the top-rated websites. What parts of the page adhere to the strategies you’ve learned, and what does it look and sound like when reading the page?
Choosing The Right Tools
Once you learn what information to utilize, it’s time to streamline how you gather, sort, and interpret large chunks of data. Doing keyword research through an automated program is a lot simpler. Programs such as Website Grader, Google Analytics, Seobility, Jasper AI, and Check Page Rank are great for helping you gather and streamline the data you’ll need for all your SEO needs.
