HERE WE GO!

SEO is magic because it’s a kind of automated sales prospecting. Leads & opportunities come to you. But beware! If you’re a startup, SEO is a long-term investment. Results rarely appear before 4-6 months of work, at best, so you need to be sure that SEO is the best way to spend your time (at the moment).

Here are some situations where it’s probably a good idea:

You’re a web marketplace (StarOfService, SoBus…)

You do e-commerce (MADE.com, Shanty Biscuits…)

You’re a SaaS and want to become top-of-mind (HubSpot is probably the most legendary case to date. They’ve flooded the market with their content on almost every possible B2B topic. And everyone knows HubSpot if they’re in a B2B business. Zapier is another legendary one.)

THE BASICS

God’s Plan

Rule #1: Be a servile flatterer

SEO is as simple as knowing the scale that Google uses to rate your website. And you’re in luck, Google tells you part of it.

Here’s what you need to prove your credentials to Google:

Connect your website to all the services that Google offers: Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Google My Business, YouTube… Google did not create them to please you. It created them to collect and analyze as much information about you as possible. Respect the basics of one-page SEO. The titles of your pages must be <h1> and the subtitles <h2>. (Ask your dev/CTO if you don’t understand what that means.)

Rule #2: Mobile responsive is a must

Look around you, people are on their phones. If you don’t have a mobile version, go and make one. Google already start knocking down sites that do not have one.

Rule #3: Go buy an SSL certificate (from http to https)

More & more browsers like Google Chrome blocks sites in http, which they see as unsafe. So you must have an SSL certificate, otherwise you’ll soon find that you aren’t referenced in Google.

➡ Free SSL certificate right here.

Rule #4: Page loading speed is the new Eldorado

Recently, Google has started putting MUCH more emphasis on the loading speed of pages. Even more than having “clean” code and good servers, you can start by compressing the images on each page, for example using tools like Recompressor, TinyPNG or TinyJPG.

Rule #5: Know Google’s relative rankings of a page’s evaluation criteria

⚠️ Unfair advantage here⚠️

Google Title or <title> (what will be displayed when presenting a URL in Google): Make it different from the H1! 65-80 characters preferably (for visibility on mobile). Keep in mind that the first word will have more weight than the second, and the second than the third, etc. Also, avoid “|” in titles, use dashes instead. Finally, a certain school of SEO claims that articles (ex: “the”) are no longer taken into account by Google. Personally, I don’t believe this, because I’ve experienced the opposite. For safety, keep the articles in the H1 of your page, and remove them for the Google Title. H1: different from the Google Title! Do not exceed 80 characters if at all possible. URL: Ideally, 3–4 words. Delete articles. Really think about the shortcut that the user will search in Google (ex: “wedding planning tips” ➡ yourstartupwebsite.com/wedding-planning-tips). Here again, the first word will have more weight than the second, and the second than the third, etc. Meta Description (what will be displayed to describe a URL in Google): Preferably, 80-120 characters. WARNING: A certain SEO theory says that this criterion does not affect the ranking of a page but instead affects the click rate, as it is the commercial text that makes the user want to click or not. I’d note though that when doing a search, Google highlights the keywords you entered in the meta description of each URL that appears in the search results. My advice: Write a meta description using synonyms of the terms used in the Google title. H2: Preferably, 70-80 characters. Go into more detail than the H1 (ex: if H1 is “Dog food: dry food, treats…”, the H2 can be “Vegan dry food and treats for dogs made in France”. Otherwise, as people are searching more and more in “question” format, especially via voice search (Siri, Alexa, Google Home…), you can also try something like: “How many treats a day can I give to my dog ?”

Note: It has been proven that the Meta Keywords tag has zero impact on SEO, so it’s useless to indicate it.

Rule #6: How to write content, the SEO way

Try to make each page contain more than 800 words. Beyond that, don’t wrack your brain: write quality content and address a maximum of topics related to your big topic/industry. Try not to hammer keywords, Google punishes this. Use as many synonyms as possible. There is also a trick for Google to identify your business pages as blog posts, which is much better in its eyes: Avoid business vocabulary (ex: “quote request”). Instead, use terms like “advice”, “good idea”, etc., since Google prefers that you advise Internet users rather than selling them something 😉 For Google, sales are done through Google Ads, and sharing valuable information through free search (SEO). It makes sense.

Rule #7: There is no secret. Craft amazingly good content.

When I talk with entrepreneurs, they always ask me “How do I choose the right keywords? I want to put lots of keywords!” But all there is to say is “Produce good content.” Content that you would like to read yourself. People will love to consume it, and Google will see that people spend time on your site, with the help of Google Analytics (refer to Rule N°1 😉)

However, there are tools that will allow you to easily view the weight of keywords on each page(Chrome / Mozilla).

Rule #8: Take the fold into account

Google is really paying attention to user behavior on pages. And people rarely scroll, it’s just a fact. So a very good way to move up the Google ranking is to place a maximum of quality content (your H1, one descriptive text, one image and your H2) above the fold. It won’t necessarily be very beautiful, but it works really well. That’s why so many Wordpress templates are incompatible with SEO: there’s too much spacing between the different pieces of content.

Rule #9: Local SEO is important

You must have a Google My Business account to be referenced in the geolocated search results. You must have as many customers as possible rating you 5/5 ⭐️ and giving good reviews.

Rule #10: Do not duplicate or copy any content

Make sure every page has different content for all of those elements: Google title, Meta description, H1/H2, page’s content. And ESPECIALLY, never steal content from another site. Google dates it every time new content appears.

A note on blogging:

Blogging is mainstream, but it’s still the best SEO strategy for startups.

Pretty much all startups have a problem with SEO. When building their website, they first have to focus on their value proposition/baseline, their UX/UI, their swag and their sales pitch to convince their target. And most of the time, these things don’t match with SEO. Or at least not with killer SEO.

Why? Just to give one example, one good SEO practice is to ensure that all your pages are accessible in the fewest clicks possible, from all the pages of your site. That doesn’t always match with a good UI/UX. (Note: e-commerce startups have less of a problem with this than others because they can categorize their pages into categories/subcategories with drop-down menus.)

Given that, my advice is to focus on producing content, intensely if at all possible, over a short period of time.

I must warn you: blog topics will seem really boring. That’s normal. You’re writing for Google, not really to bring lots of value to users. (But don’t worry, they only look at the pictures 😉)

So if you’re offering a service in the wedding industry, a good article could be, “Wedding organization: 5 things you MUST remember for the big day!”

One of the best practices in terms of SEO blogging is to use the technique of “Tops” (ex: “Top accessories for puppies: toys, croquettes, treats…”)

Top bottles for baby sheep…

More than clickbait, users often click on this kind of URL after a search because they’re convinced a human in your organization has sourced and ranked the best solutions to their problem. People also spend more time on these types of pages because information is organized.

As to the rhythm of writing, if you’re building a startup, there is a good chance you have better things to do than write content all day long. So here is the method:

Find a platform of freelance writers (SEOsecret.co…) Select 3 to 5 web writers, and make sure they are specialized in SEO writing! Writing blog articles for influence ≠ writing blog articles for SEO purposes. Ask them to write the same blog article When you get their work, read them all and only publish the best one Keep working with that freelancer

At The Family, we are working with Charlotte to build a Short List of on-demand freelance SEO writers to help our entrepreneurs. It will be available soon.

Note: if you already have a Medium blog, keep it to write influence content. For SEO-targeted content, create a dedicated blog like yourstartupwebsite.com/blog or blog.yourstartupwebsite.com. Medium blog posts are poorly referenced by Google.

Semantic SEO is the foundation 👆

Technical SEO is more rigorous (but you still have to do it) 👇

A lot of Google’s criteria for rating your site and its pages are technical criteria. That means that to improve you’ll have to get into your site’s source code, examine your server performance, and so on.

Rule #1: Domain Name System & 301 redirect

First, contrary to popular belief, your domain name’s meaning has very little impact on SEO. The only benefit to possessing a generic domain name (e.g. “vtc-paris.fr”) is that the Google Title tag of your homepage could be “VTC Paris: best drivers on-demand in Paris.” And remember that the first word will have more impact in the eyes of Google than the second, and the second than the third. Also, having a short startup name is a good thing, because the first 65 characters of a Google Title are taken into account the most.

But once you have a domain name like “vtc-paris.fr”, you really should buy its variants: without the dash, .com, singular, plural… This will ensure that you hinder potential competition and it will also show Google that you’re investing in a better experience for users who type the wrong URL (including or not the dash, for example).

If you have more than one domain name, choose a primary domain name and make additional domain 301 redirects to the main site.

Also note that the seniority of a domain name is an important criterion for Google. That’s because when Google indexes your domain name in its search engine, it vouches that this site is online and that it has (interesting) content. Showing Google that your site has been online for many years is the same as building a good reputation in your industry: people trust you and feel better about recommending you.

Rule #2: Conduct regular sitemap.xml scans of your site through your Google Search Console

A sitemap is a file where you can list the web pages of your site to provide search engines with information about the structure of your site’s content. Search engine crawlers like Googlebot are reading this file to better crawl your site.

It can be a good idea to highlight your different images and create a specific Sitemap for them using the following image tags:

<url>: the tag that includes all the information on one URL

<loc>: the URL where the image is (html)

<image: image>: the tag that includes all information about one image

<image: loc>: the URL of the image. Note that this can come from a different field.

<image: caption>: image caption. Use optimized terms for SEO.

<image: geo_location>: the place where the image was taken (not always relevant)

<image: title>: the title attribute of the image

<image: license>: URL that refers to the image’s license

Rule #3: The depth of your site’s pages is essential

The depth of a site’s pages determines the ease with which the engine accesses it from the home page. Strategic pages must be accessible in a minimum number of steps. Beyond the 3rd level of accessibility (clicks), the page is considered difficult to access.

Rule #4: Customize Error 404 pages

Optimizing the 404 error page is essential because it can be an opportunity to redirect users to strategic pages. Its optimization can also help improve the crawl of the site (through links to the main categories) and keep the user on your site.

Rule #5: Make sure the loading time of your site on different desktops is fast

Use this Google Tool to analyze your site.

And beware of responsive design that has to be optimized so as not to load the entire desktop site on a mobile device.

Rule #6: Optimize your images

Use this tool for JPG, this one for PNG, and this one for PDF.

Rule #7: Javascript is like running while carrying a couch

When a web browser encounters Javascript code by interpreting the source code of a web page, it can considerably slow down the display of the page, especially if downloading an external script is necessary. Avoid the use of Javascript as much as possible to ensure a quick page display.

How? If possible, use one of the following techniques to call for external files:

use the async attribute

use the defer attribute

add the script in the DOM in Javascript during the onload event

place the scripts at the end of your source code (ideally at the end of the <body>)

Rule #8: Use the hreflang attribute to tell Google your site’s language 🌍

Rule #9: Make sure that each CSS element uses its own identifier

Using the same identifier for 2 different CSS elements can lead to edge effects, especially when executing Javascript or when applying CSS rules.

What should you do? Make sure that nothing on the page has the same identifier. If you want to share properties/behaviors between several elements, you will have to use the attribute class:

<P>

<span class = “mySpans”> </ span> <span class = “mySpans”> </ span> </ p>

Rule #10: Fill in your microdata!!!

For visibility, you need to fill in your microdata, they are very important to referencing: https://schema.org/

These will help Google identify your organization and your business and will help you get rich snippets on Google in searches.

In general, microdata are useful for classifying your activity according to the goodwill of Google, thus favoring your visibility in the SERPs.

You can use this tool to analyze your use of microdata on your site.

The schema.org markup is easy to set up. A tool exists in the Search Console, but nothing is stronger than the code, especially since it is very simple to set up.

For example, to mark a hotel:

<div itemscope itemtype = “http://schema.org/Hotel"> <span itemprop = “name”> Name of hotel </ span> <span itemprop = “description”> description of the hotel </ span > <img itemprop = “image” src = “http: //Images/hotel.jpg” /> </ div>

Schema.org is a game changer, I promise.

⚡AND HERE ARE SECRETS FROM THE EXPERTS ⚡

“I’m looking for interesting new keywords and terms. How can I find them and how do I evaluate them?”