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SEO Skills Every Content Writer Should Master

Knowing basic SEO skills is now a necessity for content writers too. Especially, if you’re a blog writer, knowledge of how SEO works is a must-have for you. With over 90% of online experiences starting with a search engine, your content’s visibility depends heavily on how well you understand and apply SEO techniques.

Whether you are going to start

a blog or already have one, SEO tricks are only going to make you last longer in the industry. 

Studies show that 75% of users never scroll past the first page of search results, meaning your content must be optimized to rank higher.

With higher search ranks, more of your blogs will get clicks and reads, ultimately establishing your strong claim on the search engine game.

So, to help you with that, this write-up will enlist some essential SEO skills that you must master as a writer. 

Understanding SEO Basics

Learning the basics of SEO is no rocket science. At first, you need to understand that keywords play a key role in making your content optimized or not. After that, there are some points that need to be assured like the structure, content analysis, etc. Your writing also needs to be as simple, professional, and as direct as possible. 

Based on these major points, the Google crawler analyses your content and promotes it accordingly. Some core components of SEO include:

• On-Page SEO
• Off-Page SEO
• Technical SEO

Remember, Google processes over 8.5 billion searches per day. It means that if you’re playing your cards right, you can win a fortune by your side. Tons of user traffic can be directed to your website if you have done the best job.

Keyword Research Skills

Keyword research is like finding out what the audience on the internet is craving. Based on your blog’s niche, keyword research will help you in various ways like finding topics to write, keywords to add to your writing, finding how difficult it is for your article to rank with the particular keyword (also known as keyword difficulty), etc.

According to research, 68% of online experiences begin with a search engine, and the right keywords can ensure that your content gets found. So, aim your writing with the focus of letting people research well with your blog.

For some efficient keyword research tools, you can rely on platforms like Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs, or SEMrush. 

For a best practice, you can aim for a long-tail keyword for better and faster reach to a specific audience. 

On-Page Optimization Techniques

Meta titles, title tags, descriptions, etc. are the linchpins of on-page SEO techniques. You might be ignorant of these aspects of writing, but statistics show a completely different picture. 43% of people click on a given result solely based on the title, highlighting the importance of crafting optimized and engaging titles.

Apart from that, the following is a quick breakdown of basic on-page SEO techniques:

• Meta Tags and Descriptions: Ensure that the tags are unique and evenly spread across the article. Mind the character limits and other criteria while writing descriptions.
• Heading Structure: Build a proper structure for the article and establish the correct order of H₁, H₂, H₃, and so on. It makes your content readable and indexes your content much more quickly. 
• Internal and External Links: Interlinking can help your article’s promotion and also help in proving its legitimacy. Content with external links performs better according to research.
• Alt Texts for Images: Describing the image with alt-texts helps Google understand what the image is about, and also helps content to perform better. 

If you master these techniques, there will be nothing holding you back.

Writing for Readability and User Experience

If your writing is difficult to read and requires a degree to understand it, your content is for no good. Research from Nielsen Normal Group says that users typically read only 20% of the text on the page. 

So, your aim must be to provide as much information as you can so that a reader can instantly understand the message without needing to read too much. This is how you make the reading experience good, and Google understands that. And that is why, its algorithm keeps on promoting content that is popular among the readers. 

To enhance your readability:

• Make your content visually attractive with bullet points, numbers, structured headings, short paragraphs and lines, etc.
• Use simple, crisp, and short sentences.
• Also, keep in notice that a huge chunk of the population access the internet through their mobile phones. So, make your blog optimized for mobile phones as well. 

If you keep track of these points in your blog, you are following the right path.

Common SEO Mistakes to Avoid

After learning some basics of SEO techniques, there are still some common mistakes that writers make. And as a seasoned or rookie writer, you must be aware of them. 

Remember, anything beyond the limit is for no good.

Hence, take care of the following points given below:

• Keyword Stuffing: The keyword integration in your article or blog must feel natural and not overused. Overusing a keyword with an intent of better rankings can be considered spam, and will be reported by Google. If done on a regular basis, Google can even flag a site as spam or de-index the blog for a long time.
• Neglecting Mobile Optimization: Mobile phone users contribute more than 50% of the total internet traffic. Hence, ignoring this huge chunk of the population can only be done by a dumb writer. You must not be one of them. 
• Lack of Updates: If your content is not updated or outdated, it might boom for a short period of time, but holds no scope for long-term survival. Hence, ensure giving regular updates on your content.

These are some basic mistakes that you must avoid.

End Note

This article covered some essential SEO tips that you as a content writer should know. Having technical knowledge of language and writing alone cannot help you sustain your blog over time. You also need to make it rank at the top.

Hence, follow these tips on your site, and attract as much traffic as possible. Also, share it with your friends and peers as well.

Posted by

Priya Prakash

Internet Writer