Having a job is a privilege for many, and we often put up with a lot of stress traveling to work, just to arrive stressed and drained, instead of making the most out of our work-life balance. Cities and suburbs are getting more and more congested, and it is almost impossible to avoid traffic in the peak hours. If driving to work and being stuck in traffic every day is taking too much out of you, it might be time to think about new ways to get to your workplace and improve your health and wellbeing. Below you will find a few tips on how to get the most out of your commute.
Start Off Early
The earlier you start off the better you will get through traffic. You can spend the extra time you have in the morning to visit the gym near your workplace, or to listen to a podcast before work. You will save fuel and time, and spend the morning without rushing, so you might even reward yourself with a few minutes sitting down and having a nice breakfast in peace, instead of trying to munch on your toast while queueing in traffic.
Plan Ahead
You will need to keep an eye on the roads in your local area to be the first to know about roadworks and accidents. If there is a planned road closure on your regular route, you will need to find an alternative way to get to work, or even start off early. Take the stress out of your mornings and peak night traffic by being informed of the things that might affect your commute time. Some satellite navigation systems will give you information on the speed and volume of traffic automatically.
Learn Your Escape Routes
It might also be a good idea to learn some alternative routes, in case you learn that there is a roadblock or accident. You will need to know which turn to take to avoid queueing up for hours. There is nothing worse than not moving anywhere and worrying that your boss will get angry with you for not being on time. Just imagine if you had a meeting first thing in the morning and you turned out 30 minutes late? It would certainly not help you achieve your career and promotion goals.
Cycling
If you often face standing traffic on the roads, and there are bike routes that are safe enough for you to use, you can start cycling to work to save time and stay fit at the same time. However, if you have any respiratory illnesses, you might want to ensure that you are avoiding highly congested and polluted areas. If there is a country lane or a cycle road that is away from the main highway traffic, even a shortcut, you will be able to make the most out of your time and combine getting to work with your morning exercise.
Having a motorbike in the summer can be great fun, and you can explore much more than from a car. If you don’t share a ride with anyone, you can jump on the bike, take on an advanced rider course, and simply filter through traffic to save time. Not to mention that you will have much more fun and save money on fuel at the same time. You will, however, need to ensure that you can stay safe on two wheels before you attempt this technique.
Your Electric Scooter
If your workplace is too far to walk or cycle, or you want to have more fun, you could also get a scooter. Read some of the latest electric scooter reviews to find out which one is the most suitable for your needs. The range and the wheel size of the different models will vary, so you have to take into consideration the distance you have to travel, the weight limit, and the road or pavement you are going to use. Make sure that you can charge up your scooter at work every day and keep it safe.
In case you cannot avoid sitting in traffic, you can team up with some of your coworkers and share the cost and responsibility. No matter if you only carpool once a week, you can take a day off stressful traffic and simply sit back to have a relaxed chat or listen to the radio without having to worry about what people around you will do. Some companies encourage and reward carpooling, so you can join a scheme and get discounts or health club vouchers.
Working from Home a Few Days a Week
In case you have a reliable computer at home, you might also be able to do your job from your office without going to work. No matter if you are preparing a presentation or using the cloud technology to catch up on projects or follow up client orders, if you never ask, you never get it. You can save a few hours and even have a lie in if you want to, get more done in a day, and hit your targets without getting stressed.
Changing Your Shifts If You Can
If you have a job that requires you to be physically present at the office or workshop, you can ask for a shift change. Even a 30 minute early start and finish will make a huge difference in your commute time and help you arrive calmer and more prepared. Of course, if you have to do the school run, you might not be able to get to work early, but you can always ask for a later shift that will also make a difference. Most of the traffic disappears by 10 a.m., so you can get to work twice as fast.
The stress we face every morning and night commuting to and from work can have a negative impact on our work performance and long term health. If traffic is stressing you out, make sure you find a solution and discuss your options with your employer.
There are many reasons to become a more socially-responsible business person. When you’re successful, you’re in a fortunate position to be able to help drive change and make a difference to others. It’s important to make good links with your community, and being socially responsible can also help you find fulfillment away from your business.
With so many ways to make a difference, it’s never been easier to pledge to become more socially responsible. Take a look at some of the following suggestions and start setting an excellent example for others.
Why become more socially responsible?
While your business could be a great success and your profits high, it isn’t always enough to fulfill and satisfy you. Becoming active in making positive changes in your community, your environment, and can help you experience some of the other benefits of being a successful business owner.
It’s also something that’s important to your staff, your stakeholders and your customers or clients. They want to look up to someone who can lead by example, which is why customers respond well to socially-responsible businesses. Issues such as sustainability, ethics and helping others are hot topics at the moment, so if you’re wondering why your business should care about social responsibility, then you should look into it more.
Tips for becoming a more responsible business person
It’s never too late to change your ways, and even if you weren’t doing anything adverse before, it’s still good to take some positive action and look at ways you and your business can be more socially responsible. Some great suggestions include:
Use your connections
As a successful business owner, you’ll likely have a lot of friends in high places. While this can be great for doing business, it can also be useful for helping others. Perhaps you know somebody who is active in the community who could use your help on projects, or you know someone with the resources and knowledge to help out with some fantastic work you’re doing in the community? Having conversations and sharing ideas is how good work gets started, and you never know what could come from talking to a colleague or fellow business owner.
Building strong business relationships is a key element behind your success as a businessperson, but don’t just think about the value they could offer your business, think about the good work you can do together to make your community a better place.
Be kinder to the environment
We all have a responsibility to help our environment. But as someone in a position of responsibility, you can help to set an example amongst your staff, your peers and others. There are basic steps that every business can take to be more green, through introducing policies and practices that will cut everything from your paper use to how much energy your business uses. If you want to make a bigger difference, make a significant pledge. Set targets for your business to help it achieve certain sustainability targets and you’ll be sure to not only impress fellow businesses, but your customers too. With the world in a more precious position than ever before, it’s time to think long and hard about how your business can help the planet.
Crowdsource some ideas
You could find that your quite far removed from the issues that your employees and stakeholder care about, so why not ask them what you should be doing? Consulting with your employees is a good way to take their thoughts and considerations into account, and could lead to some positive changes for your organization. As them what they feel should be a priority for your business, and whether they have any ideas for increasing social responsibility.
You could also empower your employees to go out there and make a difference. By providing them with the time, the resources and the support for their own projects, you could inspire a lot of positive change and help employees feel that they’re doing their part too.
Support community projects
Giving back to the community is good for your business. Your business is a part of the community, so why wouldn’t you want it to thrive?
You’ll be surprised at the number of ways that your business can give back. From sponsoring local events and sports teams to taking part in different community projects, your time and resources can make a lot of difference to those in need. Becoming a business known for helping people can be an incredible way to bring some light and positivity back into people’s lives, including your own.
There have been many studies that show that encouraging employees to volunteer creates a happier workplace. Why not start a regular volunteering scheme that will allow your employees to help out with a project or group during their working hours? Some regular engagement with the community and helping others can help your business become a friendly face to others, while also transforming your work environment for the better.
Help political education
Low voter turnout is a recurring problem in the world of politics. While you might not have strong political leanings or even wish to share your political views publicly, there are still ways you can help with political education and improve awareness in your community. You could donate time and resources to groups who dedicate their time to political education, providing a more valuable resource than you thought could be possible.
You could also use your position to help others understand how politics affects them. From sharing ideas and education with fellow business owners to exploring the use of Christianity in politics with your church group, there are different ways you can use your influence for good. Don’t focus on supporting a political party or politician, as this could polarize your staff and your clients, and instead – focus on supporting politics and the need to be engaged in the decision-making process.
Reassess your business’ values
Does your business have values? Having some core values can be a good way to reinforce what you and your business stand for and what you want to be achieved. Setting business values gives you and your employees something to guide you in your work. Reassessing your values can signify a new era for your business and lead to some exciting new things. Involve your colleagues and employees in this work – it could be an amazing opportunity for them to feel a part of the business’ work.
Share your wisdom
Business owners inspire many people, particularly those who dream of being entrepreneurs or being a success in their field. Sharing your wisdom could help you inspire a whole new generation of people to go out there and achieve their dreams.
On a smaller scale, while not visit some high schools to talk about your career, or be a speaker at a local event? You could also look at internships and other opportunities that could help others succeed by following your influence. Remember that social media and the internet can be great platforms for connecting with others, so why not offer advice to the masses and keep inspiring new generations of success stories?
Become a mentor
Mentoring is another way you can help others along the path to success. There are many benefits of becoming a mentor, and you could find it a rewarding experience. Do you wish you’d had someone to guide you and offer valuable career advice when you were starting out? Why not be that person for someone else?
Becoming a mentor will also mean that you keep in touch with what’s going on in the world. Mentoring can be a two-way learning experience and provide you with new insights you might not have considered before. It doesn’t have to be a large commitment, but it could make a big difference to someone who’s feeling lost or unsure about their career and path in life.
Be more charitable
Business can make a big difference to their communities by being more charitable. You can start with the basics by offering charitable benefits as an option for your employees, or you could pledge to donate a certain amount of your profits to charity.
Being a part of fundraising activities also help your business to do good for others. Your power and networks can make it easier to encourage others to get involved, so pick a good cause that needs help rather than just jumping on a popular or well-known effort. Being a charitable organization puts your business in a positive light, and it can help you feel good about what you and your business is doing to help others.
Making a difference as a business owner is something you can do every day. From adopting new policies to being more active in the community, you’ll be surprised at the effect that just one person can have. Not everything in business is about profit and loss, so make sure you use your influence for good and drive some positive change.
Ben Hanzel is a Content Management Specialist for Best Company. If he’s not in the office, you can probably find him writing music or going to a concert.
Every new year brings new goals, trends, and fads. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategies should look completely different than they did five years ago.
Unfortunately, not many site and blog owners know where to start when it comes to creating, building, and optimizing a website.
Don’t worry, everyone struggles with ranking in Google.
That’s why the entire digital marketing industry was created — to help site owners win the Google turf war.
Since the process of ranking for the best keywords can take months and even years, your SEO strategy needs to be well thought out.
The main problem is that people aren’t creating big picture SEO strategies. They build their strategy article by article. This type of strategy leads to thin content, lack of enthusiasm, and eventually terrible content.
You need to start by creating a big picture strategy. Think about the objective of your site. Is the purpose to inform? Is it to sell something? Where do you want to drive your traffic? You should have a clear vision and an answer for each of these questions.
You need to clearly define your traffic goals, which means you must know your target audience. After you’ve defined your goals and researched your audience, it is vital that you not only create value, but that you also create targeted value (valuable content exactly applicable to your target audience).
A quick Google search will bring up endless information on best practices, but the reality is that most of this information is either out of date or too general, making it difficult to know where to begin.
It can be overwhelming to sort through the information, let alone implement it. This guide provides all the information you need to optimize your website.
To win the Google game and rank in Google in 2019, you need to perfect these five SEO tactics:
Build a perfect content strategy
Create content that wins an audience and ranks on Google
Beat your Competitors with on-site optimizations
Become an expert in off-site tactics
Utilize tools to maximize efforts
If you implement these SEO practices, you’ll be on you way to the top of the search results in no time.
Building the perfect content strategy in 2019
Whatever the objective, chances are you’ll want to drive traffic to a specific page on your site.
Look at your website as a building.
The foundation is a content strategy.
The walls are your landing pages (what pages visitors are seeing first).
The doors are where your visitors are entering.
The rooms within your building are the different pages on your site.
There is one room where you want every visitor to end up — the page where you turn visitors into money.
Ask yourself, are you missing walls, rooms, a foundation? The goal is to create a building that attracts AND converts. As with any building, the foundation is fundamental. Your content strategy needs to be solid or it won’t support anything built on top of it.
While developing your content strategy, keep the following in mind:
Define your goals: Great content is created with a defined purpose in mind before you even start writing. Much like your big picture strategy, focus on the objective of the individual piece of content, and don’t stray from that objective.
Research your audience: Your content strategy becomes more laser focused as soon as you identify your audience. This can also help you determine what other audiences to target as well.
Create a unique endpoint: This is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. It’s where you want everyone on your site to end up. Make this page as unique and valuable to the reader as possible. This is also the point where you want to sell or convert.
Keep the marketing funnel in mind as you create your content strategy. It’s important to know which stage you’re focusing on with a specific piece of content. The stages are as follows:
This can seem like a lot to keep in mind every time you create a new piece of content; however, a little planning upfront can save a lot of headache in the long run. Set your content strategy upfront and then tweak it as you progress, and you’ll never have to worry about creating meaningless content again.
Creating content that wins an audience and ranks on Google
“Writing great content is a choice. You can choose to put in the time and work required to create great content and build a prosperous brand. Or you can choose to take the easy path and write poor content – a path that ultimately will get you nowhere. It will only result in a waste of time, energy, and resources.”
Most of the content on the internet is useless.
This content either already exists or doesn’t provide value to the user. Make sure your content not only fulfills your content strategy objective, but also provides valuable information to the reader.
Here are a few tips for creating original, engaging, and thought-provoking content to rank in Google:
Write short paragraphs and concise content: Nobody wants to look at a wall of text. It’s visually unappealing and you’ll lose the reader’s interest.
Shorter paragraphs will engage your audience.
Use graphics or video if available: Everybody learns differently. Some people tend to be more visual, so an infographic may help them connect with your content.
A photo or video is a great way to break up the monotony of text.
Refresh old content and update regularly: Your content needs to be relevant or nobody will stick around to read it.
While some information stands the test of time, add a paragraph every now and then with new or updated information.
Target clusters > keywords: This is based around user intent. Google’s algorithm is evolving, and so strictly optimizing for keywords alone is not as effective as it was five years ago.
Organize content into topic clusters and optimize from there. The diversity in keywords has the potential to help you create more user friendly content as well.
Provide answers: When users make a search query, they are looking for an answer, and you need to provide that answer.
Try to cite any sources and keep the information as accurate as possible.
Writing great content is not easy; don’t get discouraged if you struggle at first. It takes time to research and write, so allot yourself time to immerse yourself in the writing. Your effort will be reflected in your writing.
On-site optimization is still a vital part of SEO
Most SEO guides tend to gloss over on-site and focus on off-site tactics, as they are constantly changing. Remember, on-site optimization is still as important as ever. Getting your on-site optimizations lays a foundation to build on.
Google uses the content on your site to determine what keywords your website should rank for. If you have specific keywords you’re looking to rank for, make sure those keywords are in your content. Google will assign more or less relevancy to different elements of the page.
These elements include the following:
Title tag: The page title shows up as the clickable portion on the search engine, as well as within the tab on your site.
This is the most important on-site element to focus on. There’s limited space here (512 pixels, or about 70 characters), so put only the most important information here. The important terms should be placed closer to the front.
The title tag also works as an advertisement for your website on the search engine. Make sure that it’s user-friendly, easy to read, clear, and to the point.
Meta description: Page descriptions don’t directly affect your rankings; however, they are still an important part of SEO as they can sway your click through rate one way or the other.
Click through rate is not a ranking factor, yet it does play an important part when it comes to site traffic.
The best way to write your description is to follow the FAB (Feature, Advantage, Benefit) principle. State what it is, what it can do, and why it’s a good thing.
Page headings: Headers are used as a stylistic element, yet they are still an active ranking factor.
The ranking importance has diminished in recent years, so don’t spend too much time on these.
They should adequately describe the following paragraph, and you shouldn’t need to worry about it beyond that.
Keyword in content: Keywords are important, so include several in the body of your content.
If you have specific keywords you want to rank for, make sure you mention those within the first 100 words of your content.
But don’t sacrifice the quality of your content in order to fit more keywords (otherwise known as keyword-stuffing).
Keyword variance: While Google cares about where the keywords are on your page, it also cares about how keywords relate to one another.
The best practice here is to write your content naturally, then go back to see if you have implemented the keyword enough.
Detail, detail, detail: A recent study by Backlinko shows that Google favors content with over 2000 words.
You don’t need to crank out long content with every article or blog post you put out, but it is something to keep in mind with content you want to perform well. You can also repurpose older content by adding additional relevant information.
Make sure you aren’t adding words just to add words; if it’s not beneficial to the overall piece of content, leave it out. Focus on writing quality content without sacrificing or compromising the integrity of the page.
Alt image tags: Images have a written description as well, known as the Alt image tag.
This is important to optimize for your images, as it will then allow Google to read the image and you can use that to your advantage when it comes to content.
URL: The URL can be an underrated asset. It not only adds additional value to your keywords, it also shows up in the search results themselves.
Like the title tags, don’t make them too long. Just make sure they read well and are relevant to the page.
Brush up on your technical knowledge. Whether it be switching to HTTPS, or enabling Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), it’s important to show some love to the technical side of SEO, as it can enhance the user experience as well as help with your overall rankings.
It’s important to know the difference between white hat and black hat SEO. The difference between white and black hat refers to the technique used in order to get ahead in the search results.
Think of black hat SEO as gaming the system.
Don’t cut corners and try to trick the search engine, and you shouldn’t have to worry about this when it comes to onsite work.
Off-site SEO tactics to set you above the rest
While on-site SEO focuses on making your site relevant, off-site SEO focuses on making your site authoritative. Anyone can create a website and optimize it, but proving to Google you deserve to be on the first page is a different story.
Optimizing for off-site SEO involves improving the search engine and user’s perception of your site’s reputation, authority, relevance and popularity. This is achieved by other relevant and authoritative sites linking to your site, essentially ‘vouching’ for the quality of your content and site.
Most off-site work focuses on obtaining these links. Remember, not all links are created equal.
If you’re focused on creating quality content, you may see a lot of natural links come from people genuinely wanting to share your content. This is the ideal situation, however there are other ways to try to obtain backlinks that can be effective.
Guest posting is one of the most popular methods, and for good reason. Essentially, you write a piece of content for someone else’s site, and in turn, they link back to you.
This works well because you are exchanging content in turn for a link. If the content is good, it’s putting valuable information out there, and you’re compensated with the link.
With guest posting, make sure you are only reaching out to relevant sites, as you want to add value with your expertise.
Guest posting is also a good opportunity to network and build connections within your industry. This goes back to the core principle behind link building which is to build authority.
The more you can interact and network within your industry, the more credibility you will build and you will be an authoritative site to the search engine and users alike.
Tools to help you along the way
As with most professions, you can’t get very far without some tools. As the SEO industry has grown, the available resources and tools have grown with it.
Google Search Console and Analytics will be two extremely valuable tools as they will tell you how you’re doing on the search engines as well as how users are behaving on your site. These are both free, so there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be utilizing them.
Ahrefs is one of the best tools to check keywords and backlinks. Buzzstream is a great tool for outreach.
The list goes on, but what’s important to remember is that these tools can help you track your progress.
Tips from SEO and content marketing experts
These beneficial tips from SEO experts in different industries are divided into the following four categories: Content strategy, Content curation, On-site SEO, and Off-site SEO.
“When we first started doing SEO five years ago, branding is one thing that we overlooked. Initially, we focused on finding the right keywords with a significant search volume.
But after working with some of our clients for a few years, we realized that they were getting the most traffic from their brand name. Studies have also shown that brand recognition increases click-through rate as well.”
2. Correlative potential keywords Cary Haun, SEO Specialist at Page 1 Solutions
“One important aspect of SEO that tends to be overlooked is the correlative potential between keywords. Oftentimes, people will choose and target keywords that are either topping the charts or obscurely dangling with the low-hanging fruit. (This is a common strategy, of course.)
However, combining keywords into new, niche topics is how an innovative SEO can not only find new potential audiences, but create them as well.”
3.Don’t overlook evergreen content for SEO Bradley Shaw, President of SEO Expert Brad Inc.
“Evergreen Content is content that does not lose relevance over time; it is ageless. It does not expire.
Blogs have become the keys to online marketing and SEO. Content should be crafted in a style that presumes the basic facts on the topic will not likely change over a long period of time. Using present perfect tense is one of the easiest ways to keep content evergreen.”
4. Dwell time Pierre de Braux, Content Strategist at Spiralytics Inc
“For me, the most overlooked SEO strategy would have to be keeping visitors on your page for longer.
While traditional on-page/off-page elements are undoubtedly important, bounce rates and average time on page also significantly affect how well a page ranks. And that’s not even mentioning the additional conversion potential that comes with more engagement.
If you take a look at your best-performing content, you’ll almost always see that bounce rates are relatively low and time on page is relatively high. So, the next time you’re trying to optimize a page, think more engagement and more dwell time.”
“Something that I missed for years, and still often neglect now, is a focus on lower volume keywords. Content creation tends to come with SEO nowadays since you need something to rank in the first place. As more marketers and companies start to expand their web presence, they look at the easy wins first. If they have high domain authority, they can go straight for trophy keywords and have a realistic chance of page one without much work.
The result is that everyone else, finds that they’re now on page two or three, with little chance of page one. It’s easier to create a 1,000 word post that includes ten keywords with 100 monthly search volumes than to go for a 1,000 per month keyword. In the same way, pages with ten 1,000 volume keywords words will be easier to rank than a 10,000 volume keyword.”
6. Power words Briana Marie, Content Marketing Manager at Tanzek Media
“The use of power words in title tags is often overlooked when it comes to SEO. Power words are action-packed terms or phrases such as amazing, fast, step-by-step, proven, crazy, exclusive, shocking, etc.
The use of these words in your title tag will greatly increase your click-through-rate as people are seeking the quickest and most effective answers to their questions. Your CTR is important because it helps search engines determine how relevant your content is to the terms the user has searched.”
7. Quality over quantity Matt Erickson, Marketing Director at National Positions
“One area that is commonly overlooked is too much content. Some end up having hundreds of site pages with thousands of words that people are not going to read.
You might have a short-lived bump in your rankings but over time, Google will learn that your content lacks relevancy and your ratings will begin dropping. Shorter, highly relevant content is far more valuable and powerful — so focus on your context, timeliness, and the impact of your content before you focus on content volume and length.”
8. Semantically related subtopics Stephen Jeske, Content Strategist at MarketMuse
“Those new to SEO often focus on keywords while neglecting the importance of semantically related subtopics. That’s a mistake. In September 2018, Google revealed it added a new layer to its Knowledge Graph. It’s called the Topic Layer and helps the search engine deeply understand a topic space in order to surface relevant content.
In this environment, it’s imperative your content demonstrates an in-depth understanding of the subject. Employing a detailed topic model ensures the content you create thoroughly covers those critical subtopics.”
“User experience (UX) is critical to SEO and something that can easily be overlooked, especially with SEO newcomers. UX on a site is often underestimated as a valuable aspect of link building campaigns.
When a site has a good UX, visitors to that site stay. Their extended time on the site adds value to the SEO juice. Conversely, a poor UX causes visitors to leave quickly. This reduces the value of inbound links from that site.”
10. User search intent Brandon Andersen, Chief Strategist at CerAlytics
“The most commonly overlooked aspect of SEO we see with our clients is not taking user intent into account when creating recommendations on keywords and building out content. If a user’s search intent is to know more about a topic, throwing a product page at them in search is not going to work.
Likewise, if the user’s search intent is to get help with a topic immediately from someone, giving them a how-to guide isn’t going to work either. Match the intent of the user’s query with the content you create.”
11. Visual content Tony DeGennaro, Director of Marketing at Dragon Social LTD
“I’d say creating shareable visual content is one SEO tactic I think that tends to get overlooked. Many companies employ full-time designers, who by putting together a simple and updated infographic, could end up drastically improving a post’s backlink profile.
Nearly every infographic I’ve created has resulted in a huge amount of backlinks that have helped to increase SERP. I also think this fits in well with the mantra of creating high-quality content. Everyone likes a good infographic, especially when it’s chock full of updated statistics, quotable information, and high quality visuals!”
Content curation tips
12. Build more landing pages Gene Caballero, Co-Founder of Your Green Pal
“One SEO strategy that gets overlooked is building more landing pages.
What we have done to grow our business and ramp up our organic SEO in different markets is to create landing pages for those new markets — outside of our larger markets that we already operate in. For example, in addition to creating landing pages for large metros, we also create them for smaller cities.
This will ensure that Google algorithm can detect the keywords and our business in that specific location. This helps expand our business to a new city by ranking for search and has improved our business by 10 percent by launching this practice.”
13. Delete old content Tatiana Morand, Content and SEO Manager at Wild Apricot
“Something that many people overlook when thinking of SEO techniques is the importance of deleting old content. If your website has been around for a while, chances are that there’s some pretty thin content on there.
Auditing your site and editing or removing content that provides little to no value to visitors (and to Google) can give you an easy boost without being too time-consuming or difficult to do.”
14. Experience and site structure Shafi Khan, SEO Analyst at Optiux Marketing
“User experience is among the top ranking factor for SEO in 2019 and optimizing the site structure should be the first thing you should do. Make sure no page on the website should take more than three clicks to reach (from the homepage).”
15. Featured snippets Vi Trang, SEO Specialist at Savings.com.au
“I think the most overlooked SEO practice so far has been identifying opportunities for featured snippets. Featured snippets, sometimes known as position 0, offer great visibility to websites because they rank above all organic results.
While keyword research is a familiar task to SEO specialists, it doesn’t often move beyond researching and mapping relevant keywords based on user’s intent and monthly search volume.
Keywords that provide great opportunities for featured snippets (those that have yet to generate any) are often overlooked. These should be singled out on day one, to help drive a content strategy that focuses on such keywords, increasing the likelihood of gaining featured snippets while competitors have yet to get there.”
16. Optimize video content Andre Guelmann, SEO Manager at Promo.com
“Today, the most overlooked SEO practice is ignoring/not optimizing your video content. People no longer want to read online, and we can see this with the increasing prevalence of video results when you do a search on Google.
As an SEO, your job is to optimize CONTENT, no matter the format, so you need to be prepared to do it wherever your audience is.”
17. Start a blog Dr. Ty Belknap, SEO Expert at Port Bell Inc.
“Everybody knows that content is king when it comes to getting higher in the search engines, but few people set up blogs. Blogs are a great way to blast content, but each blog post doesn’t have to be the size of a book.
Write a post reviewing an article or a helpful hint for customers. Small blog posts are not as effective as larger blog posts, but they are much more effective than nothing at all.”
18. Use of images Marie Lamonde, Content Marketing Specialist at DashThis
“One of the SEO practices I consider people overlook is the use of images. We talk about content, blog posts, landing pages, etc. But very few marketers actually talk about the importance of optimizing images for SEO.
We all know that we have to add alt text, but what about the picture itself?
You have to take into consideration the nature of the image (original and relevant), the name (SEO optimized), the format (high-quality pictures with a small size for page speed), the presentation (organize them neatly, and in a way that makes sense for the visitor), and the captions (use some if possible since they are crawlable).
Indexing your images properly can give you a lot of traffic that you would otherwise never get! You could also get image snippets that would place you before the first ranking page! So don’t choose your images lightly, and make sure they are as optimized as your text.”
19. Voice search optimization Ketan Pande, Founder of Goodvitae
“One of the overlooked SEO practices is optimizing content for the voice search. The volume of voice search is increasing day by day, and while writing a blog and making a video, we tend to overlook it.
It’s mostly overlooked by SEO, who runs a blog or youtube channel which concentrates on local topics and issue. The sentence ‘XYZ near me’ is becoming a gold mine, and an SEO must take note of it. Also framing questions in the title can help us in optimizing as per voice search.”
On-site SEO tips
20. Aggregate rating schema Kristie Deaver, SEO Specialist at Page 1 Solutions
“One aspect of SEO which is often overlooked is adding aggregate rating schema to your site. Adding this markup will add the coveted stars to your SERP entry, making it stand out among the sea of results given to users.
SEOs need to be careful when adding this to their sites, as mistakes will result in a warning from Google. Be honest in your schema and you should be fine.”
21. Canonicalization Chris Foster, Head of SEO at Acquiro Digital
“One of the most overlooked aspects of SEO that we’ve experienced is canonicalization. Duplicate pages and URLs are a common occurrence on many platforms and is something which can’t always be avoided, but in terms of SEO, having these duplicate pages could negatively affect your organic performance.
Canonicalizing similar or duplicate pages signals to search engines that these areas of the site are very similar and it allows you to tell Google which is the preferred page that you wish to be shown in search results. It’s a vital element that any new SEO specialist should take into consideration when optimizing a site.”
22. Check redirects Ryan Scollon, SEO and PPC Consultant at ryanscollon.co.uk
“One key tactic that is often overlooked is redirects. When you start working on any site, it’s always worth reviewing the site in Web Archive for any old variations of the website. Then you need to grab a few page URLs from the old versions and test them in a browser. Do they redirect? If not, it’s certainly worth getting a redirect in place should there be any historical links that still exist.”
23. Crawl efficiency David Pagotto, Founder of SIXGUN
“One of the most overlooked SEO practices is the focus on crawl efficiency — essentially making your website as efficient as possible for a search engine to crawl. Unlike individual SEO practices, crawl efficiency is a wider philosophy that encompasses a number of different optimisation areas.
For example, ensuring the website has no unnecessary indexed pages, duplicate content, or internal 301 redirects and 404 errors. This type of thinking can go a long way in boosting your organic search performance.”
24. Fix technical errors first Jeff Ferguson, CEO of Fang Marketing
“The most overlooked practice in SEO is realizing that most SEO issues aren’t SEO issues at all, but larger technical issues that are causing numerous SEO issues. Say you’re just starting work on a new site. You pull out your trusty SEO site crawler tool and it’s a bloodbath of errors. However, nine times out of ten, the reams of errors that you see are caused by another technical issue that mucks up a dozen other issues.
Find the root of the issue first, fix that, then crawl again. Your life will be so much easier.”
“The canonical link is set up incorrectly. Canonical links are designed to show the proper version of a page so Google knows what to display to an end user. Many websites and templates do not have it set up correctly.”
26. Internal link hierarchy Jeff Kear, Head of Marketing at Planning Pod
“Creating internal links to key pages on your site in the body copy of your site pages is vitally important in letting the SERPs know the hierarchy of your site as well as passing more link value to important pages and less to marginal pages.
This is also critical if you are restructuring a site and need new or repurposed pages to take more prominence and want them to be recognized by the SERPs for specific keywords or phrases.”
27. Internal link impact Jimmy Rodriguez, COO of 3dcart
“Internal links can have a huge impact on how Google reads and prioritizes pages on your site, and it can be the difference between you ranking for your target keyword or not. The way you link pages within your site tells the bots what that page is about, so make sure to always clean up your link profile and use the right anchors for the right pages.”
28. Internal linking opportunities Dave Hermansen, CEO of Store Coach
“The mistake I see more often than any other when it comes to websites — especially new ones — is that people miss so many internal linking opportunities. Maybe it’s because there were no internal pages to link to at the beginning.
Almost every post, product, or category on a website has at least one page that it should be linking to from the textual content. Go back and review each page of your site and I’m sure you’ll find internal linking opportunities galore!”
29. Optimize for mobile Sadi Khan, Digital Marketing Manager at Run Repeat
“Optimizing for mobile: This gets overlooked a lot because SEO specialists are working on the desktop computers or laptops. Mobile searches and mobile traffic has now surpassed desktop users.
So, SEO specialists need to acclimatize to a mobile-first approach in everything they do. It will include, but will not be limited to, voice searches, mobile user experience, and loading speed.”
30. Optimize meta titles and descriptions to grab people’s attention Jack Parcell, CEO of Clovr Creative
“I think the biggest thing that new SEO specialists overlook when first starting out is to optimize meta titles and descriptions to grab people’s attention. By grabbing people’s attention, you are sure to improve your click-through rate.
I think that SEO specialists, especially new ones, get so caught up in trying to inject their keywords into the titles and descriptions that the titles and descriptions end up dull and boring. While it is important to make sure the keywords are there, click through rate is a huge indicator for Google, so it is important to stand out from competitors.”
31. Page load speed Andrew King, Search Analyst at Klood Digital
“A commonly overlooked aspect of SEO, and improving the ranking of a website, is page load speed. Many SEOs don’t think about it, as they consider it to be more of a technical issue for developers to deal with, but there are many simple jobs that can be done to improve it. One example is to ensure images are compressed to a reasonable file size to allow them to load more quickly.”
32.Robots.txt file check Borislav Ivanov, SEO Executive at Best Response Media
“The thing that rookies often miss is the thing you should do first when you start working on a website as a technical SEO. That’s a robots.txt checkup along with robots meta directives and canonical links.
Without proper sorting, the bots crawl and index on all of the wrong places. Often there are blocked assets, like CSS files. That means that little bots can’t reach them and render the page.”
33. Sitemap check Stephanie Hooper, Senior SEO and Digital Marketing Manager at Infront Webworks
“One aspect of SEO that gets overlooked is checking your sitemap. Your sitemap is a directory or guide that lists the web pages on a website and can also include when the pages were last updated.
The pages are listed in a hierarchical order and the most relevant pages are listed at the top. It is important to submit your website’s xml sitemap to Google Search Console. This ensures that Google has the most updated version of your website.”
34. Update disavow files Adam Gingery, Paid Search and Digital Strategy Manager at Majux Marketing
“New SEOs aren’t often tasked with updating disavow files, but it’s an important process that can’t be overlooked. Google has said that it actively credits or discredits links in real time, with the implication that your disavow file is superfluous, and you won’t be penalized for bad links — they just won’t help you rank higher.
However, our own tests have shown that deleting a disavow file will expose you to penalty-level fluctuations, and when a disavow is re-uploaded to Search Console, the eventual rankings recovery (likely during a core algorithm update) will make it fairly obvious that the disavow file was important all along.”
35. URL length Kris Rivenburgh, SEO Specialist at RIVE Marketing
“New SEOs often overlook URL length. Although simple to implement, keeping URL slugs as short as possible by removing filler/unimportant words definitely makes a difference.”
Off-site SEO tips
36. Anchor text ratio Kevin Peguero, Digital Marketing Manager at Astro Pak
“Anchor Text Ratio is overlooked. Many people don’t know how to build backlinks to have correct anchor text ratios pointing to their site. They get penalized often for this.
I specialize in building backlinks for my clients. That is what I do and I have came across dozen of brands with this issue. It is also not talked about much. It is not as sexy as other SEO practices.”
37. Broken link building Owen Cook, Founder of Blockchain SEO
“While it may be somewhat time-consuming, broken link building is still an effective way to boost SEO results and is highly scalable in 2019.
Specifically, broken link building is the process of identifying a broken or dead link, recreating the content which was linked to, and then notifying the website or party linking to that dead content. After all, it’s in a website’s best interests to make the user experience as smooth as possible — and broken links sure don’t help!”
38. Digital PR Caroline Khalili, Associate Director of PR at Circa Interactive
“Digital PR has emerged as a powerful tool for generating exposure and establishing credibility online.
Forging strong relationships with journalists, bloggers, and other producers of digital content can help an organization amplify its story and reach larger, higher-quality audiences. Digital PR also creates value in the form of improved search engine rankings, greater conversion rates, and enhanced brand trust.”
“As a white hat SEO tip, Google review system is an overlooked SEO practice. The more positive reviews your website has, the better the SEO. Businesses should take advantage of this practice by asking people to leave their reviews on Google and not just on social media. It’s not only for SEO but also builds the credibility of a website.”
40. Handle toxic backlinks Dan Rawley, Account Manager at The SEO Works
“One area of SEO that often gets neglected is handling toxic backlinks. While actively building strong backlinks is a common focus of any SEO campaign, it is just as important to monitor new links to the site that you have not built, and ensure that undesirable links are dealt with, either by creating and submitting a disavow file or by contacting webmasters to request link removal.
This ensures that the strength of the backlinks you are building is not being diluted and allows you to keep on top of any potentially harmful new links.”
41. Name, address, and phone number consistency Damien Buxton, Director at Midas Creative
“One fairly simple task that often gets overlooked is to review every website that your business is mentioned online. Look at places such as online directories, social media accounts, and local listings What you should look for is consistency of the business name, address, contact number and categories that your business is listed as.
Search engines such as Google cross reference other sites to validate data that it holds on your company. If you’ve moved address recently, for example, make sure that your new location is updated across the web. By doing this you’re helping your website have a better chance of appearing stronger in local search results.”
42. Networking through PR Winston Nguyen, Owner of BitCoinSEO
“People don’t normally associate PR with SEO, but I think most of SEO is PR! After the technical audits, the only thing that’s left is the content creation and link building. And the best way to do link building is through PR.”
43. Optimizing “Google My Business” Lewis Peters, Marketing Specialist at Online Rock Salt
“During the past year we have found a huge lift in our local SEO rankings by optimizing our Google My Business (GMB) account, by increased rankings in the map pack and increased ranking in localized organic searches.
GMB can easily fall under the radar for many businesses; many have theirs left untouched for many years and not paid any attention to it. A new SEO specialist may not think to optimise GMB especially if the contact details have not changed.”
44. Out-of-business competitor sites Simon Rogers, Digital Marketing Executive at Website Pulse
“One of the overlooked link building practices is to check (and keep checking) your out-of-business competitors’ websites and try to get their backlinks. You can do that by outreaching the linking sites and letting them know their link is broken and suggest they link to your content/service/product.”
45. Review outbound links Natalie Athanasiadis, Founder of Ormi Media
“When it comes to SEO, everyone talks about inbound link-building but too often outbound linking is overlooked. You want your site to be linking to authoritative and relevant content.
Pages can be deleted on other websites and not redirected resulting in your site displaying dead links. So it’s really important to review outbound links periodically.”
SEO Tool Tips
46. Google search performance report Ryan MacKellar, SEO Specialist at 9thCo
“One of the most overlooked SEO methods is using the performance report in Google Search Console. Specifically, the keyword impression data can provide a ton of insights.
For example, you can find new keywords that you didn’t know your website was ranking for and ensure you are fully optimized for them. It can also provide a treasure trove of long-tail keywords that make for ideal blog posts.”
“Many new SEO specialists avoid learning basic HTML code. They rely on WordPress and the SEO plugins to get them by. All goes well until they acquire a client, or have the opportunity to, but it’s a custom site.
Simple courses on HTML markup would be beneficial to anyone in the SEO world. Key things to be capable of editing in HTML would be the meta info, title tags, heading tags, links/anchor text, lists, and paragraph copy. There are courses all over the web on these topics. It’s worth learning and will help SEO specialists with longevity in the industry.”
When your business first starts out, all of your manufacturing will be outsourced to an outside company. There’s no sense in building a manufacturing operation of your own when you can’t afford it and you don’t even know whether there is a market for your products. But once you start making some sales and seeing steady growth, it might be time to reconsider. If you’ve got the capital available and your sales volume is high enough to warrant it, building your own manufacturing operation instead of outsourcing has a lot of benefits.
First off, you can usually do it cheaper than outsourcing because you’re just paying the base costs for materials and labor without having to pay an extra fee to the manufacturer on top. Beyond that, you have full control over the operation which means that you can always be finding ways to make it more efficient and reduce your costs.
That level of control also allows you to create a better product. When you’re outsourcing to a manufacturing company, you’re just one of their many clients. Although they will work to create a good quality product, they’re not that invested in your company. But when you’re handling it yourself, you can build a close relationship with your manufacturing staff and work with them to find ways to improve your products and make them the best that they can be.
Those are all good reasons to consider building your own manufacturing operation, but be aware that it’s a big task to take on, especially if you don’t have that much manufacturing experience. However, it can be done if you plan properly and remember these important things.
If you’re looking to expand and build your own manufacturing operation, you’re going to need money. Some of that will come from the business but it’s unlikely that you’ll have enough money to cover it all, which means that you’ll need to approach investors. The cost of a new manufacturing facility is going to be high, so investors need to be sure that it will actually benefit the business and they’ll see good returns on their investment. That’s why you need to make sure that you create the perfect business pitch to convince them that it’s a worthwhile way to spend their money. Do a cost analysis so you can show the estimated amount of money that you’ll save by handling your own manufacturing. You should also include details of how you will use that extra money to push business growth in future. They will also want to know whether this new manufacturing operation will allow you to increase your output and whether you have enough customers to buy those products, so always include your sales projections for the next few years as well. If you walk into a pitch unprepared and you get tripped up by any difficult questions, you’re not likely to get the money that you need. So, always do your research beforehand and prepare for every eventuality.
Location
Once you’ve got the money that you need, the first step is to choose a location for your new manufacturing facility. Price is obviously a big factor and you’ll have a budget for what you can afford, but that’s not the only thing that you need to think about. You’ll need to consider how you’re going to distribute products once they’ve been manufactured. If you build a factory in the middle of nowhere and there aren’t good transport links, you’ll spend a lot more money on distribution and that will eat into the savings that you’ve made in manufacturing. However, the cost of buying the property is likely to be higher if you’re right in the centre of a city. It’s about finding a balance between the cost of the property and the ideal location.
You also need to be aware of any environmental issues in the area. You might be restricted in terms of what materials you can use and what emissions you can put out in certain areas, so always check with local authorities first.
Lastly, you have to make sure that you’re close enough to residential areas so that workers can get to your factory easily. If it’s at least an hour commute for anybody to get there, you’ll struggle to hire the best workers for your factory.
Now that you’ve found the ideal location, it’s time to start building, and that means finding the right contractors. People often underestimate just how many different people are required to set up a manufacturing facility. You’ll need general contractors to either put up the warehouse or repair an existing one so it’s fit to work in. Then you’re going to need a polished concrete contractor to maintain the floors and ensure that they’re safe for work. Once all of the main construction work is done, you’ll need to find plumbers and electricians as well. The quality of contractor that you pick is going to have a direct effect on the quality of your end product, so it’s vital that you choose well.
If you have any other contacts in the manufacturing industry, it’s worth asking them which contractors they used. Always ask to see examples of their previous work as well so you can check the quality. While construction is going on, maintain a close relationship with your contractor so you’re aware of any potential problems.
Your equipment is the most important part of your manufacturing operation. Without good quality equipment, you can’t manufacture good quality products. You also need to consider the safety features on your machines so you can reduce the chance of any accidents. The biggest problem is that manufacturing equipment can be incredibly expensive. In some cases, you can save money by purchasing second hand machines but you’ve got be sure that they’re in good condition otherwise the quality of your product will suffer and your employees won’t be safe in the workplace.
Building your own manufacturing facility is very difficult and it requires a lot of investment, but if you can get it right, it’ll save you money and facilitate a lot of business growth.
Small businesses make a massive impact on the local economy. Either by generating income and then spending it in the local area and then in other local businesses or by bringing in good trade from outside – like tourists. But when it comes to being a business owner, it will always be in your benefit to do good in the area that you do business in.
Ideally, you will begin by seeking out companies and causes that speak to you on a fundamental level. It might be a local animal shelter, it could be a healthy initiative like a walking group, or it might be a small local branch of a larger company.
You don’t have to come from a wealthy background, or even sink a lot of money into anything. Usually, time and help will achieve the funds.
General Community
When it comes to making a swift and lasting impact a lot comes down to the local government. Ensure that you are up to date with domestic policies, what will impact your business, and others that perhaps are vulnerable in your local area. Take the time to work out where the city spends its money, where it comes from, political reform organizations, upcoming changes and what you can do to support your own values and the values of others.
Animals
Each and every city has (sadly) far too many animal shelters that will always be in need of donations. Get in touch with a few and see where your business (and you) can contribute. It might be a portion of profits, it could be a Saturday morning in the kennels. Blanket collections, food, and maybe raising money for medical expenses. You might even look into helping to foster dogs when needed – and who doesn’t love an office dog?
Sadly there are millions of lonely people, and you might even be one of them. If you don’t have the cash to put into something, perhaps you have the time? Seniors, parents of young children are in the bracket that is most often associated with being alone. You could make a point of visiting people you know are on their own, or you could arrange a friendship club in the local area – church halls and community centres tend to be great for this. Bring hot drinks, cake and boardgames and let people interact. Social connects are powerful and fulfilling – so help to nurture those connections.
Give Back
If you have been fortunate enough to do well from your business, then perhaps it is time to pass on that knowledge. Get in touch with local schools, and children’s clubs and see if they have anything coming up like a careers day. Go and speak about your success and failure – perhaps even pass on some of the skills you’ve learned along the way.
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