Starting out as an SEO expert a few years back was a difficult task. I was completely new to this jargon, as I felt it initially. However, with time, things took turns for the best. Recalling the memories makes me wonder – What if someone had explained the term ‘SEO – Search Engine Optimization’ in a little better or simpler manner. Simply put, what are SEO basics?

So, here I am trying to ease out things for the beginners. Talking about SEO, as we all know, the first thing that comes to mind is ‘Google Ranking’. What is different about the companies that often pop out in the few top results?

Well, the mantra isn’t that complex. Just follow the SEO guidelines outlined by Google and find a place within its favourite choices. However, you will require a little patience to keep going when the results aren’t falling in place.

If you are ready to buckle up and sit tight for the rest of the journey, let’s get to know about SEO and its hacks, more closely.

SEO Basics– A Quick Refresher  

Search engine optimization abbreviated as SEO helps bring your website to notice in the top Google searches. Definitely, for the keywords or phrases, you want to rank for. This way, you not only improve your rankings among search engines but also acquire more organic traffic, the ones you do not have to pay for.

With that being said, there are paid advertisements as well, called PPC. And, it does come within digital marketing. However, when it comes to search engine optimization, it’s all about organic search results and not PPC optimization.

Still not sure about the difference between PPC and organic traffic? To put it simply, PPC is a paid service where the advertiser pays for each click on the link to the website. On the other hand, organic traffic comes to your website when you rank good on Google.

Here is an image to explain the difference between the two.

NOTE: While the PPC result is with paid marketing, organic traffic comes with SEO.

Key Components of SEO

SEO is a vast subject. The complex Google algorithm along with the difference in the search engines’ programs for returning results to the users. All that seems to be too overwhelming.

The good news is that you do not need to know everything. By covering just the major key components of SEO, you can make your web pages accessible for internet users.

On-Page and Off-Page SEO

Depending on whether or not you perform the SEO activities on the website, the on-page and off-page SEO will differ.

As the same suggests, the on-page SEO is what you do on the webpage. This includes all the technical aspects of the SEO activities. Either it’s the optimization of your well-written content or internal links.

In short, you must focus on the content quality as well as user experience while ensuring that the search engines understand what the page is about.

On the other hand, off-page SEO involves getting backlinks to your website to increase its page ranking. The various other digital marketing strategies such as social media marketing, branding and more also help in link building. Thus, strengthening the off-page SEO further.

On-Page SEO	Off-Page SEO
Keyword research	Guest Blogs
Content optimization	Email Subscriptions
Title Tag optimization	Broken Link
Internal Page linking

Black Hat SEO and What Hat SEO

There are two different approaches to a successful SEO. One that may not last for longer and can also result in the blacklisting of your website, the other is a more legitimate method.

As the name suggests, Black Hat refers to unethical practices of SEO that may get the results faster, but won’t sustain it for longer.

In other words, you may use the Black hat approach for improving the website ranking quickly. However, as soon as search engines find out about the same, your website may be banned forever.

White Hat SEO is completely the opposite of Black Hat SEO. It uses genuine SEO techniques, sticking to the guidelines. As already discussed before, you must have the patience to reap the fruits of this approach. And, being a long-term strategy, you need to be consistent about your content posting, optimization and more.

White Hat SEO	Black Hat SEO
Keyword research	Keyword stuffing
Quality Content Strategies	Hidden texts
Natural link building	Manipulation of links / irrelevant links
Brand building	Spamming comments

The Conclusion

The digital age has made it essential for every business to take SEO seriously. Either you are freelance like I am, or a business, selling products and services, ranking on Google among the top results is necessary.

Therefore, you must take some time out to figure out and plan your strategies, in a useful way for making every SEO approach count.