What Is SEO For Bloggers?

Our goal as a business that supports bloggers is to give you the very best insight into how to grow your blog and brand. Whether you’re just starting out or you’re a seasoned blogger looking to double down, we’re here to help. Our goal is to inspire you to grow your community and make more money off your blog.

So today, we’re answering one of our most frequently asked questions: what is SEO for bloggers and why does it matter? We’ll start with a basic overview, so you can understand how SEO works. Then, well discuss why SEO is so important for bloggers and how you can utilize SEO to grow your blog & brand.

Before we get started, here’s why you should even spend your time reading this post. Obviously, we think SEO is the most important thing bloggers can and should focus on. But don’t take our word for it, let’s look at what the data shows us.  

So, What Is SEO For Bloggers? 

What Is SEO?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It’s the process of creating content that is “search engine friendly” in order to gain traffic through search engines. When you create search engine-friendly content, you’re more likely to become “indexed” for various search results.

Search engines such as Google, Yahoo, & Bing are all giant indexes full of websites & blog content. When you search for something on Google for example, the “answers” that pop up do not pop up by accident. They pop up because Google has recognized that blog post or website as a reliable answer to the search you typed in.

Search engines such as Google use algorithms to decide which websites & blog posts should pop up as answers for every day questions and searches on their platforms. So when you’re working on SEO, the goal is to get your posts recognized and indexed as search results for various search questions. In turn, your content will rank higher on the results pages and increase your website traffic. 

Why Should Bloggers Invest in Their SEO?

1. Most top bloggers earn far more traffic from search engines than all of their traffic earned from social media combined.

Let that sink in for a second. All the effort Influencers put into Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, etc. Even if you combine all of the traffic earned to most bloggers’ websites through social media platforms, it’s still second to the traffic they earn from search engines.

2. Most higher income earning bloggers put more of an emphasis on SEO.

In this study, bloggers earning over $50,000 per year from their blog reported that Google is their number one source of traffic and placed a higher emphasis on SEO than lower income bloggers. We see this in our internal InfluencerSEO data as well. 

3. Brands care about your traffic data when deciding whether to work with you or not on sponsored content.

In fact, 75% of content marketing and communications professionals say verified web traffic of an influencer is the most important criteria when selecting an influencer. When you focus on SEO, you give yourself a competitive advantage against those that don’t.

SEO traffic comes in automatically, organically, and consistently. It’s traffic you don’t have to work for. Your past blog posts do the work for you. Once you build up a base of incoming traffic from search engines, anything earned from social media is like the cherry on top – rather than the driving factor behind your traffic. SEO is truly the fastest way to gain compounding blog posts, and gain a competitive edge as far as pageviews go. More on that below.

4. It’s the most efficient way to reach new people.

Traffic earned via search engines is the best way to reach new people and grow your overall readership. When you promote your blog on social media, you’re promoting to people that already follow you (and some new potential readers).

However, when you focus on SEO, you’re reaching people that have most likely never heard of you. They are simply searching for something online, and happen to come across your site in search results. Reaching these new people is how you grow your overall repeat readership, gain new followers, and grow your community. Simply promoting to the same people over and over is just not quite as effective. 

5. Search engine traffic converts better.

When you promote your blog on social media, or even just have readers visiting regularly, you’re hoping that they’ll be interested in your current content. You’re hoping that someone scrolling will find your social media promotion interesting enough to click, then possibly buy or read whatever you’re talking about.

SEO traffic is a totally different approach. Instead, you’re reaching people that are definitely interested in the topic you’re discussing. In fact, the reader is so interested that they searched for it, found it, and then decided to click onto your site. Now all you need to do is ensure you have enough interesting and valuable content to keep them on your page. 

6. Grow what’s yours.

Your website is the only platform that you actually own. If you want to have a powerhouse brand, the platform you own needs to be your priority.

Our clients typically see anywhere from 250 – 400% more traffic from search engines after working with us for one year. Many doors open up when your traffic grows at that rate. Think more affiliate sales, higher rates for sponsored content, acceptance into advertising networks, and of course, the ability to sell your own physical or digital products.

7. It’s cost effective.

When putting resources into growing your blog traffic, getting the best bang for your buck is the most important thing. Running ads on social media or Google is fleeting. Oppositely, rankings are consistent and dependable.

When you run an ad on any platform, you’ll see a boost in traffic while you’re paying for that ad. As soon as you stop paying, you stop seeing that boost. When you put your efforts into SEO ranking factors, you gain reliable placements on search engines that last a long time – typically years.

So even if you stop investing in SEO, the investments you made in the past will continue to pay for themselves. In most cases, you’ll keep earning traffic to your high ranking posts from your past efforts. To put this in perspective, our clients are earning traffic organically that would normally cost them tens of thousands of dollars per month if they were to pay for their traffic in ads.

8. Traffic earned through search engines is compounding. 

A compounding blog post is a piece of content that continues to earn you increased traffic over time – posts that earn you organic traffic for months & even years after the post goes live. While a decaying blog post earns traffic initially when you post it, the traffic slowly tapers off as it falls off your social media & blog scroll.

Feels like a waste don’t you think? One study found that compounding blog posts create SIX TIMES more traffic for websites than decaying posts. So it’s definitely true that the more compounding posts you have on your site, the more traffic you will gain.

Influencers should always put focus on growing their blog traffic. From a traffic standpoint, having compounding blog posts on your site is a great way to set you apart from the rest. 

9. SEO gives bloggers their most valuable resource back: TIME.

Traffic earned via compounding blog posts is traffic you don’t have to work for. Instead, the content you create does the promotional work for you. It pulls in traffic through search engines month after month automatically.

While your old content keeps bringing in traffic, you can focus on finding new potential readers with your new content and social media posts. The more compounding, ranking blog posts you have on your site, the the more time you will have to focus on new content. 

Good SEO for bloggers also incorporates a strategy of recirculating old high-performing content. This way, you make use of old content, while still constantly gaining organic traffic to your site and still being able to create new content.

In other words, you won’t be stuck in the social media hamster wheel, or feel the constant pressure to create new content. You’ll be automatically earning a ton of traffic from your compounding posts each month and repurposing old content to create massive value!

10. There is so much opportunity.

As of 2020, there are around 5 billion searches performed on Google each day. That is roughly 89,000 search queries per second. The average internet user searches on Google 3-4 times per day. And search engines like Google are growing constantly. In fact, searches on the platform grow by 10-15% each year.

Google recorded their highest revenues ever in 2020. So, it’s not a platform that’s going to fizzle out. Internet users between 18 and 44 years old are the most likely to use Google to search the web, which also happens to be the target age demographic for most Influencers. Why wouldn’t you want a slice of that pie? 

SEO For Bloggers FAQ:

What does good SEO look like?

At the core of good SEO, bloggers should have a user-friendly, SEO optimized website and competitive content. Bloggers should try to write about topics that have high search volume and low competition. Writers should also optimize their blog posts as well, for both SEO and readability.

All in all, you should have a user-friendly web design thats also mobile-friendly. You should also always optimize your title tags and write powerful meta descriptions on all pages to improve your click-through rate. Do plenty of authentic internal linking, attract authentic & organic backlinks, and choose your types of content wisely. Your posts need to be informative, easy to read, concise, and truly valuable.

This is obviously a super basic (and quick) description of what makes for good SEO, but this is a good start. If you want to take the guesswork out of SEO, we recommend working with a company that takes the strategy part of SEO off your plate. See our Strategize Package HERE.

How does SEO bring more traffic to your blog?

In simple terms, when you optimize your content for search engines, you’re creating high-quality content that search engines can easily understand and recognize as valuable enough to rank. Ranking means that your post on a specific topic has been indexed for specific search terms, AKA keywords, on search engine results pages.

When your content is indexed by search engines for relevant keywords, your posts pop up as answers to various searches. Because people on the internet are constantly searching, you are able to capture traffic organically through rankings because your blog posts pop up as answers to everyday searches.

In other words, someone searches on Google, your post pops up, they click on your post, you’ve earned the traffic. YAY! Top bloggers create a lot of content, and they create valuable content. Search engines LOVE valuable content. So it’s no surprise that top bloggers are earning a ton of traffic through search engines. And so can you!

How can you improve your SEO?

There are literally hundreds of things you can do to improve your site’s SEO. Everything from web design, URL structure, and SSL certificates, to the topics you choose to write about, how you format your content, and the research you put in your content.

Because there are so many things that impact SEO, bloggers really need to pick and choose what they put their energy into. We believe that quality content should be your sole focus. So, at the end of the day, when it comes to SEO there are three basic questions you should always ask yourself:

First, are you providing the best user experience from a design and usability standpoint on your website?

Second, is your content truly providing value?

And third, does this topic have search intent? AKA, would people search for this on a search engine?

If you’re not investing in SEO services, those three questions are a good place to start. You can also follow these general guidelines in our post on SEO basics for bloggers. Still, we recommend you hire professionals if you want to get serious about SEO, without all the hassle. 

How important is on page vs off page SEO?

Both are important. But honestly, we find that on page SEO is really all you need to succeed. This is especially true for bloggers. Plus, off page SEO really comes naturally if you focus on your on page SEO.

If you have valuable, SEO friendly content, your content will naturally to get linked to and gain backlinks. Other publishers will start to reach out to you for interviews, guest posts, quotes to include in their articles, etc. Plus, there is a lot of grey area when it comes to off page SEO. Anything that looks like you’re trying to beat the system can look like black hat SEO and actually get you penalized. More on black hat SEO below.

What is SEO for bloggers vs. product or service businesses?

SEO strategy for bloggers is different than SEO for product/service businesses. You have different goals. Businesses offering products or services are trying to drive sales for their own products and services. Whereas with bloggers, your website’s content is essentially your product. How many pageviews you have, how connected your readers feel to you, and how much they trust you is directly related to how much money you’re going to make. Rather than just gaining and selling to customers, you’re building a community.

SEO for traditional businesses is typically focused on design, including keywords on your homepage, site navigation, page speed, sales funnels, adding meta data for product pages, schema markup, and a bit of content. Differently, SEO services for bloggers needs to be very content-focused.

For example, at InfluencerSEO we help clients pump out SEO friendly content to push pageviews to the max. In order to be effective when working with bloggers on SEO, the SEO team has to be able to write like you, mimic your voice, understand your connection with your readers, be comfortable with affiliate marketing platforms, understand how sponsored content deals work, & understand the Influencer industry as a whole. So, you can see the differences between SEO for business, and SEO for blogging as a business. 

What is White Hat SEO vs Black Hat SEO?

White Hat SEO is ethical, and follows search engines guidelines for best practices. Black Hat SEO uses unethical practices that are against search engine guidelines. So basically shady, sketchy SEO.

Those practicing Black Hat SEO often see positive results initially, only to be blacklisted. You want to stay away from Black Hat SEO. Typically you can spot a Black Hat SEO service or practice if it feels like you’re trying to cheat the system. Keyword stuffing, inauthentic link building or link buying, sneaky redirects, clocking, etc, are all obvious ones. Those random emails you get offering to get you featured on big publications? Major red flag. You can read more about Black Hat SEO, here.

How Our SEO Services For Bloggers Can Help You Grow:

As a blogger, you should really be focusing on being a creative. To do it properly, earch engine optimization takes a lot of time. It’s so important, but can take you away from writing, creating, photography, and connecting with your readers.

As a blogger its important to figure out where you should spend your time, and where you should get professional help. Our team can edit and optimize your content for you, provide you with blog post outlines based on keyword research, and build an overall strategy to improve your SEO. Simply follow our lead and see the results flow in!

If you’re excited to take on the SEO challenge yourself, check out our blog for TONS of SEO tips. And if you have any other questions related to SEO tips for bloggers, feel free to shoot us an email HERE.