When you think SEO, you probably think too complex, right? But don’t ignore it. One of the most effective ways to get people finding your website on Google? Create an SEO friendly blog. High quality content is what will help Google determine if you are a site to direct people towards.
Now, SEO can be a complex subject if you want it to be. If I were to walk you through everything I know (and plenty more I don’t) on SEO there would be far too much to cover in one blog post. In this post I’m simply going to look at one of the most basic aspects of SEO: your page title (or more specifically, your blog post title).
Please note this post may contain affiliate links. Please refer to my disclosure for more information.
Think SEO: Think Titles
When someone puts a search phrase into Google, one of the biggest factors Google examines to determine if your page is relevant is to look at a match between the search phrase and the title of your blog post. If someone searches for “villas for rent in spain” then your post will probably get a better ranking if it has a title of “villas for rent in Spain” rather than “Spanish villas”.
Knowing whether people are more likely to search for Villas for rent in Spain rather than “Spanish Villas” is a subject for another post in the future. What I want to concentrate on for this post is whether or not “villas for rent in Spain” is a good title for a blog post. Because you need to remember than not everyone reading your blog will have found you via Google. They may have found you via social media, from a recommendation, or from browsing another part of your website. If that is the case, “villas for rent in Spain” isn’t a very catchy, appealing title and it isn’t going to tempt many people to click on that post and read on.
The Dilemma When Choosing A Title
So we have a bit of a dilemma. Should you create a title for your post that will be great for SEO? Or should you create a title that’s catchy and appealing to a human being?
The answer is actually pretty straightforward: you can, and should, do both. Here’s why.
Let’s go back to the example “villas for rent in Spain”. Now, imagine you’ve typed this into Google and you are on page 1 of the results. The fourth result is a blog post called “villas for rent in Spain”. Fantastic. That’s exactly what you were looking for. Ah – but what’s this? The seventh result is a post called “Why these 10 villas to rent offer the BEST value for money in Spain”. Which one of these posts would entice you into reading further?
So remember, behind every Google ranking is a human looking to find something interesting, intriguing and relevant to their search efforts. You need to make a good attempt to match your title with what they are likely to be searching for, but it doesn’t have to be perfect. Because equally, you also need to play around with those titles until you find one that really sounds appealing and makes you stand out from the competition. Always remember the golden rule for great SEO:
Write for a human, not a machine
Want to learn more about getting traffic to your website? I can highly recommend this eBook from blogger Lena Gott:
Traffic Transformation: 21 Strategies I Used To Go From 17k to 400k+ Monthly Page Views In 10 Months
