I am pretty sure that we have all had our own fair share of healthy competition. Almost every aspect of our lives, competition is existent, and I even talked about competition in the world of SEO. Remember the old adage? Nothing is ever constant in the world, but change!

Well, that’s true! Everything is figured out, and now, people are just constantly finding ways to reinvent old ways. Finding ways to rehash traditional systems into something new and different. Same is true with search engine optimization and brand building.

Nothing is a new discovery, everything is innovated, re-imagined and transformed into a new form. When it comes to optimizing your website, your rivals are a actually a great avenue for you to pick up a few strategies. Your enemies can turn into your friends by being your company’s little puddle or pool of knowledge. You can learn a lot from their existing system, and apply it to your own routine.

don’t just attack; plan your moves well!

Before you go and spy on your competitors for strategies, here are a few critical factors you need to consider:

• Know your online competition.

  • You need to have an adequate level of knowledge about your online competitors.
  • Their online transactions may be handled differently from the offline transactions. Do your own keyword research!
  • In the digital space, you need to outshine them and find ways to rank better than them in search.

• Know where they are engaged.

  • It is not just enough to know who your rivals are, but you also need to know where they are.
  • If you know where your rivals are actively or passively engaged, then, you will know where to stay.
  • Of course,  if you notice that your target audience is on Facebook, then, you would naturally create a page on Facebook. Link this page to your website so that when you publish new content, it will also published on Facebook.
  • It’s as simple as that. Follow where your people are.

• Know what your rivals do.

  • If they are hitting the right spots, then, learn from it. You need to follow and innovate only the things that are optimizing the content. Study what is working for them so that you can apply it in own your search engine optimization strategies.

• Find out also the flops.

  • Once you know where the are focusing majority of their efforts on, you need to analyze what is or is not working. When you know that this strategy is NOT working, then abandon it. Be aware of the things are doing no good to their business just so you can avoid doing the same to your website. Learn what could go wrong!
  • You need to know what is driving them off the cliff so you wont make the same mistakes. In this way, you can prevent yourself from investing effort, money and time.

• Know their level of investment.

  • It is important for you to know the extent of commitment your rivals have for certain things in their online business for you to also exert the same level of investment in your own business. It is not enough to be on par with them, you need to outshine them.
  • If you realize that they are exerting effort in content development, then, raise the bar higher and produce better content.

SOURCE: (1)

After studying content, page speed, and links in search engine optimization, you might think you have it all figured out.

Think again, my friend, because there are still more to learn.

Worrying on what could go wrong on your website.

You may have gathered all that there is to perfect your search engine optimization strategy, but there are certain things that could still go wrong. Believe me, in a perfect world, everything that was taught to you about search engine optimization could be enough but let us face it, we need a reality check.

What exactly could go wrong is search engine optimization?

Three things:

• You can get over-aggressive with SEO strategies and apply too much,
• You may do things that are wrong in the context of Google because of the lack of awareness,
• Tendency to use shady or spammy tactics ( totally not classy!)

 How to get through this?

•  First of all, always go back to basics. Trust that what you know about search engine optimization is already sufficient to the optimization of your website.
• Think of it this way, it is just like putting on make up. You just basically have to study your face, learn what works for you, what shades and hues complements your eyes or your lips, and just enhance the features of your face. Not because you have a hundred pounds of make up layered to your face, then it automatically makes you instantly more attractive. No, that’s not how it works. Just apply enough to let the natural features shine. Same goes with search engine optimization strategies, it is best to not OVERDO it.
• You may think you are adding more value to your website, but you may be adding more burden than actual value to it. Remember that even in search engine optimization, less is definitely more.
• Secondly, research well. This is in contrast to the first one.  On the actual application, you will implement less. Before you go to apply the best SEO strategy for your site, you need to research first. You need to know everything, every move that you make, what goes around in the same industry that you are in, what the prohibitions are to avoid sanctions and penalties and more. With the right knowledge of SEO, you are sure that you won’t bark on the wrong tree.
• Lastly, do not ever resort to shady tactics. You need to instill trust and confidence into what you have learned about search engine optimization and develop strategies and techniques in good faith. If you start to apply questionable strategies, it will definitely affect your website. Also, it could ruin the trust of your existing and potential customers.

You can’t avoid mistakes.

In every line of business, there will always be loopholes, even to the most perfectly thought of system because that is inevitable. Remember, when you falter, go back to the basics. What is important in SEO?

1. developing excellent content that satisfies the users’ wants
2. improve page speed and user experience
3. obtain high-quality links and brand mentions from reputable sites

What matters most is you focus on your strengths, develop a great plan, and execute everything in good faith.

SOURCE: (1)

In a general sense, relevance is defined as “the quality or state of being closely connected or appropriate.”

To put it in the simplest way possible, when something is relevant, it basically means that it matters.

So enough defining things, now that we have unraveled what relevance really means, it is just about time to relate it to our topic – search engine optimization.

This is a reminder to choose relevant keywords.

How is relevance relevant to the study of search engine optimization?

See what I did there? Okay, on to the topic… Imagine, if you are in the business of food, and let us say that you manage an online food business. Of course, you would want to promote your business for it to reach millions of people.

Naturally, your website or any part of your website would never use the words “summer fashion,” “clothes,” “apparel,” “lipstick” and so on. This is not an online clothing store, or a business of selling clothes.

In the digital world, these simple things like ranking for relevant keywords related to your line of business. So, it does not matter how many links you really get, you will never in a million years rank for queries or searches that are related to an online clothing shop.

If you use it to your advantage, you could reach your target audience.

Now, imagine, you having the same online business, an online food shop and you get links from a very successful chef’s page or a trusted online market’s blog?

Imagine, what that huge influence can do to your humble online shop, right? It could give you the opportunity to branch out to different people and to reach millions and millions of customers and I am not even exaggerating. When you very relevant link from a reputable person, this changes the game. Compared to the first example, this second scenario is ideal.

Links and relevance are closely associated.

To break it down very clearly, you basically just need to be involved with links that can do good to your page.

Keep the links that are related to your line of business or content in general for it to reach your target market. In short, the relevance of the linking page, and the linking site, impacts how valuable a link might be considered.

That is how relevance generally works.

The main point of this article is for search engine optimization professionals or even the enthusiasts to understand that quality matters.

At the end of the day, it is really not about the number of links or mentions that you get.

More than anything else, consider the relevancy and the quality of the links to your website.

if you get a million links from a page that is completely unrelated to your website, it does not really count as “good” link. Google might be suspicious that you are getting links from questionable sites. So, do not even bother thinking about it. You can disavow shady links; just read Google’s guide on how to properly disavow links.

Always go for quality!

Whether it is food or clothes, we are always looking for the best quality. In SEO, do the same. Prioritize quality over quantity and substance over form.

Of course, it is undeniable that the content that you put out there is the very core of your website or your brand.

In general, content is the first thing we consider, but is it the most significant aspect in improving search performance? Is it the most important factor in search engine optimization?

Is content really important?

There Are Other Factors Aside from Content.

While I may agree that your content is basically the lifeblood of your website, however, it is not mere content alone.

It is the reason people visit your website of course and the very goal of search engine optimization is to maximize your content’s exposure so that many viewers can see it.

As content creators, bloggers, vloggers, online entrepreneurs, online influencers, even online advocates, or whatever we may call ourselves, we need to deviate from the popular opinion. As long as we have a fun and interesting content, we tend to slack off. We don’t focus on all of the other valuable aspects that help build the entirety of our brand.

No Compromises.

It is imperative to make it a goal to put a hundred percent of effort  in creating amazing contents. However, we should not compromise everything that comes along with it.

Honestly speaking, no search engine optimization factor has greater value than content. We should really weigh on what is important for our brand.

You cannot just give every bit of your time and effort in making sure your content is top-notch while compromising other important factors. Of course, you need to consider the technical issues, usage of links, your web design, accessibility, usability as well. Everything should go hand in hand if you really want to optimize search to its maximum potential.

One aspect will never work without the other, and vice versa. That is what we really need to bear in our minds.

So, if you want you content to really reach more people, you have to make sure to keep in mind that:

• you need to make sure your website is accessible,
• to minimize technical issues,
• to maximize usage of links,
• and to make sure that your overall design and feel is enticing for your viewers.

If your website is not easily accessible and if does not appear in the search results, then, your content, no matter how phenomenal it is, will not mean anything.

Go Beyond Content.

Again, content is something you want to come across virtually to your viewers, but it is not all there is.

Do not get me wrong though, content is extremely important, but so are the other factors in search engine optimization.  Your action plan should be clear and direct:

1. create contents that are interesting for your viewers,
2. but do not ever neglect or overlook its search capability,
3. and most importantly your customer’s experience

Before, during and after a web visitor has browsed your website, there should be that overall pleasant experience. Not just in the content, but also in the design, in the usability, and in the applicability. As much as as possible, think of all of the factors equally for you to also reach the perfect equilibrium of success.

Source: (1)

To be honest, it really depends. There is no better answer than “it just depends.”

If we talk about definite time frames, then, I would not really be able to provide you a specific answer. Because unlike all the other topics about search engine optimization that are easy and teachable, the amount of time that SEO needs is far more complex and hard to determine.

SEO is a long-term investment.

Why if you may ask?

• Well, aside from all of the aspects that are involved in developing your very own brand’s search engine optimization strategies. In addition to everything that comes along with it, there are research and development, marketing, tactics, etc.,
• Also, one should not neglect that the strategies of your competitors are of the same value and importance. Imagine, having to develop your own brand’s tactics while simultaneously studying your competition.
• It will take you forever, no exaggeration. In this article, I will be talking more about the significant role that your competition play in developing your search engine optimization strategy.

Let us start by talking about why we also need to study our competition.

Of course, if you are in an industry that provides specific products and services that a lot of people patronizing, you always need to give it your best shot and that involves benchmarking.

• Benchmarking is when you evaluate or check (something) by comparison with a standard . If you want your brand to be successful, one major trick is to really be familiar with how the industry that you are in work.

It is basically like courtship in men’s perspective.  If  a guy is really into a girl, he would set his best foot forward at all times and he would study how she would get the girl’s attention. Not only that though, of course, he would anticipate his competition. There will be a lot of other guys who would also race to get the girl’s precious little heart right?

So, a guy who really loves the girl would also study how to outshine all those other guys that are also vying to get the girl.

A form of healthy competition.

• Studying your rivals techniques is good way to get familiar with how they work in your industry in order for you to know how they will move. It is a good way to know strategies that could also work to your advantage.
• The higher the demand for the products and services that your industry offer, the higher the potential of existing and new competitors.
• The more demand increases, your competition will also up their game. They will do whatever it should take to outshine their competition.
• You can learn a thing or two from your competition and that is a guarantee. Your competition is not just there to give you a good game, you can actually benefit from them as well.

One thing that you need to learn about search engine optimization is that it is tricky and you need to gather as much resources as you can even and especially from your very own rivals. Like what they always say, even in the SEO industry, keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

Source: (1)