With Christmas fast approaching and the year drawing to a close, now is the perfect time to start your preparations for next year. You have probably already planned some of your business marketing and goals for the year ahead but you may have missed some quick SEO points!
If you really want to start your New Year on a high, continue reading below and make sure you implement this quick SEO checklist.
1) Mobile
The first point on this quick SEO checklist is mobile. Is your website currently mobile friendly or mobile responsive? Do your mobile visitors engage with your website as much as they do on desktop? How do your mobile search engine rankings compare with your desktop rankings? If your website is still not mobile friendly you need to get with the times or you will get left behind! Mobile traffic has increased vastly over the past few years and the trend shows no sign of stopping! Also, Google will reward you with better mobile search engine rankings if your website is mobile friendly.
2) Site Speed
Site speed is an important SEO factor that Google looks at. If your website is slow and underperforming, your users will get frustrated and won't have a great experience. Google doesn't like this. They like to see fast loading sites that people enjoy browsing and have a good experience with. You can simply run your website through Google's own tool, Page Speed Insights. This will then give you a score for mobile and desktop and will give you recommendations on what you can do to improve the speed of your website.
3) Indexing
Indexing is another important point you should be checking before the end of this year. You should check how many of your website pages are currently being indexed, which pages are and which aren't being indexed. If a page is being indexed that shouldn't be or vice versa, you need to look at why this could be as it could have an impact on your rankings and traffic. You can use software programmes to check this, or get in touch with us and we can help check this for you. All of your website pages should be indexed and crawlable, including your CSS and Javascript files, as Google is now able to render pages like modern browsers do.
4) Duplicate Content
If your website contains duplicate content this can massively harm your search visibility. Whether there are two pages on your site that are the same or whether one of your pages is extremely similar to another on the internet. It is important just to check over your website for duplicate content issues and if there are any errors, get them fixed!
5) URL Errors
Your website user experience is really important, not only for your prospects and to help keep them on the site, but for Google as well. Google doesn't like to see any URL errors that could put your visitors off. Use a web crawler like Screaming Frog to check your website for URL errors. Are there any 404s? If so, why are they there and can they be resolved? Also, check any 301 redirected pages to ensure they are redirecting to the correct place.
6) On Page Optimisation
Your website on page optimisation is a vital factor for SEO. As part of this quick checklist to help prepare you for 2017, you need to check your meta information as well as internal links. Make sure there are no broken internal links and ensure they're going to the right places. Also, double check all of your meta tags including page titles, meta descriptions and keywords. Ensure there are no duplicates and that you're abiding by Google's rules. For more information on on-site optimisation, read this article – 9 Different On-Site Optimisation Factors For Your Website
7) Keywords
Before the New Year begins, double check the keywords you are targeting in your SEO campaign. Ensure your content and on-site optimisation is in line with these target keywords and make sure that the list is up to date. For example, if you have stopped offering a product or a service it is pointless targeting a keyword around this. Also, do some extra keyword research and look at Google Trends. See what your prospects have been searching for recently and potentially add them to your SEO campaign.
8) Backlink Check
Link building has evolved hugely over the past few years and it is now very difficult to do in the right way. The best way of building links now is through obtaining them naturally by creating top quality, shareable content and resources. Before this year comes to an end, run your website through a backlink checker programme and make sure there are no poor quality links that could be harming your search visibility.
Conclusion
SEO should be a part of your overall marketing strategy for 2017 and hopefully this checklist will help get you ready for the year ahead! Start checking and implementing some of these points now to stay ahead and to start a profitable New Year.
