SEO Optimization Part 4: Simple Strategies to Boost Off-Page SEO

In the last part of this series we'll cover how to improve your SEO strategies by focusing utilizing off-page SEO.

And the term is pretty much explains itself...

...Search engine optimization, off of your web page.

But specifically speaking:

Off-page SEO is focused around in building backlinks to your page from other high authority websites. 

When Google sees that other high authority sites are linking back to your content, they'll see your site at as a credible and valuable resource.

In SEO jargon, we call this a "vote of confidence".

This a big ranking factor that allows Google to trust you as source that will provide value to the users search query.

Their aim is to match high quality information to a user's search and backlinks are a powerful way to assess this.

But although link building is arguably the biggest factor when utilizing off page SEO, it isn't the only one.

It goes deeper than this.

And in this post, I've dug out small golden strategies for you to follow and apply to your own website.

I'm going to reveal to you 10 tips that every marketer must do (or at least be aware of) to game off-page SEO.

1)Create Valuable Content That Can Be Shared And Referred To

Come on, let's face it: SEO is only ever getting more competitive. 

With millions of other sites in your niche, there's no way possible you could rank on the first page with any old post.

It just doesn't work like that.

To build natural links to your site and favour the algorithm, you can't overlook the importance of creating valuable content.

This type of content always wins.

It's wins trust with Google, creates an enjoyable experience with the user and gets referred to by other sites. With this combined there is no way Google can afford to lock you up in the ^th page.

Creating valuable content does interlink with on-page SEO, but the aim (from an off-page perspective) is to create credible content high authority sites will link to you for.

Here's a couple tips:

Create content that people are searching for: This is standard stuff in the SEO game, but you need to see your content as a solution to someone's problem.

People come on to Google with the intent to get their problems solved.

Before you got here, you probably searched on the topic of SEO with the intent to find the solution (learning more about it perhaps).

Your content should be focused around this, solving user's problems. 

To find what people are looking for you can read other blogs in your niche and find what themes seem to frequently pop up. 

You can use a tool like AskThePublic to find what people are looking for.

For example, say I ran a blog on Amazon FBA and I wanted to create a new post, if I typed in the keyword "Amazon FBA" it would show up a range of relevant sub topics I could create my content around.

You could also use Uber Suggests keyword tool to find what people are searching for. 

Back up your posts with facts and data:

What sounds more convincing?

A - "Adding your keyword in your title tag can help you to improve your ranking"

B - "Adding your primary keyword in your title tag increase click-through-rates by as much as 56%"

B right?

Because it shows you're not talking out your ass and actually giving valid information.

Part of creating valuable content is backing up what you say with facts. Be sure to always back up statements with facts and the source you got it from.

The more you do this, the more readers will trust you as a reliable source.

Sites like Kissmetrics and Statista are great places to find statistics.

Add more visuals to create an enjoyable experience:

There's no doubt that if I was to hand you the same content, but only of them had images, you'd choose the one with images.

As humans, we're predetermined to consume visual information much easier and faster.

According to Hubspot, the brain processes visual information 60,000 times faster than text.

Which explains why people guided by illustrations with text do 323% better than people who don't (Source: NeoNam)

To make your content a more enjoyable and memorable, be sure to add as many visuals as possible to get your point across.

2) Optimize Your Internal Links

It's important that you map out internal links on your site in a way promotes easier SEO juices to flow through.

Good interlinking between pages on your sites makes it easier for Google spiders to crawl and index data correctly.

In each of your posts, naturally link to other posts you have on your site.

Of course, make sure the page you link to is relevant to the topic at hand. Don't link to random pages on your site because as this can have an opposite effect.

Creating inbound links help to create easy navigation around your site and allows your site to flow in a relative form.

An example of this is adding related posts to the end of your posts or on the sidebar like we have done here.

3) Create A Silo Structure To Your Content

Silo content is another powerful way to interlink relevant content to each.

Quite simply, a silo structure refers to breaking down content into different categories and each post in is relevant category (source: Quicksprout).

For example, content at Affilorama is broken down into different categories – Lessons, Our Products, Blogs and Forums.

Once again, this is a way of making it easier for your search engines to crawl your website and index related content with each other.

4) Source And Replace Broken Links

The internet is filled with huge amounts of broken links to dead pages that have been outdated, crashed or pull up technical errors.

Scanning for these broken errors on sites are a powerful way in which you can land backlinks for yourself.

Doing this can be broken down into four steps: Finding the broken link, contacting the owner of the site and offering a replacement link.

Here's how you can do this.

Say you were to find a post on a high authority site that was outdated or created relatively a long time ago.

You stumble upon a link and click on it, only to find out it's been broken.

Now it's not deemed necessarily a ranking factor, but of course the owner would want to make an effort to keep his content active and linking to other sites.

So you contact the owner to inform them of this broken link and offer to replace the link with a link to your piece of content.

Hopefully the owner would consent to this, and you've now earned yourself a back link.

This is an easy way to receive a number of links to your site which if leveraged can bring your more traffic from other sites and a higher ranking on Google.

You'd also want to check yourself too.

Make an effort to scan around your site to double check both internal and external links are active then replace or fix any that aren't

No visitor wants to click on a link only to see a 404 error. It creates a bad online experience and shows don't care about your content.

Costing you a potential customer and their friends too. According to a study by Kissmetrics, 44% of users will tell others about a bad online experience.

Do yourself the favour and make sure all links on your site are intact.

5) Guest blogging

Guest blogging if used strategically will reward with more traffic to your site and inject a boost in your rankings.

Because simply put, guest blogging is a way of increasing your exposure to build authority and new relationships with other people within your space.

Guest blogging helps to secure a strong backlink to your site which flashes green lights to the algorithm.

But if abused can also be seen as a 'spammy practice'. Something which head of webspam at Google Matt Cuts declared:

This however doesn't take away the fact that guest blogging stands as a powerful online marketing tactic.

But just how do you find sites to connect and guest blog with?

You can go on to Google and use a search string like "[keyword of your niche]" + "write for us"

As shown here:

It will then show a number of sites that invite people to write guest posts for them.

Be sure to note that not every site will be open to guest blogging (and that's totally fine) so don't be surprised if you don't hear from a lot of bloggers you reached out to.

6) Create Infographics 

Infographics is the most easiest and interactive way to present information to your reader.

And what do all of us marketers have in common?

We all present information.

And presenting it in the form of an infographic is a key strategy to send backlinks your way.

When creating an infographic, you want to make sure that it's:

• Has a great design – One with vibrant and eye-catching visuals.
• Clearly understood – Make sure your text can still be comprehend well.

To create an infographic you can easily go Fiverr and hire someone to make one for as little as $5.

Here's an in-depth guide on how to create the best infographic for your content.

As mentioned before, visual information is one the rise and is becoming a standard practice for authority bloggers.

Look at the increase in the demand for infographics (source: Neil Patel):

7) Create Social Media So Your Content Can Be Shared

The more exposure you get, the more authority you earn and your popularity and traffic both increase.

A study from Cognitive SEO found a relationship between social media influence and rankings on search rankings.

They found the stronger the influence, the higher the rankings of that particular brand.

(Source: CognitiveSEO)

Creating social media profiles allows you increase awareness of your brand and get your voice heard amongst your space.

Leverage this strategy by creating brand pages for:

• Facebook
• Pinterest
• LinkedIn+
• Google+ 
• Instagram

These are all simple steps.

But of course, there's the management of each of these profiles. In regards to that, it isn't entirely necessary to go hard on each space.

That can get time consuming and you'll end up having to play catch up.

The purpose is get some exposure and positioning of your brand and creating multiple media profiles help to deliver this approach.

In addition to this, adding social media buttons invites your audience share your content with other people.

I explained this in the previous post, but adding social share buttons can increase your chances of getting shared.

This off-page strategy isn't exactly designed to target a ranking factor, but indiretly has a positive effect on the credibility and popularity of your site.

8) Create Natural Anchor Text

An SEO practice that's relatively simple and easy to learn. 

Simply put, anchor text is the clickable text within your content (usually blue and underlined as you've seen all throughout this post).

When it comes Google, anchor text is scored by its consistency between the text and what it links to (they have to be relevant).

As a general practice you want to ensure your anchor text is:

• Relevant to the page it is linking to
• Not generic 
• Has low keyword density

It should be succinct and flow well with the content being presented.

Are You Ready Build Boost Your SEO?

There's no doubt that SEO is a huge factor when it comes to marketing online. It's simply something you have to do to survive in your space. 

If you leave it in the corner, it will end up leaving you there too.

Even having a brief understanding around technical, on-page and off-page SEO is enough to see an improvement in your Google rankings.

But if you're serious about SEO you should be leveraging all of the tips I've given you the best way possible.

Whatever niche you're in, SEO should be a priority for your site. With the tips I've shown you throughout the series, you should now be ready to go and make it happen on your own.

I've given you the breakdown and shown you several strategies to guide you when carrying the job out yourself.

(Be sure you've bookmarked all parts of this series as you'll need it come back and take action.)

Follow the tips, apply and you'll see some seriously amazing results for your business!

If you want to go back and read any of the previous parts:
Click here to read Part 1: The Basics and Why It's So Important
Click here to read Part 2: Handling the Technical SEO First
Click here to read Part 3: Simple Strategies to Boost On-Page SEO