The 16 most important SEO tips for beginners

Tip 1: Choose a good CMS for your website

A CMS(content management system) is an expensive word for a tool that allows you to easily manage your website without coding. It comes in handy when you don't have a team of developers at the ready. So for just about anyone, a CMS is always recommended. There are many options in this. We recommend WordPress for many reasons. Especially for SEO, it has the best plugins and there is a lot of information online.

Tip 2: Make sure your website is measurable

Of course, it is important to start measuring the effectiveness of your Web site. Otherwise, you won't know if what you're doing makes sense. For this, you need at least the following tools: GA4 (Google Analytics 4), GSC (Google search console) and GTM (Google tag manager).Through GTM (after it is linked to your site) you can make various settings and link GA4, for example. This way you can easily manage and measure everything.

What you should at least make measurable

One of the most important things to make measurable are conversions. Think: filling out a contact form (with a thank you page), clicking on a phone number or email address and making a purchase. You can do this through the settings in GA4. We still owe you a tutorial on this but it is in the works.

Tip 3: Regularly assess the effectiveness of your website

After your website is measurable, it is important to regularly assess its effectiveness. That way, you'll know whether you're headed in the right direction. This can be done in countless ways and with many kpi's. For SEO, we basically always look at three things. Namely: views in GSC, search traffic in GA4 and your conversions. These are the most important SEO kpi's to keep an eye on. Make sure there is an upward trend here in the medium to long term.

Tip 4: Make a crawl of your website

Download Screaming Frog (free tool) and make a printout/crawl of your website. This will help you detect technical errors on your website. It's smart to review our Screaming Frog tips while doing so. It may look intimidating, but it is important to make the crawl and get a first indication of how your website and pages look technically. To do this, look at "issues. Do you see a lot of red and orange icons and issues here? Then try to solve them with our blogs. Can't figure it out? Then let us take a look with you via a free SEO scan.

Here are the issues within Screaming Frog

Tip 5: Check the loading speed of your website

Today there are many tools you can use to check the loading speed of your website. It's good for user-friendliness to analyze it and improve it where necessary. I recommend that you just start with Google's own tool, PageSpeed Insights. But there are many other tools as well. There are many variables and terms within Pagespeed Insights. But don't be fooled. First, look at the score and key areas of improvement. Often low loading speed has to do with images that are too large, which is a great place to start.

Tip 6: Make use of (Google) extensions in your browser

There are numerous Google extensions for your browser that can make your SEO work easy. These allow you to quickly check if things are correct. The following three are the most important as far as I'm concerned:

Detailed SEO extension

This is by far the most useful SEO extension you can use within Google. It allows you to see all sorts of things instantly. Like the use of headings, links to the robots.txt and sitemap, indexations status, meta description and much more. You must have this one!

Sample screenshot of the Detailed SEO Extension

Redirect Path

With this extension, you can see redirects. Or in other words, you can see from which page any redirects are made. This is useful if you want to solve redirect chains and loop, for example.

Tag assistant

This allows you to very simply see if GTM (Google Tag Manager) is properly implemented on your website. This is important because GTM allows you to link to different tools such as GA4, for example. With tag assistant you check for example if GTM is not installed multiple times (which is not the intention).

Tip 7: Check your Google search console for 404 errors

Yes, Screaming Frog also looks at your 404 errors. Still, it's important to check (and resolve) GSC as well. GSC is often better for managing 404 errors because it shows exactly which pages Google tried to reach during indexing and couldn't find. This is crucial because it directly affects how Google rates and ranks your site.

Tip 8: Make sure you have a good developer

A good developer who understands SEO is also very important. Too often we still see technical SEO adjustments go wrong due to lack of knowledge. An experienced developer ensures that your website performs optimally technically and meets the latest SEO guidelines. Is well worth your investment.

Tip 9: Tackle quick wins right away

Always look for technical errors first where you can make the most impact. Does a sitemap exist and is it linked in GSC? Is the website indexable at all? Do the most important pages have a meta title and description? Go step by step like this and pick up the most important things first. Sure, you can start adding structured data to all your pages, but that still doesn't make much sense if the paragraph headings, for example, aren't right yet.

Tip 10: Build quality backlinks to your website

Backlinks are links from other websites to your site. More and better links improve your findability. This is called link building. Good content often creates backlinks by itself. Write guest blogs and collaborate with other sites to get links. This way you strengthen your link profile and authority.

Tip 11: Try to consider E-A-T content

E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness. It sounds complicated, but it simply means basing your content on trusted sources and expertise. Make sure your content is written by experts (can be yourself, of course) or that you use their input. Build authority through backlinks from trustworthy websites. Show reliability by having clear contact information and a privacy policy.

Tip 12: Improve your website's user experience with design

A good user experience (UX) and user-friendly interface(UI) are also important for good SEO. Therefore, ensure clear navigation and mobile-friendly design. Improve loading speed and make sure your website is responsive. For example, by optimizing your images. Make your content easy to read with short paragraphs and headings. An optimal UX/UI also ensures that all those visitors will actually convert. Nice touch.

Tip 13: Use relevant keywords and start analysis

Keywords are the foundation of SEO. Conduct a thorough keyword analysis to understand what terms your target audience is using. Capitalize on your target audience's search intent to really help people. Incorporate these keywords naturally into your content. Make sure your content is quality and unique so that it provides value to your visitors and answers their questions. Avoid duplication and focus on providing valuable information. Before writing blogs, keep our checklist handy.

Tip 14: Improve the structure of your website

Use your keyword analysis to improve the structure of your website. Make sure your website is logically structured into groups based on keyword volumes. Create clear categories and subcategories that contain relevant keywords. Make sure your urls match those as well. This helps search engines better understand your content and improves usability for your visitors.

Tip 15: Be patient and consistent

SEO is a long-term investment of both time and money. Results often don't come right away, so be patient. Don't go readjusting everything just because you're not at the top after one day. Work consistently on your SEO strategy and adjust your approach when you really need to. Also, keep learning and be on top of the latest developments in SEO. This will pay off in the long run with better findability and performance.

Tip 16: Remember what matters in the end

Don't lose sight of what it's ultimately all about: helping people. Focus on creating valuable content that provides real answers and solutions for your target audience. By focusing on the needs of your visitors, you not only improve your findability, but also provide real value that your audience appreciates.