to integrate SEO into a brand new website //

A new website launch is a very exciting project for any company. Everyone involved in these projects obsesses about the smallest of details, as if it were their life.

No stone is left untouched, unless it’s the one with SEO beneath it. SEO is often the team that’s not allowed to enter the room.

Everyone expects the traffic to appear instantly after a big launch. If it doesn’t happen, then they will have to spend even more money on SEO.

It is cheaper and more effective to build SEO into a website from the beginning than to add it as an afterthought.

This article will describe the three phases of a new website and explain how SEO can be used in each phase:

• The Strategy Phase
• The construction phase
• Launch phase

Read on if you are launching a website for your business and want to promote SEO.

Stage 1: the strategy phase

During the strategy phase teams will discuss the look and functionality of the website.

You are responsible for laying the foundations of SEO while others debate whether to use black and white photos or color ones.

You can do this by focusing on the following tasks:

• Keyword search
• SEO siloing

Keyword search

Keyword Research allows you to align your website’s content with the search queries your audience uses.

What is the role of this in the new site?

Keyword research done during the planning phase will influence the content that appears on your website when it launches. It can, for example, help you build the navigation of the website and determine the topics.

You can engage your team by asking questions during this phase to help you create a list of seed keywords.

• What are the most important topics for which your website should be relevant?
• What would you type into a search engine to find out what we offer?
• What do our customers say about us?
• What are the problems our products or service solve? What would someone look for if that was their problem?

After exploring these questions, you should have a good list (and perhaps more). You must then refine that list of keywords using the appropriate SEO tools.

You can now see the navigation more clearly. Then I will discuss what to do next with the SEO siloing.

SEO siloing

SEO siloing is a way to organize links and content on a site. SEO siloing has several goals, including:

• Helping the user navigate your website easily.
• Optimizing your site for relevant keywords will help you to improve page rankings.
• Establishing your site’s authority and expertise on a particular subject.

You can create a mock-up of a site structure that supports the keywords you have chosen with relevant content.

How? As an example, I will use a fictional website for power tools to show how you could build a website using keyword research.

If you owned a company that sold power tools such as cordless tools, electric tools, and gas-powered ones, your keyword research will likely reveal that you should target key terms, including “cordless tools,” “electric tools,” and “gas powered tools.”

You should create the navigation of the website for the designers and developers. You would show how the navigation and content of the website will support these keywords.

The graphic below shows the subpages and landing pages that will be created for the website power tools. These pages will contain content that supports primary keywords.

SEO siloing goes further by indicating how to link the pages.

Stage 2: the build phase

The designers/developers will create your site as you enter the build phase.

It’s important to keep in mind that this is the longest phase and you should be ensuring everyone is considering SEO.

Three primary areas are of concern

• The technical side of the website.
• Content development is the process of creating content on the website.
• On-page optimization is the process of optimizing a site.

Technical Aspects

Most website designers and developers don’t have a good understanding of SEO. They can build a website that is incompatible with a search engine’s ability to understand and crawl a website.

You could also create pages that do not offer the best experience to users. Many website publishers are optimizing their pages with Google’s new page experience update.

SEO friendly web design should be discussed with your designers/developers before they begin their work.

Discuss the features of your website.

• Search engines will be able to easily crawl and index your site.
• Accessibility is important for all users.
• Use links, buttons, popups and other interactive elements to make your website easy to use. ).
• Be quick and secure.

When building a website, it is important to keep in mind the following SEO friendly design principles:

• Clean code
• 
  A fast site
  
• Mobile-friendliness
• Core Web Vitals
• Pop-ups can be annoying.
• Implementing HTTPS

Google offers information on these topics in Google Developers.

The content

Content is a very important part of SEO for launching a new website.

Google will only rank the best quality content on its search engines. This is important, especially when you’re competing with millions of websites.

You need to make sure that each landing page, subpage, and other pages are filled with helpful, quality content.

Ask questions such as:

• Does the author have the necessary expertise and experience to create the content?
• Does your brand/website position itself as an expert on the subject?
• Can you be trusted by others?
• Do you answer the question better than your competitors?
• Do you include data from search results such as ” People also Ask” and Searches Related to, in addition to FAQs that are common?
• Include original data, research, opinions, and images.
• Do you check your facts and use quality, relevant sources?
• Do you write with accuracy about ” your money or your life ” topics?

Google:

• Search Quality Rater Guidelines
• 
  File for creating useful, people-first content
  

Dig deeper. How you can survive and even come out ahead after a Google core upgrade.

The next step after building the pages and adding the content to them is to optimize each page as much as possible.

The most important tactics for on-page are:

• Readability – Does your content match the grade level of the audience?
• Meta tags Do your pages have unique and compelling meta tags?
• Heading tags Are the heading tags properly formatted on the webpages in the correct sequence? (H1, H2, H3, H4, etc.)
• Keyword Optimization:Can the content be tweaked using keywords to increase the page’s relevance, even just a little more?
• Image optimization Do the images on your page have the potential to increase traffic?
• Alt Text: Did you include alt texts on images for those with vision impairment?
• SchemaWhat are the opportunities available to you in order to make it clear to search engines about the content of the page and to improve your search engine listings? For more information, see Schema.org.
• Other structured Data:Have You formatted the page so that it is easier for people and search engines to understand the contents? (Tables, bulleted list, table of contents, etc.).
• Links –Are you using fully qualified links? Absolute links require more effort upfront, but they are easier to maintain over time.

Stage 3: Launch phase

The pressure is on.

If everything has been done correctly, the launch phase should be smooth. There are some SEO tasks that must be completed in the pre-launch phase and during launch.

Pre-launch

Do the following before the site is live:

• Accessibility : Use an SEO tool and crawl the website to check for errors.
• Analytics – Make sure Google Analytics and Google Search Console is configured correctly.
• Technical Ensure that the XML Sitemap, HTML Site Map and robots.txt files are properly set up.

Launch

Everyone involved is excited on launch day. This stage focuses on monitoring SEO and reacting accordingly.

Find things such as:

• Technical Errors: Use SEO tools to monitor your site for any technical issues.
• Indexing issues: The site may not be fully indexed for a few weeks or days, so be on the lookout for indexing problems.

SEO is not going to end after launch. It will continue to evolve and progress.

You will need an SEO strategy as long as there is competition and Google changes its Search.

Your new website is a great way to get started

Building SEO into your new website gives you the best chance of performing.

You want to be ahead of the competition, so you need to start driving traffic as soon as possible.

Follow the advice in this article if you’re part of a team launching a new website.

SEO considerations for website development, and after launch: Dig deeper

The post How do you build SEO into your new website from scratch first appeared on Search Engine Land.