A Stupid Simple SEO Strategy for Bloggers

[hellis]

Looking for a less complicated stupid simple SEO strategy?

I’m sure you have read countless tutorials about search engine optimization and what is needed to do in order to rank your blog in the search engines.

Over the years SEO has changed and what worked then does not work now due to the ever changing algorithms by Google.

After reading hundreds of SEO articles and testing thousands of strategies with my own blog. I’ve come to realize that most people especially newbies simply over think SEO and get overwhelmed.

In reality SEO for blogging is stupid simple and all you need to do is learn and know the basic of on page and off page SEO along with a little blog technical strategy.

Learn my stupid simple search engine optimization strategy that I’ve been using to rank my blog post – and grow my blog traffic.

Let’s take a quick look at what my stupid simple SEO strategy covers.

Quick Disclaimer: Note that the below is my personal daily strategy that has been working for me.
I'm sure there are hundreds of other SEO strategies that work for others but the point is to not over complicate things so feel free to share any secret strategy that works for you and spread the love.

These are the SEO rules I give myself:

SEO Strategy Rule Guideline

One of the biggest mistakes I see bloggers make is that they try to rank for keywords that is beyond their domain authority.

So before you even try to rank for short tail or long tail keywords you should check your domain authority using the free Moz tool or any other free domain authority checker.

Based on your results use my guideline for your overall SEO strategy. As your website traffic and domain authority grows adjust your keyword phrase length and search targets.

For example if your domain authority is less than 30 then target key words with search volumes of less than 100 and keyword phrase length of five words.

If your domain authority is between 30 - 50 then target keywords with search volumes of 100-300 and keyword phrases length of four words.

Then if your domain authority is 50 or more then target keywords with search volumes of 300 plus and keyword phrases length of two to three words.

As your domain authority rises then you can adjust your SEO strategy accordingly. Hope that was clear.

My Off Page SEO Strategy

Step 1. Use Google auto complete with _ and | tags with seed keyword

Step 2. Use Moz Keyword Explorer

Step 3. Hubshout [ dot ] com/ Web Grader ( See a full keyword list for competitor websites )

Step 4. View Keyword competition on Google

Step 5. Avoid high volume and competition that already has rich snippet or ads for the keyword you will just be wasting your time trying to rank on page one.

My On Page SEO Strategy

Step 1. Use an SEO Plugin ( I use RankMath )

Step 2. Write at minimum 2,000 word article/tutorials

Step 3. Include keywords in H1,H2, H3, H4 tags

Step 4. Sprinkle keyword and phrases throughout the content ( do not keyword stuff )

Step 5. Includes images with alt tag keywords

My 3 Step Technical SEO Strategy

Keep It Simple. All you need to do in SEO is give Google what it wants and what Google wants is pretty simple.

Step #1.

• Technical SEO

Build a solid and healthy website structure with categories and tags. Your main or corner stone content should not be more than three clicks away from your home page.

Identify and fix any issues with:

• Site structure

• Page Speed

• Index Management

• Duplicate content

• Internal Redirects

• Trust Signals

Here are four (4) main problem to fix your rankings

1. Page Speed

You can use a plugin like WP Rocket (premium ) or Autoptimize ( free) to help your website with speed and Short Pixel plugin to optimize your images.

2. WordPress Taxonomies V.S. Duplicate Content

Pruning your website is key. WordPress creates tons of duplicate content that Google hates. All this index bloat decreases the overall SEO value of your website and causes you not to rank.

Not only do you risk duplicate content problems but you also wastes valuable crawl budget time on your website.

So what do you do-

• Prune the site by applying noindex/no follow to your category and tags
• Use an SEO plugin like RankMath or Yoast ( I use RankMath )
• Prune pages with duplicate content ( If you have similiar content merge your post )
• Prune pages that offer little to no value to your users ( Thin content

3. Fixing Internal Redirects

Using a plugin like RankMath or the free version software like Streaming Frog can check for internal redirects.

Quick Note: Downloading Steaming Frog requires a lot of resources and my slow down your laptop/computer.

4. Improve Thin Content

You should take the time to go back and improve or remove thin content from your blog as this negatively affects SEO.

Try and achieve 2,000 plus words per post but don’t force it and update old content.

Step #2.

• Content Creation

This is where most bloggers fall short. Regular content creation is key and creating relevant content that helps people will be key to blog success. It's that simple.

Step #3.

• Link Building

Acquire links from relative authority websites will help your traffic growth, guesting and asking for referrals will help you links grow.

The more (high quality) links that point to your website, the higher it will rank in Google. And the specific links you’re looking for are ‘do-follow’ links which pass 100% link juice, as opposed to ‘no-follow’ links.

You know, the ones that you get for simply commenting on blogs/forums (they don’t work). Here are some of the link building methods I use to create an authoritative website:

• Guest posting
• Directories
• Building relationships

Remember to just keep it simple, rinse and repeat.

 

[Blogmoz]

Short and straight to the point.

I think that as a blogger the most troubling part is realizing you have to write for others, not just for yourself.

Unless you focus on Pinterest, in that case just F keyword research.

 

[thescrrr]

Use images to break up the text, otherwise, people won't read your article.

 

[Junior Arthur]

Thanks for sharing high-quality stuff

 

[Dreams411]

Nice share. I prefer to include keyword in header 1 and 2 only.

 

[Shaybib]

Don't you think google understand tag and categories and don't treat them as duplicates?

 

[Mr Positive]

The da part I don’t agree as I have seen sites with little da take down giant sites

 

[Tom Chase]

that already has rich snippet or ads for the keyword you will just be wasting your time trying to rank on page one.

Nice share!! disagree on above point- depends on the searcher intent I have seen pages at 6-7 position with review post getting lot of the traffic than 1-3 position ads on low volume KW (<1000).

 

[FLASH POINT]

If you use to images to better to reach people read your article.

 

[phoenix9]

This is an example of blind mind try leading another blind man.

 

[bumblehornet]

this topic very good info inside bigg thank you

 

[Roger Marquez]

One of the biggest mistakes I see bloggers make is that they try to rank for keywords that is beyond their domain authority.

I agree with pretty much everything else but not entirely with this.

The da part I don’t agree as I have seen sites with little da take down giant sites

This is more in line to what I see regularly whenever I am doing keyword research and, especially, SERP Analysis to check a keyword competition.

I´ve seen smaller DA sites outrank sites with much higher DA.

Not targeting those keywords might be a mistake and can be passing out on a great opportunity to bank hard on a single keyword.

Also, I know high DA sites have an advantage when it comes to publishing new content in comparison to a much smaller DA one but, Google ranks pages NOT domains.

So, if you´re looking to target a keyword and you see on the top 3 positions on the SERP sites with a higher DA but, when you dive deep into their articles you´re 100% sure you can offer a much better alternative then, by all means, GO FOR IT!

I´ve seen SERP results for a particular keyword filled with high authority sites offering content that doesn´t match Google user´s search intent. Personally, that´s a great opportunity to grab.
Whenever you see a high DA site ranking for an article that doesn´t match the search intent and it´s solely ranking because of their DA, that´s a great opportunity.

I am NOT stating you should go after keywords targeted by high DA sites, those are usually high competition keywords. I am just stating that you shouldn´t just pass those keywords up without properly diving deeper and running a SERP analysis to further evaluate the competition and better and more accurately assess your chances of ranking for that keyword.

I also agree with what @Tom Chase mentions about having too many SERP features on a search result.

Yeah, a keyword´s CTR will be much smaller depending on the number of SERP features present on any given search query but that doesn´t mean you can´t still generate a decent amount of traffic from a keyword.

 

[Wealii]

nice share

 

[hellis]

This is an example of blind mind try leading another blind man.

@phoenix9 I appreciate and respect everyones input and comments in this community.

I made it very clear in the post what may work for me may not work for others and also my method is not the only one that works.

When comments like what you made "This is an example of blind mind try lead another blind man" it's not only insulting but your post response gave zero value to the thread and does not help anyone.

However you are entitled to your personal opinion.

By the way quick question, what has been your contribution to to community since joing? Im eager to know.

 

[hellis]

Don't you think google understand tag and categories and don't treat them as duplicates?

I wish Google did but your category and tags will still generate as duplicate content I personally noindex them on my blog to avoid being penalize for it.

 

[hellis]

The da part I don’t agree as I have seen sites with little da take down giant sites

Thanks Ill look into that.

 

[hellis]

Nice share!! disagree on above point- depends on the searcher intent I have seen pages at 6-7 position with review post getting lot of the traffic than 1-3 position ads on low volume KW (<1000).

Great tip and I agree and I have some review post gaining traction. Thanks

 

[hellis]

I agree with pretty much everything else but not entirely with this.

This is more in line to what I see regularly whenever I am doing keyword research and, especially, SERP Analysis to check a keyword competition.

I´ve seen smaller DA sites outrank sites with much higher DA.

Not targeting those keywords might be a mistake and can be passing out on a great opportunity to bank hard on a single keyword.

Also, I know high DA sites have an advantage when it comes to publishing new content in comparison to a much smaller DA one but, Google ranks pages NOT domains.

So, if you´re looking to target a keyword and you see on the top 3 positions on the SERP sites with a higher DA but, when you dive deep into their articles you´re 100% sure you can offer a much better alternative then, by all means, GO FOR IT!

I´ve seen SERP results for a particular keyword filled with high authority sites offering content that doesn´t match Google user´s search intent. Personally, that´s a great opportunity to grab.
Whenever you see a high DA site ranking for an article that doesn´t match the search intent and it´s solely ranking because of their DA, that´s a great opportunity.

I am NOT stating you should go after keywords targeted by high DA sites, those are usually high competition keywords. I am just stating that you shouldn´t just pass those keywords up without properly diving deeper and running a SERP analysis to further evaluate the competition and better and more accurately assess your chances of ranking for that keyword.

I also agree with what @Tom Chase mentions about having too many SERP features on a search result.

Yeah, a keyword´s CTR will be much smaller depending on the number of SERP features present on any given search query but that doesn´t mean you can´t still generate a decent amount of traffic from a keyword.

Great feed back thanks for the tips

 

[HustleTong]

May help some users. Well appreciated.

 

[hellis]

May help some users. Well appreciated.

Thank you for the contructive feedback.