It’s been over two weeks since Google’s March 2024 core update rolled out – and it’s one of the most significant updates I have seen to date. It’s currently sweeping the web in the same way we saw Panda and Penguin updates do more than ten years ago, and all the forums agree: this update is a big deal.  March 2024 Core Update After reading the official Google announcement, it was very clear that it was very different from past core updates for two reasons. First: not only did it cover the usual major changes to ranking systems, but it rolled out at the same time brand-new spam policies w ..read more

Notice a huge spike in your referral traffic in the last month? Confused as to why a bunch of people from Poland are suddenly interested in your website? If so, you’re not the only one. In my routine checks of our Google Analytics 4 (GA4) accounts, I found several with a spike in unusual referral traffic. After investigating, I also found that other webmasters are seeing spam referral traffic from sites like news.grets.stor(e) and static.seders.websit(e). Webmaster’s Note: Please do not visit these websites. This kind of thing skews your traffic data, so you need to remove as much of it as pos ..read more

In SEO, content is king. Aside from creating new and valuable content, the existing content on your website should also be up to par with Google’s evolving standards.  Doing these two things reap huge rewards for your website. That’s why I say maintaining your content strategy is a huge part of SEO. And it’s why I made a content checklist, and separated this from the rest of the on-page elements on your website. So I do recommend paying extra attention to this part as you go through your SEO strategy for the year. Content Strategy & Optimization Managing your content is an art—after ..read more

When it comes to ranking on Google, the work you do on your website is only half the job — the rest comes down to your off-page SEO strategy. Building your off-site presence can make all the difference in traffic, search engine rankings and revenue. Searching for an off-page SEO checklist to help your site rank higher in Google? You’re in luck. I have here a simple yet effective list for you to work through — complete with all the best practices as of 2024. Off-Page SEO Factors Your biggest competitors have probably perfected their on-page SEO. It’s highly competitive, too. It’s why businesses ..read more

Want to make your pages rank high on Google? You won’t be able to do that if you don’t know where or how to start your on-page SEO — and with each Google update, this pillar of SEO gets more and more complicated. To keep you updated with the best and most relevant practices when it comes to this aspect of your website, I have prepared an on-page SEO checklist for 2024.  On-Page SEO Factors On-page SEO, in simple terms, is all the ways you can optimize your website take place on your website. Tweaking certain elements of your pages can enable them to climb very quickly up the ranks when d ..read more

With Google getting a whopping total of six algorithmic updates and four core updates in 2023, you can bet the search landscape is more complicated (and competitive) to navigate nowadays. To succeed in SEO this year, you will need to figure out what items to check and optimize to ensure your website stays visible. And if your goal is to not just make your website searchable, but have it rank at the top of search engine results, this technical SEO checklist for 2024 is essential. Webmaster’s Note: This is part one of our three-part SEO checklist for 2024. I also have a longer guide on advanced ..read more

Knowing where you stand in organic search results is obviously something you want to do if you want to take your SEO seriously. And if you’ve just started, then you might be wondering how you can check your keyword rankings for free. Well, you have come to the right place. This is a guide to how to check your rankings for free using Google Search Console. Plus, I cover the basics of keyword ranking analysis so you know what to do with your data.  How to Create A Google Search Console Account Keeping a close eye on your keyword rankings is something you must do regularly. It’s how you kn ..read more

Dominating the keyword rankings in your niche is a difficult yet rewarding strategy in SEO. It allows your website to quietly seize the top spots for low-hanging and surprisingly valuable keywords, while your competitors are busy fighting over more popular and broad ones.  Easier said than done, though. It can be difficult to find a niche to target, much less become an authority in it.  But if you’re here, you’ve taken the right first step. I have a guide on the best strategies for dominating keyword rankings in your niche that I and other SEOs on my team use often. Understanding th ..read more

No matter how often you work on your website, there will come a time where you’ll see fluctuations with your site’s performance — and worst comes to worst, sudden and drastic drop in Google rankings.  I personally have seen my website go from sitting at #1 for my keywords for months with no issue, then one morning falling entirely out of the first page results.  Experiencing this can be a daunting scenario for anyone. And if you can’t recover quick enough, expect to see a lot less organic traffic and conversions.  However, it’s not the end of the road. With my 8-step recovery p ..read more

As a website owner or SEO, you may have encountered a 5XX server error at some point—you may even be seeing this error message on your screen right now.  If so, you’re definitely looking for the best way to resolve it. If not, then you might just be looking to protect your website from ever having to deal with it.  This is a simplified but comprehensive SEO guide to the most common HTTP 5XX server errors, their causes, and how to troubleshoot them.  What are 5xx Errors? A 5xx error means “an error number starting with 5”, such as 500, 501, and so on. 5xx errors are one of the H ..read more