According to 71% of bloggers, SEO is the most important traffic source. At the same time, it’s also the most demanding aspect of creating a blog that search engines and visitors alike will love. 
We took one for the team and prepared a list of the top 10 SEO tips for blogs. These will help you master your SEO performance and drive an influx of readers where you most need them. 
Table of Contents
- Rely on Keyword Research to Plan Your Content 
- Create Helpful and Engaging Content
- Optimize Page Titles and Meta Descriptions
- Use Internal Links to Other Pages on Your Website
- Add Visuals With Relevant Alt Tags
- Boost Page Speed
- Pay Attention to Mobile-Friendly Web Design
- Add External Links
- Monitor User Engagement
- Promote Your Blog on Social Media
- SEO Tips for Blogs: Key Takeaways 
- SEO Tips for Blogs FAQs
1. Rely on Keyword Research to Plan Your Content 
When it comes to blog SEO, keyword research is a step you can’t afford to skip. It helps you understand what people are searching for and how keywords can be used to strategically target your audience. You also get to plan your content in a way that will be more likely to rank in the SERPs. 
There are many tools for SEO keyword research, such as Google Trends, AnswerThePublic and Ahrefs. Some of them come at a price but the free Google SEO tools are just as effective at identifying keywords.
We already talked about several actionable tips for keyword research and this is where you can apply them. Try to look for keywords relevant to your topic that have relatively low competition levels. 
Once you have identified relevant keywords, use them strategically throughout your blog post. Don’t forget to incorporate them into titles, headings and meta descriptions. However, make sure not to overuse them or stuff too many into one post—this could have negative effects on rankings due to spam penalties from search engines. 
Consider using long-tail variations as these may be easier targets because of their lower search volume per month. They’re usually less saturated than the average single-term keyword phrases. And according to WebTribunal, with over 600 million blogs out there, you better do everything in your power to stand out. 
Encouragingly enough, only 50% of bloggers perform keyword research and 17% never research keywords, giving you just the advantage you need. 
Leveraging keyword research when planning blog posts ensure your content has a higher chance of ranking in the SERPs—which translates to better visibility for your website. Plus, tracking keyword performance will keep you informed about the changing interests of your customers, giving you an opportunity to make your content timely and relevant. 
2. Create Helpful and Engaging Content
The first rule of blogging is to focus on high-quality content, known as the primary success factor among all bloggers. Creating helpful and engaging content not only helps attract more readers but also supports building trust with your audience and search engines.
Quality content should include accurate and useful information, be easy to read, have keyword-rich headlines, use internal links, allow comments and be frequently updated. 
The information provided in each post should add value to the reader’s experience and encourage them to come back for more. Each piece of content must have a clear purpose—this will give visitors an idea of what they can expect before they even start reading. 
3. Optimize Page Titles and Meta Descriptions
Page titles and meta descriptions can help you kill two birds with one stone. These elements not only help search engines understand what your content is about but also influence potential readers to click through to your website from the SERPs. 
Many agree the optimal page title length should be no less than 30 and no more than 60 characters, while accurately describing the post's contents. Here’s your chance to showcase your keyword research and include keywords relevant to the topic being discussed.
Make good use of action words in the titles to intrigue potential readers into clicking on your page instead of other competitors’ pages. 
Meta descriptions—the small snippets of text that summarize what each post is about—should also include the primary keyword. They shouldn’t exceed 160 characters and should also have actionable language within them whenever possible. 
This will help draw people into reading further, once again increasing engagement levels with visitors, ultimately boosting overall conversions over time. 
Don’t just copy and paste the same meta description to all posts—this could lead Google to think you’re placing duplicate content due to lack of originality. 
If you don’t feel like risking it, you can always hire one of the top on-page SEO companies to help you with all this. 
4. Use Internal Links to Other Pages on Your Website
Using internal links is one of the most important aspects of SEO for any website. Internal links are hyperlinks that link to other pages or posts on your own website, which can help increase a user's time spent on your site and make it easier to navigate around its content.
According to Databox, 51% of SEO experts say two to three internal links per blog post are just enough, but 36% of them believe three to five are even better. 
Internal linking also helps search engines discover more pages on your website by providing them with an easy-to-follow pathway through all your content. When used correctly, internal links can boost page authority as they act as votes from one page to another, signaling a higher level of relevance and trustworthiness from Google’s perspective. 
If you’re yet to adopt this practice, start by identifying content within blog posts that are topic-wise related and add appropriate anchor text linking out toward those target URLs. 
You can also use the Related Articles feature at the bottom of each post listing similar topics users may find interesting. 
5. Add Visuals With Relevant Alt Tags
You can further enhance the user experience by using visuals whenever possible. These elements are proven to increase engagement levels, which can ultimately lead to higher conversion rates from visitors into customers or subscribers down the line. Videos are a favorite among marketers, with 86% of them agreeing they provide a traffic boost, a The Social Shepard study finds. 
Adding visual elements makes posts easier to read—people tend to scan text rather than reading every word carefully. And going by an Insivia survey, it’s no wonder viewers retain 95% of the message delivered through video content. 
However, you must take additional steps when optimizing visuals for SEO purposes—web crawlers can’t perceive images the way people do.  Because of this, you have to explain to Googlebot what the visual is about. 
One way to do this is by adding relevant alt tags (also known as alternative text). This allows screen-reading tools & search engine crawlers to understand what an image contains even though they cannot actually view it themselves. 
These tags help people with disabilities or special needs access information easier while providing context about the topics being discussed in the blog.  
When creating alt tags, make the descriptions detailed but concise and include keywords. Also, consider using captions underneath each visual element. This will further explain what certain pictures contain and gives you extra room to include keywords without sounding spammy. 
6. Boost Page Speed
Speaking of the best SEO practices for blogs, page speed has a major impact on conversion rates—for each additional second of load time, they can drop by 4.42%. Almost 70% of consumers agree it influences their likeness to buy from an online retailer. 
A slow-loading page can result in visitors leaving your site before they even have the chance to explore its content. This directly impacts conversion and sales if the issue isn’t addressed promptly. 
To boost page speed, you can try the following techniques:
- Reduce redirects
- Enable browser caching
- Compress images and videos
- Minify HTML, CSS and JavaScript
- Set up a content delivery network (CDN)
- Implement AMP pages for mobile devices
- Leverage lazy loading for non-critical resources
- Execute third-party scripts asynchronously or in batches
- Enable GZIP compression for faster network transfer of data
- Use a dedicated hosting provider with optimal server configurations
7. Pay Attention to Mobile-Friendly Web Design
Having a mobile-friendly web design is one of the best SEO tips for blogs anyone could give you. Statcounter found that 61.52% of all internet traffic comes from mobile devices, so it’s only logical you create a website that can be easily used on a smartphone or tablet. 
This means having a design and layout that is optimized for smaller screens and easy-to-read content that doesn’t require users to zoom in or scroll through endless pages of text. Having a responsive website is extremely beneficial as it allows webpages to automatically adjust their size and shape depending on the device they are being viewed from. 
While optimizing for different screen resolutions, don’t forget the images. Some may appear too large or too small if not properly sized up prior to uploading. 
Additionally, think of the font sizes—they have to be legible even when viewed on small screens. Avoid using too many ads and popups. These take up valuable space, which could be put toward more useful elements like navigation menus or contextual information containing keywords. 
Most of the website builders available today allow you to make all these customizations without lifting a finger. You can also hire a web development company and have them create a responsive website for you. 
8. Add External Links
Adding external links to blog posts is a great way to reference other sources of information and provide additional context for readers. This demonstrates transparency in terms of the research conducted on a particular topic while also helping build credibility. 
According to recent HubSpot findings, most SEO experts say external links are one of the three most valuable aspects of their SEO strategies. 
External links should be used sparingly and with caution. Include only those that are most relevant and within the same industry or topic being discussed. Make sure they open in new tabs. 
Adding ”nofollow” tags alongside any external links you add may be a good practice too. This will tell search engine crawlers the page isn’t endorsed by the source it comes from while still allowing readers access to related materials.
Keep track of the backlinks created over time using tools like Ahrefs or Moz Link Explorer to check if they have gone bad or need updating due to any changes to the website. 
9. Monitor User Engagement
When investing resources in SEO for your blog, the best way to see if your investment is being fruitful is to keep track of user engagement. This allows you to know how visitors are interacting with the pages on your site, from the length of time spent reading each post to which sections of the website receive the most clicks. 
Knowing this information can help you identify any areas where users may be getting stuck or confused, helping you make an informed decision when adjusting your strategy. 
Google Analytics is an invaluable tool for measuring user engagement. It offers a wealth of data points ranging from bounce rate percentages and average session durations all the way up to more complex metrics like time on-page reports and custom events tracking.
Add heatmaps to the web pages to see exactly where people click and assess whether you need to (re)move certain elements.
Think about implementing live chat support to see how customer service teams handle visitor queries in real-time scenarios. Not only will this give valuable insights into potential usability problems, but it will also provide opportunities to enhance overall experiences. 
10. Promote Your Blog on Social Media
If you’re trying to find an easy solution regarding how to optimize your blog for SEO, you can always use what you already have—your social media profiles. Although indirectly, social media improves your SEO efforts, finds a SEMrush survey. 
Promoting your blog on social media can be a great way to reach a larger audience and build brand awareness. However, you first have to consider which platforms are most appropriate for your type of content, as well as the optimal times to post in order to get the best engagement from followers.
Facebook is one of the most popular social networks out there, so it’s worth creating a page or group for your blog that people can easily find. Make sure you regularly post interesting visuals and captivating titles. This will help draw more attention to what you have written and encourage others to click through. Use hashtags and join relevant groups whose members have similar interests to your target audience. 
Twitter is another powerful platform that allows users to quickly spread the news about particular topics they are interested in. Plus, Twitter tends to keep an open dialogue between different parties involved, so you have a unique chance to include your blog even in the comments section in different discussions. 
Since it’s image-based, Instagram is the perfect place for sharing snippets taken from your blogs. Of course, you’ll need to include a link in the captions that leads back to your website post. 
SEO Tips for Blogs: Key Takeaways 
There are many important aspects of becoming a successful blogger and the SEO tips for blogs we shared above will greatly help with your efforts in achieving just that.
However, you can’t expect to see results overnight. The truth is, blog SEO takes time, money and effort. With the Google algorithm constantly changing, you have to be ready to work on your strategy around the clock.
If you'd rather focus on what you do best and leave SEO to the experts, we vetted hundreds of SEO agencies and made a list of the industry leaders, so feel free to pick your match! 
SEO Tips for Blogs FAQs
What tools do you use for technical SEO audits?
Screaming Frog, Google Search Console, and SEMrush and some of the best tools for technical SEO audits.
How do I monitor technical SEO?
Monitor technical SEO through regular checks using tools like Google Search Console, Screaming Frog, and website performance tools. Keep an eye on crawl errors, page load times, mobile-friendliness, and indexation status. Set up alerts for critical issues and regularly review log files for deeper insights into search engine interactions.
