You’ve read about keyword research, inbound links and optimizing web copy for search. If you follow the leading SEO experts, you undoubtedly know about Penguin, Hummingbird and Mobilegeddon. But what are they NOT telling you about? In this presentation, SEO expert Bruce Chapman (from DNN) shares 24 tips that you haven’t considered. View this presentation for tricks that you can apply to your website right away. You’ll also see a list of tools you can use to test to find out the best results and improve the SEO of your site.

2. About Me
•DNN SEO Strategist
•10 years working in SEO
•SEO strategy for DNN’s products
•SEO strategy for DNN’s website (dnnsoftware.com)
Twitter: @brucerchapman | @DNNCorp

3. 24 Tips to Improve SEO
Simple Easy
Actual
Work

4. Basic SEO Strategy
Starting with the Right Plan

5. Tip # 1: Be on the Internet for the Topic at Hand
Have a website page on
the topic
Make sure it’s publicly
accessible
Make sure it’s indexable
by Search Engines

6. Tip # 2: Your ‘SEO’ Pages, Not Your Entire Website
Optimize your home page
for your most valuable
search intent
Optimize all your other
pages for specific search
intent, and don’t overlap
Domain names give
authority, but pages rank
for keywords
Winning is done one URL
at a time

7. Tip # 3: Develop a List of Key Phrases
3-Step Process
1. Understand what customers in your space are searching for
2. Compile a list of keywords and phrases that customers are using
3. Verify estimated traffic and choose the target keywords (and intent)

8. Tip #4: Sign Up for Google Webmaster Tools and Use It
Google/Bing have Webmaster Tools
accounts
• Check for crawling issues
• Understand how search engines
see your site
• Understand your Conversion Rate
(CTR)
• View your search traffic based on
keywords
Check often – put it in your calendar

9. Tip # 5: Sign Up for an Analytics Account and Use It
Google Analytics or other Analytics
Product
Measure Organic Search Visitors
Understand how your search traffic
is converting
>Use the results to modify your
strategy
Google Analytics
Bing Analytics
Evoq 8 Content Analytics

10. On-Page SEO Basics
Make the Most of Your Content

11. Tip # 6: Start with On-Page Ranking Factors
SEO On-Page Factors: URL, Title, H1, Description, Alt Tags
http://www.dnnsoftware.com/products/evoq-content/content-personalization

12. Tip # 7: Tag Your Images with Alt Text
Tag each image element with alt text
(use a descriptive filename as well)
Works for the page, and works for the
image
Also helps with visually impaired visitors
Don’t do keyword stuffing
Alt Tags helps with Image search

13. Tip # 8: Know How Your Pages Appear to Search Bots
Bots render pages like a browser (not text browser)
Tools
Webmaster Tools includes ‘Fetch as Googlebot’

14. Tip # 8: Know How Your Pages Appear to Search Bots
Bots render pages like a browser (not text browser)
Tools
https://www.feedthebot.com/tools/
• Useful page for reading bot results

15. Tip # 9: Check robots.txt File for Disallow on Resources
Robots.txt files can be forgotten
after site setup
2014 – change in Google bot
rendering for modern sites
Search engine bots respect the
file – for all resources
Check to see that all resources
are allowed - including script,
image and CSS files

16. Mobile Visitors and Search
Can Your Visitors Find You?

17. Tip # 10: Know Your Mobile Visitors and Conversions
Understand what
proportion of visitors
are mobile
Use the Google
Analytics Industry
Comparison tools to
assess position

18. Tip # 10 : Know Your Mobile Visitors and Conversions
Understand what
proportion of visitors
are mobile
Use the Google
Analytics Industry
Comparison tools to
assess position

19. Tip # 11: Use a Modern Responsive Theme for Mobile
Optimization
• What is responsive
design?
• Responsive Design to
match device display
• Can be separate site or
separate page
• Fonts, buttons, images
suitable for mobile
devices
• Optimize search
conversion with CTA first
on mobile

20. Tip # 12: Use Mobile-Friendly Code and Components
Avoid flash – use
HTML players instead
YouTube embeds –
use iFrame not Object
Avoid any type of
library or code that
increases the page
payload
Pictured: A website as seen on my desktop.

21. Tip # 12: Use Mobile-Friendly Code and Components
Avoid flash – use Html
5 players instead
YouTube embeds –
use iFrame not Object
Avoid any type of
library or code that
increases the page
payload
Pictured: That same website on my iPhone.
Wait, what happened?

22. Tip # 13: Test your Pages for Google Mobile-Friendly
Attribute
• Google Mobile Friendly Test
• Check the preview image
• Test all your pages,
particularly those which
convert search traffic
• Check for ‘Mobile Friendly’
marker on mobile search
results
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/

23. Tip # 13: Test Your Pages for Google Mobile-Friendly
Attribute
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/

24. Web Page Performance
The Web Likes Fast Pages

25. Tip # 14: Concentrate on Page Performance
Measure your page load speed
• Page speed is a ranking factor
Time To First Byte (TTFB) and
rendering time is critical
• Google recommends < 200 ms
TTFB

26. Tip # 15: Analyze Slow Loading Pages and Identify and
Implement Fixes
Tools:
Google Pagespeed (part of Chrome developer tools)
YSlow Plugin (published by Yahoo)
Identify the worst areas that are easiest to
fix.
Iterate as changes are made and score
improves.

27. Tip # 15: Analyze Slow Loading Pages and Identify and
Implement Fixes

28. Tip # 15: Analyze Slow Loading Pages and Identify and
Implement Fixes
Tools:
• Google Pagespeed (part of Chrome developer tools)
• YSlow Plugin (published by Yahoo)
Identify on the worst areas which are easiest to fix
- Tools provide suggestions
Iterate as changes are made and score improves

29. Conversion Optimization for SEO
Getting Your Visitors to ‘Yes’

30. Tip # 16: Measure the Value of Organic Search
What is the search intent of visitors?
Are visitors converting to outcomes?
Tasks
Determine search intent by page
Set up goal measurement and reports in Analytics
product

31. Tip # 16: Measure the Value of Organic Search

32. Tip # 16: Measure the Value of Organic Search

33. Tip # 17: Optimize and Test Conversion for Organic Search
•Try different page elements to measure and test
conversion
• Links, Buttons, calls to action
•Use tools like Google Analytics or Optimizely to
measure results
•Understand Statistical Significance when doing tests.

34. Tip # 17: Optimize and Test Conversion for Organic Search
Pictured: a test we performed on our “Employee Intranet” page.

35. The Search Long Tail
Capturing Different Searches with
Content Creation

36. Tip # 18: Long Tail Keyword Research
Long tail keywords are used infrequently but
are large in aggregate
Do research around search intent with
different modifiers:
Action words: buy, compare, install,
customize
Tools: mine your Webmaster tools data – it’s
already full of long tail keywords
Head
“widgets”
Tail
“how do I upgrade from widget 1.4 to widget 2.4”
Potential : higher traffic, lower competition

37. Tip # 19: Create Content to Target Long Tail
Blogs are an excellent way to
capture long tail
• Categories/Tags for specific
topics
• Change theme if different
look/feel desired
Microsites for strategic use:
Conference, Special Event,
Promotion
Content Management Systems
excel at long tail targeting by
creating and managing content.

38. Tip # 20: Tap Into User Generated Content
Community Features on your site create content
Content is relevant, trend following and full of key phrases matching
search intent.
Why Online Communities help lift SEO

39. Specific Case Handling
How To’s

40. Tip # 21: Use Structured Data to Enhance Search
Results
• Structured data is annotations to
your html markup to provide
context to data
• Also known as Microformats
• Can provided enhanced results
with extra information
• Find data formats at
http://schema.org/docs/schemas.
html
• Restaurants
• Recipes
• Authors
• Product, Event, Place

41. Tip # 22: Use DNN to Help with SEO
DNN can help with many of these strategies
See my blog post ’10 Ways DNN Can Improve Your Website's
SEO’

42. Tip # 23: What Should I Stop Doing?
SEO – what might have, but no longer applies
• Meta keywords data is not a ranking factor
• Googlebot can read:
• Querystrings / Dynamically Loaded Content / Javascript/Css
Cloaked Content
• Google Toolbar PageRank score is not updated anymore
• Press Releases won’t give inbound links
• Search Engine Submission isn’t required
• Cloaking/Keyword Stuffing/Link Spamming

43. Tip # 24: Fix the Problems You Find
Identify 3-5 (or more!) tips from this
presentation and apply them to your website.
NOW.
Why not?
Thanks for reading!

44. Next Steps
Read Related Blog Posts:
10 Ways DNN Can Improve Your Website SEO
A Q&A with Groupon on Their SEO and SEM
Strategies for SEO Keyword Research