On-Page SEO versus Technical SEO

This article explores the crucial differences between On-Page SEO and Technical SEO, emphasising that mastering both can greatly enhance your website's performance. It also covers how tools like SiteAudits and SEMRush can enhance your website's health.

The Basics of On-Page SEO

On-Page SEO involves optimising individual web pages to boost search engine rankings and organic traffic. It includes enhancing elements like the title tag, meta description, headings, content, images, and URLs. The aim of On-Page SEO is to enhance the webpage's relevance and value for both users and search engines.

Understanding the Importance of keyword research and targeting

Prior to commencing website optimisation, it is crucial to grasp the significance of keywords pertinent to your business and target demographic. Completing comprehensive keyword research enables the identification of optimal keywords for incorporation into your content, titles, and meta descriptions.

Optimising Title Tags and Meta Descriptions

Title tags are the first thing users see when they come across your website on a search engine results page. It's crucial to have an optimised title that accurately describes the content of your webpage and includes relevant keywords.

Similarly, meta descriptions provide a brief summary of what the webpage is about, so it's essential to make them compelling and informative.

Creating High-Quality and Engaging Content

Content is king in the world of SEO. Ensuring your webpages have high-quality, relevant, and engaging content is critical to improving your website's ranking. Consider incorporating keywords naturally into your content, but avoid keyword stuffing as it can negatively impact your SEO.

It's also essential to update your content regularly to keep it fresh and relevant for both users and search engines.

Properly formatting headings and subheadings 

Using properly formatted headings and sub-headings (H1, H2, H3…) can also improve the readability of your content for search engines and make it more appealing to readers.

Optimising images with alt tags 

When you are uploading images to your website including descriptive captions can also contribute to your overall SEO efforts.

Make sure to provide valuable information that is easy to read and understand, as well as visually appealing with images and videos. Engaging content not only keeps users on your website longer, but it also increases the likelihood of them sharing your content, which can lead to backlinks and improved rankings.

Remember that quality trumps quantity when it comes to content. It's better to have a few high-quality pages than many low-quality ones. 

Improving page load speed and mobile-friendliness

Mobile friendliness and super-fast page load speeds are also important factors for SEO. With an increasing number of users accessing websites through mobile devices, it's crucial to have a responsive design that caters to different screen sizes and loads quickly.

The Fundamentals of Technical SEO

Technical SEO focuses on optimising the technical aspects of a website to improve its visibility and crawling efficiency by search engines. It involves optimising a website's infrastructure, server settings, and code to ensure search engines can easily access and understand the content. Technical SEO plays a crucial role in improving website performance and user experience.

Key focus areas for Technical SEO should include:

Optimising website structure and navigation

A well-organised website structure and navigation helps search engines effectively crawl and index the website's pages. This includes creating a clear hierarchy, using descriptive URLs, and implementing breadcrumb navigation.

Implementing XML sitemaps and robots.txt files

XML sitemaps provide a roadmap for search engines to easily discover and index all of the website's pages. Robots.txt files, on the other hand, help control which pages are crawled and indexed by search engines.

Ensuring proper URL structure and canonical tags

URL structure is an important aspect of Technical SEO. It should be concise, descriptive, and keyword-rich. Additionally, implementing canonical tags helps prevent duplicate content issues.

Optimising website speed and performance

Site speed is an important ranking factor for SEO. Search engines favour websites that load quickly as it enhances user experience. Page loading speed is also an important factor in both user experience and search engine rankings. Minifying code, and reducing server response time can significantly improve website loading speed.

Fixing crawl errors and broken links

Broken links and 404 errors can negatively impact a website's performance in search results. Regularly monitoring for these issues and fixing them promptly can help improve the overall usability of a website.

Enhancing mobile-friendliness and responsiveness

As mentioned earlier, having a responsive design is crucial for both user experience and SEO. With more users browsing on their mobile devices, it's essential to have a website that looks good and functions well on different screen sizes.

Implementing structured data markup

Implementing structured data markup allows search engines to better understand the content on your website. This allows them to display more relevant information in search results, such as rich snippets and featured snippets. In providing this additional context, through structured data, you can improve your website's visibility and attract more organic traffic.

Canonical tags are an important aspect of SEO too, that should not be overlooked. These tags help search engines understand which version of a webpage is the main or preferred one. Without canonical tags, duplicate content issues may arise, negatively impacting your website's ranking.

Distinguishing Between On-Page and Technical SEO

While both On-Page SEO and Technical SEO are essential for improving website performance, they focus on different aspects of optimisation. 

On-Page SEO primarily deals with optimising individual web pages and their content, while Technical SEO focuses on the technical infrastructure and code of the website. 

On-Page SEO aims to make the content more relevant and valuable to users and search engines, while Technical SEO ensures that the website is accessible, efficient, and search engine-friendly.

Distinguishing Between On-Page and Technical SEO:

• On-Page SEO focuses on content optimisation, while Technical SEO focuses on infrastructure optimisation
• On-Page SEO aims to improve relevance and value, while Technical SEO improves crawling efficiency
• On-Page SEO involves optimising elements on individual pages, while Technical SEO optimises the overall website structure

Both On-Page SEO and Technical SEO are necessary for a comprehensive optimisation strategy

The Impact of On-Page SEO on Website Performance

On-Page SEO has a significant impact on website performance and search engine rankings. By optimising various on-page elements, you can improve the visibility and relevance of your web pages, leading to higher organic traffic and better user engagement. Properly optimised title tags, meta descriptions, headings, and content make it easier for search engines to understand the context and relevance of your web pages, resulting in improved rankings and click-through rates.

The impact of On-Page SEO on your website performance will include:

• Higher search engine rankings and organic traffic
• Improved visibility and click-through rates
• Enhanced user engagement and satisfaction
• Better conversion rates and business growth

Enhancing On-Page SEO

We use SemRush Topics Tool, a powerful tool, to enhance your On-Page SEO efforts. It helps us identify relevant topics and keywords for your content, ensuring you are targeting the right audience and optimising your web pages effectively. 

By using SemRush Topics Tool, we will help you to discover new keyword opportunities, analyse competitor strategies, and optimise your content to rank higher in search engine results.

We will help you to;

• Identify relevant topics and keywords for content optimisation
• Discover new keyword opportunities and search trends
• Analyse competitor strategies and keyword rankings
• Optimise content for better search engine visibility and relevance
• Improve content quality and user engagement

Benefits of Technical SEO on Website Performance

Technical SEO offers several benefits that positively impact website performance. By optimising the technical aspects of your website, you can improve its visibility, crawling efficiency, and user experience. 

Technical SEO ensures that search engines can easily access and understand your website's content, resulting in higher rankings, organic traffic, and better user engagement.

Carrying out technical SEO on your website will help to;

• Improve website visibility and search engine rankings
• Enhance crawling efficiency and indexation
• Deliver better website performance, speed, and user experience
• Raise organic traffic and click-through rates
• Improve website security and mobile-friendliness

Why we should carry out a Site Audit for your website

Site Audits can significantly enhance our Technical SEO efforts on your website. Using a comprehensive website auditing tool that helps us to identify and fix technical issues that are hindering your website's performance and search engine rankings. 

We can analyse your website's health, identify errors and warnings, and optimise your website's technical aspects for better search engine visibility and user experience.

Carrying out an SEO Site Audit enables us to;

• Identify and fix technical issues and errors
• Analyse website health and performance metrics
• Optimise website structure, URLs, and metadata
• Improve website speed, mobile-friendliness, and accessibility
• Monitor website performance and implementing best practices

If you're ready to enhance your website's search engine performance, or are considering optimising your website, feel free to reach out to us today and kick start the process.