Whenever we visit a supermarket, we end up buying more items than the ones which are mentioned in the grocery list. The most common reason for this is the premium visibility that some items get on the shelves, which subconsciously maneuvers us to check them out. On a digital playground, this is called SEO.
Every business needs the right blend of SEO tactics to outshine its competitors by topping the charts when anything even remotely associated with them is searched by the users. Keeping in mind the going concern principle, which says that a business must go on, the SEO strategy should complement the business at all times.
It is a classic case of choosing between black and white. Black Hat SEO can be outrightly discarded because it is not human-centric in approach and thus is only reliable to make some quick money for shorter durations of time.
White Hat SEO, on the contrary, focuses on humans and makes sure that the user has an insightful and smooth experience. After keeping those features in mind, it is the only way forward to sustain a business that exists for good.
White Hat SEO is the ethical way of doing SEO without twisting or turning any loopholes that exist in the search engine's algorithm. It focuses on creating quality content so that users can actually benefit from it, and the goodwill increases.
Google has an algorithm to rank the websites on the Search Engine Result Page (SERP), where a website's score is calculated. This score determines which website stays at the apex of the page and, in turn, receives more traffic. White Hat SEO shows a very strong prospect to make the website rank higher and comes with a few simple hacks.
As briefly mentioned above, White Hat SEO is a very human-centric approach that aims at delivering quality results for its users. These things will lead to effective implementation of the same.
Any good content on the website will make sure that the user is staying for longer durations, and it is not hovering between different websites. This will ensure that the website will have a low bounce rate and, in turn, a better website score. Publishing good content also wins backlinks, which will be explained as we move further.
Some basic points are:
The website must be updated regularly so that the users can always expect something new when they come back. The content should be updated as and when the need arises so that the relevance remains in the same proportion as when the content was published.
A website looks new and fresh when the webpages experiment with new plugins, it makes the website advanced and always provides that “aha moment” when the user revisits the website.
Alt tags are alternative descriptions that are added to the photos and videos which form part of your content. It helps in better navigation for search engines and also for the browsers which are restricted to text.
Alt tags also help to indicate some references which are more than the meaning and thus prevent the user from disrupting their flow.
The meta description refers to the small description which comes below the title on the Search Engine Results page. It helps the user to make a better choice as sometimes the title itself is not enough to understand what the website is going to offer. They do the same work which the back cover of any novel does.
On-page and Off-page SEO are crucial for a website to rank higher, and thus the attention towards them should be equally divided.
On-Page SEO refers to how the website looks on the internet when the search results are shown. Every minuscule detail adds up to the overall score, and thus, every information and alteration should be tailor made.
Off-Page SEO, on the other hand, ensures that the website has attained a decent amount of goodwill. It includes putting valuable content and backlinking it to other credible sources so that the quality of the content is enriched. Backlinking makes the page authority to go up and hence helps in a better rank.
Gray Hat SEO is said to be a mixture of both Black and White Hat SEO strategies. It is riskier than White Hat SEO but safer than Black Hat. The whole concept of Gray Hat SEO revolves around bending some of the ill stated guidelines by Google and then finding a loophole to exploit. As the guidelines keep changing, the tide of Gray Hat does too.
Although, experts over the world believe that there is no point in messing with Google's algorithm as it might cost the business a lot of traffic. The implementation is risky, and hence the pros and cons are weighed with utmost caution.
SEO in itself is a time-consuming process because the reputation of the website is earned, not bought. It takes time before the blogs start getting recognition, and before the website even starts ranking on the first page of Google. It will take time before the website starts getting backlinks, but once it starts, it happens for good.
The businesses are formed with the intention to run for a long amount of time, and as businesses start getting recognition, the SEO process gets a boost too. For any business to sustain itself, being ethical is a no brainer, and that is why White Hat SEO should be your only choice.
