For SEO experts, our toolkit is crucial. It’s how we make sure we can quickly and effectively assess how well our websites are performing. Using the best tools can put you way ahead of other SEOs. One example (and one tool I’ve personally been using for years) is Screaming Frog. It’s a powerful, straightforward, and insightful website crawler tool that’s indispensable for finding technical issues on your website. And the good news is that it keeps getting better. Screaming Frog just released its 20th major version of the software, which includes new features based on feedback from S ..read more

What is Google My Business? Google My Business (GMB) is a free tool that business owners can use to manage their online presence across Google Search and Google Maps. This profile also puts out important business details, such as address, phone number, and operating hours, making it easily accessible to potential customers.  When you click on a business listing in the search results it will open a detailed sidebar on the right side of the screen, providing comprehensive information about the business.  This includes popular times, which show when the business is busiest, a Q&A ..read more

The relationship we used to have with Google was simple. It was a fair-use argument: we give Google content to index, and we get traffic in return. We do a good and ethical job at creating that content, we get rewarded with better rankings than those who do not. AI has essentially turned all that on its head. Google I/O 2024 announced several AI-powered applications, the most notable being AI Overviews, which has since been rolled out in Google US.  It’s the beginning of a disruptive search landscape, and we have very little idea how that’s going to go. And, considering how Google plans ..read more

Google’s search algorithm is, essentially, one of the biggest influencers of what gets found on the internet. It decides who gets to be at the top and enjoy the lion’s share of the traffic, and who gets regulated to the dark corners of the web — a.k.a. the 2nd and so on pages of the search results.  It’s the most consequential system of our digital world. And how that system works has been largely a mystery for years, but no longer. The Google search document leak, just went public just yesterday, drops thousands of pages of purported ranking algorithm factors onto our laps.  The Le ..read more

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