What is SEO and How Does Search Engine Optimization Work?
Many people use search engines daily for various purposes. A large portion of them are potential customers. Therefore, if a brand occupies high positions on the search engine results page, its visibility increases. This is what determines the importance of SEO, Search Engine Optimization, which plays a leading role in raising company awareness in today’s digital world.
What is SEO and how does it work? You’ll find the answer to this question here. Commschool lecturer, Niko Samkharadze, will tell you how to make a business successful through search engine optimization.
Niko is one of the leading specialists in the field, with over 5 years of experience in SEO. His portfolio includes 20+ projects in both local and global markets in industries such as Adtech, iGaming, tourism, financial sector, E-commerce, healthcare, online media, and more. Currently, Niko works as an SEO specialist at Upgaming and as a freelance SEO specialist at the digital transformation agency Redberry.
SEO is a practice through which a website’s traffic increases both qualitatively and quantitatively by improving its positions in search engines. The work cycle consists of the following stages:
- Website SEO audit
- Keyword research
- Competitor research
- Defining SEO strategy
- Technical SEO
- On-Page SEO
- Off-Page SEO
- Reporting
- Repetition
What factors determine a website's position in search engine results?
Officially, Google has more than 200 factors by which it determines the position of websites on the search engine results page. However, their number may be much higher. In reality, Google’s algorithm code is closed and inaccessible to everyone. The reason for the closure is that otherwise, people would misuse this knowledge and Google would turn into one big spam website. However, interestingly, in 2022, information about Yandex’s search engine so-called Ranking Factors leaked. Anyone had access to it. It turned out that there were 1922 such influential factors; that is, 1922 factors according to which the algorithm assessed the “goodness” of a website, which is quite a lot.
For example, one of the influential factors is considered to be the age of the website's domain, i.e., how long this or that website has been continuously functioning and existing in the web space.
SEO
In reality, an SEO specialist doesn’t need to memorize all this information. It’s quite enough to know the fundamental factors that are most important. These are:
- Quality, unique, and valuable content on the website;
- Fast and user experience-oriented website;
- Quality, organic signals from other sites to our website;
- Secure website from which user’s personal information will not leak.
Why is keyword research important?
As Niko notes, keyword research is one of the most important stages in the process of planning and implementing an SEO strategy. In reality, it’s the first stage when starting work on a project. For comparison, just as we turn on the light when entering a dark room, keyword research has a similar effect.
Only through properly conducted keyword research is it possible to take the right direction on the project and achieve the desired results. Otherwise, the website may end up in top positions for keywords that are irrelevant and have poor quality traffic that won’t convert.
For example, let’s say we have an online store in Britain where we sell chips and we’ve defined our main keyword as “Potato Chips”. This word in British English means “french fries” and not “chips” (the correct term would be “Crisps”). If our website ends up in top positions for this word, we’ll get visitors who are actually looking for french fries, while we’re offering chips. With this method, we definitely won’t sell many chips.
How to develop a successful SEO campaign?
In Niko’s opinion, competitor analysis and constant effort to offer customers better service or product than the competitor is one of the starting points of successful SEO. When working on a project, you should always keep your finger on the pulse of competitors’ websites. SEO specialists try to create better quality content than them and create a better experience for the user than them. There are appropriate tools to effectively monitor competitors. For example, Ahrefs and Semrush.
To measure SEO success, it’s important to agree with the client at the beginning of the project, or determine yourself, what the KPIs will be. As a rule, the main goal is to increase conversions. This could be sold products, purchased services, more regular readers on a news website, more listeners on a podcast, etc. To get conversions, it’s important that the website appears in top positions for relevant keywords and has increased organic traffic.
The best method to measure success is to take the main metrics (Clicks, Impressions, CTR) and compare current and previous periods. Observe what the dynamics are according to overall growth and individually according to keywords. Google Analytics and Google Search Console are quite sufficient as tools to know exactly where you are and what you need to improve.
If we're in first place for all important keywords, we congratulate ourselves and start looking for new keywords, new opportunities to develop ourselves and develop the business.
SEO vs AI
Is SEO dead in 2023? Niko’s answer is simple – no. As long as Google’s main source of income is ads in the search engine, SEO is not threatened. To use facts, in Q4 2023, Google’s revenue was $86.31 billion. 76% of this income came from ads run in search engines, which, in turn, is a 12.7% increase compared to the previous year.
As for artificial intelligence, Niko’s opinion is this: The widespread so-called Generative AI type artificial intelligences need real information, databases, materials from which they can learn, develop and generate satisfactory results for us. In most cases, the “learning material” of artificial intelligence is websites placed in the web space. Life is not static either and many new things happen around us every day, which are then illustrated in the web space. Therefore, a good website is only welcome for artificial intelligence. This should be the goal of SEO specialists – to have the type of content on the website that will benefit both the user and artificial intelligence.
Today, an SEO specialist is one of the most in-demand and highly paid professions. Therefore, if you’re ready for new challenges, the SEO course is for you. Learn more about the program and join us at Commschool!
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