Ever wonder how some websites always top search results? The key is mastering SEO. It’s not just about keywords—it’s about building a site search engines love and users trust.
By following SEO best practices, you can significantly improve your rankings and attract more organic traffic. With the right approach, you can turn your website into a go-to resource for your target audience.
But that’s easier said than done. While there’s a lot you can do to improve your SEO, you need to prioritize the most crucial ones. In this article, we’ll discuss SEO best practices, and by the end, you’ll know the right changes to make to boost your ranking.
So read on to find out more.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) best practices are a set of techniques that can help improve your website’s ranking on search engine results pages (SERPs). Implementing SEO best practices can increase your website’s visibility and drive more organic traffic.
The more visible your website is, the more likel
y you are to generate qualified leads that convert into customers. This is what makes SEO best practices vital for businesses.
Experienced SEO professionals know which SEO best practices to follow to get the best results and rank at the top of Google SERP.
And we all know how important that is. After all, research from Backlinko shows that the first organic search result is 10 times more likely to get clicked than the tenth. The same study suggests that only 0.63% of users get to the second page of search results.
Take a look at the CTR by search result position below.
Image via Backlinko
Clearly, optimizing your website and
following the SEO best practices delivers the desired results.
So, let’s go ahead and explore the top SEO best practices.
Now that you know what SEO best practices are, are you ready to learn some of the most effective ones?
Let’s explore 9 powerful SEO best practices you can utilize to boost your search engine rankings and traffic.
We can’t discuss SEO best practices without mentioning auditing. A technical SEO audit is key to checking your website’s health—it looks at how search engines crawl, index, and rank your pages. It helps uncover any issues that might prevent your site from ranking in search results.
This audit covers site speed, mobile-friendliness, broken links, duplicate content, structured data, and more. It’s one of the SEO best practices that help your site perform better.
A good technical SEO audit includes the following steps:
Conducting technical SEO audits is one of the SEO best practices, but they can be overwhelming to manage manually, especially for large websites. Fortunately, there are many affordable SEO audit tools to help streamline the process and save time.
Notable examples include Google Search Console, which identifies and automatically resolves some issues. There are also premium versions with advanced features, like Ahrefs and its alternatives.
Image via Ahrefs
What makes your website stand out from the crowd? The answer lies in creating content that provides value to your target audience.
But where do you start?
Here are some SEO best practices for creating high-quality, relevant content:
Relevant content attracts users and encourages them to spend more time on your site. High engagement signals search engines that your content is valuable, boosting your SERP rankings.
Do you have a physical store or address? If you do, you can take advantage of local SEO tools and tactics to boost local search rankings.
Local SEO best practices help your site rank for search results for location-specific search queries and can increase foot traffic to your physical stores.
Here are some local SEO best practices to get you started.
Here is an example of businesses that rank for the local keyword phrase “best restaurants in Los Angeles” on Google’s local pack.
Image via Google
Website owners that use specific local keywords have a higher chance of ranking than those that use generic keywords.
Pro Tip: Utilize GMB features like photos, insights, and Q&A to enrich your listing and enhance your local presence.
We all know that backlinks are great for SEO.
However, not all backlinks and internal links produce significant results. The key to nailing down SEO best practices is knowing how and where to incorporate your links. But how do you do it?
Check out these external and internal linking best practices.
Meta descriptions and title tags are the first elements that hook users to your content. They can make or break your SEO efforts, and it’s one of the SEO best practices you shouldn’t overlook. To ensure a reader clicks through to your website, your title tags and meta descriptions need to be compelling enough.
Let’s dig a little deeper.
Title Tags
Title tags or page titles appear as clickable headlines on search results. One of the SEO best practices you should follow is to use title tags to encourage readers to click on your SERP result and visit your website.
Here is how page titles appear on search engines.
Image via Google
Here are some SEO best practices you can follow when adding meta titles.
Meta Descriptions
These are summaries that provide a snapshot of a page’s content and are crucial SEO best practices you need to implement. While they may not be a direct ranking factor, they can convince users to click on your SERP listing and visit your website.
Here is how they appear on search results.
Image via Google
Here are some practices you can follow to optimize your meta descriptions:
Optimizing images is one of the best SEO best practices that helps search engines understand your content better. While visual content is crucial, large unoptimized images can slow down your website and affect user experience.
So how can you still use images while improving user experience? Here are some SEO best practices you can follow:
How fast does your site load? If it’s not less than 3 seconds, that’s a problem.
Improving website load speeds is one of the top SEO best practices that ensures a site loads as fast as possible without adding wait time for visitors. Faster websites give people a better experience and keep them engaged.
A study by Bidnamic shows that a website that loads in 3 seconds has a 2.55% conversion rate, while those that take 7 seconds see a drop to just 1.5%. A slow-loading website can frustrate users and cause them to leave. This sends a signal to search engines that users are not finding your site useful.
Here are several tips to help you optimize your site’s loading speed.
PageSpeed Insights allows you to analyze your website’s speed and overall health. It also provides useful insights into improving your website’s loading speed.
Image via PageSpeed Insights
Image via PageSpeed Insights
According to Statista, almost half of website traffic globally comes from mobile devices. Mobile devices generated about 61.85% of worldwide website traffic in the fourth quarter of 2024.
What does this tell you?
Optimizing your website is no longer an option but a necessity.
Here are some SEO best practices to make your website mobile-friendly.
Most mobile phone users abandon a website when it takes too long to load. Additionally, most consumers will abandon their carts if the checkout process is too complex.
A good user experience allows website visitors to seamlessly engage with your content. Furthermore, it signals search engines that your website is trustworthy, which helps improve SERP rankings.
Here are some SEO best practices to improve your site’s user experience.
Pro Tip: You can utilize LinkStorm to seamlessly link related pages and simplify navigation.
Q1. What are the SEO best practices to improve website rankings?
A. Here are 9 search engine optimization best practices you can use to improve your website’s ranking.
Q2. Is SEO still worth it in 2025?
A. Yes. SEO is still worthwhile. It helps improve your site’s visibility, attract organic traffic, and boost credibility.
Q3. How does Google know how to rank a page?
A. Google uses search engine crawlers and complex algorithms to analyze several factors and rank a page. Some of these factors include content quality and relevance, backlinks, user experience, keywords, and more.
Q4. What are some best practices for on-page SEO?
A. Here are some of the important on-page SEO best practices.
Q5. What is an SEO strategy?
A. An SEO strategy is a detailed plan outlining techniques for improving a website’s visibility on search engine results pages. It involves using SEO best practices to rank higher and get more clicks.
Some of these SEO best practices include technical SEO audits, crafting quality content, improving local SEO, optimizing images, and elevating page speeds, among others.
And there you have it. Now you are equipped with 9 crucial SEO best practices to follow.
Embracing these SEO best practices is just a starting point for increasing organic traffic and search rankings. Implementing search engine optimization practices is a continuous process that requires a commitment to providing value to your audience.
By aligning your strategies with user intent, creating quality content, and using an internal linking tool, you can boost your SEO efforts. Good luck!
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