The fundamental SEO optimization tips 2022

Review: What was and what continues to be the idea behind SEO?

First of all, I would like to briefly explain what SEO is all about.

 

As the Internet slowly spread, it quickly became confusing. The first search engines were launched. They all worked with a full-text search and showed the user matching results to the search query - but not sorted by quality.

 

Dann kam Google und revolutionierte den Markt. Das eigens entwickelte PageRank-System hat dazu gedient, dass nicht nur ein Match zwischen der Suchanfrage und dem Content auf der Seite erfolgte. Stattdessen wurde bei Google die Qualität der Seite bei der Berechnung des Relevanz-Wertes mit einbezogen und die Suchergebnisse wurden viel nutzerfreundlicher.

 

Search engine optimization is therefore about convincing Google & Co that one's own page offers high-quality information and at the same time perfectly matches the user's search query.

 

Some may assume that SEO is meant to trick Google & Co in order to help your own site achieve good rankings. That is definitely not correct! Such methods simply no longer work in 2022.

 

SEO optimization 2022 - Make your site fit!

 

 

A large part of search engine optimization takes place on your website. So-called crawlers (i.e. the bots of the search engines) access countless pages every day and look where new content has been added or whether something else has changed.

 

Although the algorithm has been improved and refined many times in the last 10 years, the basic optimization factors still count. basic optimization factors still count in your ranking.

 

• URL structure
• Heading structure
• META tags
• Quality of the content
• Page speed
• Internal linking
• BACKLINKS / Social Signals

 

We will now take a closer look at all these aspects.

 

Ensure a sensible URL structure

Die URL-Struktur Deines Seite ist ein wesentlicher Baustein für erfolgreiche Suchmaschinenoptimierung. Verabschiede Dich von langen, kryptischen URLs

 

(e.g., www.meineseite.de/ordner1/unterordner2/unterunterordner3/überschrift-des-artikels.html).

 

Instead, you should work with short, concise URLs that also contain the (most important) keyword for which you want to optimize your page.

Highlight headings correctly

Once you have tidied up the URL structure, you should look at the heading structure of your page. Make sure that each subpage only has one H1 heading.

 

This is the main heading of the page and all other headings (H2 to H3) are subordinate to it. Also, no heading hierarchy should be skipped.

 

Meta title & meta description - The blurb for your website

The so-called meta tags are something like the blurb on the spine of literary works. They are displayed in the search engine results and can increase the likelihood that a user will click on your search result. They are also a ranking factor.

 

Optimize meta title

The meta title offers you approx. 60 characters of space to summarize the topic of the (sub)page in a few words.

 

Optimize meta description

The meta description contains about 160 characters. Here you can integrate a short summary of the content and make the reader curious.

 

Improve the quality of the content

High-quality content is true gold in terms of search engine optimization. Only pages that offer their visitors information with high added value have a chance to achieve a good ranking.

 

This means: The user must find on a page exactly the answer to the questions he asked himself during the search.

 

When creating and optimizing content, you should always ask yourself exactly what search intentions your target group might have. There are special W-question tools that can help you determine the most common questions that users type into the search mask for a particular topic.

 

In the past, it was important to include as many keywords as possible in the texts, as Google & Co strongly matched the search queries with the written content.

 

Nowadays, this is no longer so important. Search engines have become smarter and can therefore recognize synonyms and capture the content of a text without you having to serve them the corresponding keywords on a silver platter.

 

Of course, you should consider which topic you want to work on with a text. And if the keyword can be well built into the text, you should do this in any case. However, I recommend that you always put readability in the foreground.

 

Provide more content variation

Content is much more than clumsy text. Start thinking broadly here.
Content counts:

 

• Text
• Image
• Video
• Audio / Podcast
• PDF's
• Infographics
• uvm.

 

Page speed - search engines love high speed

Google & Co are increasingly evaluating how comfortable the user feels on a page. One thing is clear: no one wants to wait forever for the website to load. Therefore, fast websites are clearly preferred by search engines in the rankings.

 

Make sure that your website loads fast enough for mobile. The "mobile first" approach should be taken into account when designing your site. This means that the mobile representation of the website is in focus.

 

You can check the PageSpeed of your site here: HTTPS://DEVELOPERS.GOOGLE.COM/SPEED/PAGESPEED/INSIGHTS/

 

Google will also show you some ways to improve the speed of your site. A common problem is, for example, too large images. Maybe you should also change the hosting provider if your values are miserable.

 

Internal linking - Guide the user to their destination

 

 

A rule of thumb is that each subpage should be reached with a maximum of three clicks from the home page. With a clever internal linking you can lead the user cleverly over your page.

 

Crawling bots also use internal links to navigate your site. Make life easy for the bots and at the same time make sure that your users stay longer on your site - this is also noticed by search engines and improves the ranking.

 

In addition, the power and trustworthiness that Google & Co attribute to your page can be distributed in the form of internal links on your page. SEOs like to speak here of the so-called "linkjuice" - a fictitious liquid that is distributed over your entire page and ideally arrives where you need a lot of power.

 

Backlinks & Social Signals produce Linkjuice

But where does this link juice actually come from? The source for this are still so-called backlinks in the year 2022. If another page links to your page, this is equivalent to a recommendation and thus an indication of the high quality of the content offered.

 

However, unlike in the past, nowadays you have to pay much more attention to the fact that the linking page fits thematically to your page. In addition, Google will classify a link that generates practically no traffic as less valuable.

 

The so-called social signals are also becoming increasingly important. You should be sure with your page on Facebook, YouTubeInstagram and - if appropriate - also on LinkedIn and XING. How exactly the social signals affect the ranking is not 100% known. However, it is conceivable that pages that are popular on social networks also receive a ranking boost on Google & Co.