SEO Checklist: How to Get More Organic Traffic (Fast)

[00:00] In fact, this is the same checklist I've used to get first page Google rankings for competitive keywords, I'm Brian Dean, the founder of Backlinko,

[00:15] my entire SEO checklist, When I first got started with SEO, So, I started to search for things,

[00:27] and how to SEO my site, and despite following all the advice It was really frustrating. Today, my site brings in hundreds of thousands

[00:41] and major media sites, like Entrepreneur, My secret, I developed a repeatable, and that's exactly what I'm gonna share with you right now.

[00:56] Set Up Essential SEO Tools and Plugins. three important SEO tools set up and ready to go.

[01:08] is the Google Search Console. to track your site's performance in Google. that are holding you back, but most important of all,

[01:22] that you rank for, and where you rank for them, this data comes straight from Google, The next tool you wanna set up is Google Analytics.

[01:37] to see how people find and use your website, With Google Analytics, you can do all sorts of cool stuff identify the exact websites that send you traffic,

[01:53] and Time on Site, and lots more. you need to install the Yoast SEO Plugin. and for good reason.

[02:08] SEO friendly right outta the box. Find Keywords That Customers Search For. The question is, how do you find keywords

[02:24] Here are three simple techniques. First, find long tail keywords with Google Suggest. but don't press enter or the search button.

[02:37] Instead, take a look at the keywords that Google shows you. that people are actually searching for, you know that lots of people are searching for that term.

[02:51] Next, find keywords with the Google Keyword Planner. is Google's official keyword research tool. but it's still super useful for SEO keyword research.

[03:05] and check out the suggestions that the tool spits out. Finally, spy on online communities. I'm talking about reading threads on sites like reddit,

[03:21] All you need to do is head over to the community and find questions that crop up again and again. on the Paleo sub-reddit

[03:34] so if you ran a site in the Paleo niche, and Keto friendly desserts With that, let's jump into Step #3,

[03:48] So, you've installed all of the important SEO tools, Now it's time to actually optimize your site. in the first 100 words of your page.

[04:03] that show up at the top of your page, For example, on this post for my site, you can see that I use the term SEO tools right off the bat.

[04:17] Just like with your page's content, on terms that show up early in your title tag. is SEO case study, and, as you can see,

[04:33] Third, use short URLs that include your target keyword. Well, a recent SEO industry study and higher Google rankings,

[04:47] so you'll wanna keep your URLs short and sweet. uses a super short URL, and that short URL for my target keyword, SEO techniques.

[05:03] in a H1, H2, or H3 tag. but every little bit helps, especially if you're trying For example, my main keyword for this page

[05:18] is Content Marketing Tools, so I use that exact keyword Moving right along, let's quickly blast through Find and Fix Technical SEO Issues and Errors.

[05:33] can tank your rankings, you'll wanna find and fix 'em right away, here's how. As you might've heard, Google now runs

[05:49] on a mobile-first index, which means if your site What the heck, I can't click anything. with the Google Mobile-Friendly Test.

[06:04] whether or not your page is mobile-friendly. A crawl error just means that Google is having trouble and if they can't index your page,

[06:20] in the Google Search Console using the Coverage Report. Your site's loading speed is a confirmed ranking factor.

[06:33] page loading speed isn't gonna make or break your rankings, but in general, the faster your site loads, the better. check out Google's PageSpeed Insights and WebPageTest.org.

[06:51] for how quickly your site loads. to help you speed things up, nice. Create Content Designed to Rank in Google.

[07:06] you need to publish great content, Uh, it's content that's great. that actually ranks in Google,

[07:21] to create the type of content that ranks First, create awesome content with the Skyscraper Technique. for creating amazing content.

[07:35] to double my search engine traffic in two weeks. First, find a piece of content Next, create something even better,

[07:48] For example, last year I noticed that lots of people are writing about SEO for Ecommerce, and make something even better,

[08:00] on an 8,000-word post called Ecommerce SEO, The Definitive Guide. and using email outreach, and this three-step process

[08:14] It also helped me crack the top three results Second, break your content down into chunks No one, and I mean no one likes reading

[08:29] That's why I always break things down into chunks, because it makes my content super easy to read and skim, my Bounce Rate, a key Google ranking factor,

[08:45] Next, make sure to cover When I recently analyzed Content that covers an entire topic in depth

[08:59] ranks above content that only covers part of a topic. I mentioned earlier? a lame blog post, like five ways to get high rankings

[09:12] that covered everything there is to know about optimizing Ecommerce sites, which helped my page Besides making your content in-depth,

[09:26] I'm talkin' about stuff like images, polls, For example, I use lots of screenshots, visuals, and videos in pretty much every post.

[09:41] on content formats that are working best right now. to analyze almost one billion blog posts, Well, there was some good news and some bad news.

[09:56] The bad news is that most content is completely ignored. In fact, we found that 94% of all published content That's right, zero.

[10:11] that attract more backlinks than others. and infographics get significantly more backlinks

[10:23] For example, this why post has been linked to Obviously, you can't just publish a why-post but our data shows that sticking

[10:38] to these three content formats can increase the odds Speaking of links, it's time for the last step So, are backlinks still important for SEO?

[10:53] by Stone Temple Consulting found that backlinks are still one of Google's most important ranking factors. about ranking in Google, you need backlinks,

[11:07] that are working great right now. First up, build backlinks using link roundups. to get backlinks, why?

[11:20] is to link to amazing content. there's a good chance For example, here's a roundup in the marketing space.

[11:34] and content marketing that came out a giant guide to SEO, and because my post they happily linked to me.

[11:49] So, why do I say strategic guest posting That's because guest posting can work,

[12:01] and if you do guest posting the wrong way, So, how do you do guest posting the right way? on a respected site in your niche.

[12:17] on any website that has a Write For Us page, A good rule of thumb that I follow that are gonna send me targeted traffic,

[12:31] For example, here's a guest post Buffer's blog focuses more on social media, but those two topics are related enough.

[12:45] If I publish the same post on a site about cute cats, Anyway, I got a solid backlink for my post, of targeted traffic to my site.

[12:57] is to go on podcasts as a guest. link-building techniques on the planet. from your podcast appearance,

[13:11] You don't need to pitch topics, or work with an editor. and show up and provide value, that's it. I've actually appeared on over 70 podcast episodes

[13:27] Last up, we have the age-old strategy This process couldn't be any simpler. Then, let 'em know about it.

[13:42] I published this giant list of SEO tools. and hoped and prayed that people actually see it, So I reached out to each person

[13:57] and as you can see, most of the people that I reached out to Now, before we close out this video, Tap Into Advanced SEO Techniques and Strategies.

[14:12] so lemme walk you through a handful that are working really well right now. is to delete what I call zombie pages.

[14:26] that don't bring in any traffic, with lots of zombie pages. that they prefer to rank sites

[14:39] over those that are bloated, That's why I make sure In fact, Backlinko generates

[14:52] I've only published around 70 total blog posts. I focus 100% on quality, not quantity.

[15:07] like a crazy person. so use Google Analytics to find a handful of pages then delete them, or redirect them to another related page.

[15:24] Then, over the next few months, For example, the team at Proven.com noticed that they had almost 50,000 pages indexed,

[15:37] As it turned out, a lot of these extra pages so they deleted them, and thanks to this Proven's organic traffic significantly increased.

[15:53] is to boost your organic click-through rate. to how many people click on your site in the search results. and click on the other results,

[16:07] but if lots of people click on your result, and you'll get a rankings boost. "when you click on a link in Google Search,

[16:22] "when ranking that search result." Scan the first page search results what someone searching for that keyword

[16:35] Then, optimize your title tag and description For example, if you search for video SEO, are guides and tutorials.

[16:49] don't want a handful of tips, they want a complete guide, I made sure to include the word guide

[17:01] The last advanced SEO tip I have for you Back in the day, I'd publish a new post and as time went on, my content got really outdated.

[17:16] and overall, content that just looked kinda dated, Go back and update every single post on my site.

[17:29] Like I said earlier, I only have about 70 posts, to go through and update. I only had to update about 20 posts,

[17:42] I'd notice a huge spike in search engine traffic, it was still much higher than before the update.

[17:54] For example, a few months ago, I updated this post. that page still gets 30% more organic traffic And, thanks mostly to these content updates,

[18:08] my site's overall organic traffic is up 24.6%, which means 249,000 more people So that's it for my SEO checklist.

[18:21] make sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel right now. and if you want exclusive SEO and traffic techniques head over to Backlinko.com

[18:36] Now, I wanna turn it over to you. Are you gonna update your old content, Let me know by leaving a comment below, right now.

[18:50] (keyboard clicking) I was like, who said that (laughs)? Usually, it's higher at the end.

[19:02] It's kinda on here.