At our company’s core, we started as an SEO company and see everything through that lens. While the goal of this article is to show the process of Holistic SEO, the other purpose of this article is to show our response to helping companies put this in context. That context is called a Holistic SEO Foundation.
Having a Holistic SEO process creates a clear mission for your website and all tactics while keeping the focus on targeting your ideal customers. Many people believe that SEO is a mysterious process that only experts can understand, and while SEO has many complicated and highly technical aspects, it can be understood and used by anyone.
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and refers to optimizing the content on pages of a website to rank higher for search terms. Everyone wants to be on the first page for a service or product they offer. The problem is that many people have no idea how to achieve that goal.
Holistic SEO Is A Process
When people talk about wanting to rank their website online, it’s important to remember that pages rank for search terms, not websites. If you don’t have a clear mission for your website, it’s like wanting to build a roof without having all of the parts of the building that support it.
The details matter – a lot. This is why SEO is now a part of every single creative detail that goes into building a website. This includes optimized hosting, a clear content strategy as well as a well-planned site structure. Every website also needs great content and a plan to distribute that content. This is why we believe in a Holistic SEO process from start to finish.
“SEO is not something you do anymore. It’s what happens when you do everything else right”. – Chad Pollitt
A great SEO strategy is the result of organizing a core message that targets a specific audience. The goal of this message is to provide high-quality content that people online are searching for. Here are a few ways to not just better understand holistic SEO but to start your own holistic SEO process.
First, Create A Buyer’s Persona To Target Your Ideal Customer
A Buyer’s Persona represents who your ideal client is and how you would like your website to communicate to them. In order to associate goals with your business growth properly, the first step in establishing a Holistic SEO process is to identify, in great detail, who your ideal customers are, how they think, what are the biggest problems they need to solve, and what questions are they asking online? We would go so far as to interview your best past converted clients as well as do outside research.
- So who is your ideal client or customer?
- What do you like, and what do they dislike? Are they male or female or both?
- How old are they?
- Did they graduate from college?
- What is their annual income?
- Do you have more than one ideal client or customer?
- How did they find you?
- What problems did your company solve for them?
- Where do they get their information and education from?
- How do they value your service or industry?
Creating a detailed buyer persona is very helpful to the SEO process. The reason buyer personas are so helpful is that they help craft a targeted message about how your products and services can solve the problems that your ideal customers are facing.
This process avoids creating content that’s talking to the wrong people. By answering these questions and creating a Buyer’s Persona, it will also create a huge advantage for you when doing keyword research as well as on-page optimization and online advertising. To help you craft your Buyer Persona, check out this amazing tool that Hubspot has created – Buyer Persona Generator.
Second, Establish Topic Clusters per Persona
Topic clusters are the way in which you should be targeting and attracting your buyer personas. Topic clusters help define a strategy of content creation aimed based upon your buyer personas and the research around those personas. Check out this phenomenal Hubspot video I show to our clients on topic clusters.
Third, Write Out A Mission Statement For Your Website
Creating a mission statement for a website allows clear and concise goals to be established that allow everyone to be on the same page. This mission statement will help you understand what goals are most important for your website to achieve and what services and/or products are the most crucial to your marketing campaigns.
- Who are you?
- What is your website about?
- What makes it special?
- And what promise do you make on your website?
Fourth, Audit Your Website
In light of the goals established, the next step is to review if your website hits those goals. Also, website health is a very important ranking factor and is often overlooked when evaluating the optimization of your online presence.
At Striventa, we strive to create websites with a Holistic SEO strategy in mind. This includes being mindful of designing websites that have fast load times, picture optimization, inner linking within the website, and building out a page for every keyword that a website wants to rank for online.
Implementing the changes from a detailed website audit can dramatically increase your website’s online rankings and user experience. It’s easy to get wrapped up in the excitement of design & animations, but if your website can’t be crawled, then it can’t rank.
Fifth, Study your competition
I get it, you may feel like you are in a space with no competition because your service or product is so unique. Trust me, though, there’s always competition. By examining your top competition and understanding how they’re doing in relation to your business and attracting the market into their funnel, you’ll be better armed and prepared. Plus, who knows, you may even learn a thing or two…and that’s not a bad thing at all!
Clear And Precise Holistic SEO Strategy From Inception
SEO is a holistic process that must have precise goals in mind from beginning to end. The goal of every website should be to provide the best content possible for your unique audience and create an incredible user experience resulting in new business.
To accomplish this goal, you need a clear and precise strategy from inception. We’re always happy to help as we believe Holistic SEO is vital in accomplishing all of your online goals, even to the hosting provider you use. Everything matters. Every detail is important.
Feel free to check out a Holistic SEO Foundation we made for one of our amazing partners:
If you are interested in scheduling a FREE 1 Hour Exploratory Session with our team, click here.