What is SEO?

Last updated April 7, 2026

What does SEO mean?

SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization.” It represents the set of processes, methods, and tasks one can perform to achieve not only higher results for a website on search engines, but better engagement, retention, and conversion on that website.

Effective SEO strategies utilize both content-based and technical configuration over time, both on the website and off, to increase the amount of traffic and conversions for a website. 

Why is SEO important?

When small brands and businesses start on the internet, SEO is a great way to attract and build an audience. Earning traffic and conversions for search queries organically through qualified SEO can strengthen your brand reliably.

Using SEO for your website is:

• Cost-effective compared purely to paid advertising
• Complementary to other online marketing efforts
• Scalable as your business grows and changes
• Adaptable to trends and seasons
• A way to get measurable and qualifiable results

How does SEO help?

Studies over years have shown that SEO – when applied properly and over time – yields worthwhile results. As the internet becomes our most popular form of research, SEO optimized websites and businesses rise above the rest.

• Less than 1% of searchers click on the second page of Google results (Backlinko, 2023)
• Pages with the highest number of total backlinks usually rank best in Google (Backlinko, 2020)
• The top traffic source for all websites is organic search (HubSpot, 2022)
• Long-tail keywords make up the vast majority of all Google searches (Semrush, 2022)
• Some 88% of marketers who already invest in SEO plan to allocate more or maintain the same amount in 2023 (HubSpot, 2023)

How do search engines work?

Search engines use the process of crawling, indexing, and ranking in order to archive and present web pages results to searchers based on relevancy.

There is a specific order to the events that search engines (like Google) use:

1. The search engine bots crawl the internet to find new and freshly updated web pages.
2. The search engine bots organize, categorize, and store web page and other content based on provided context and factors, such as keywords.
3. Someone enters a search query (a question, statement, etc.) into the search engine.
4. According to the search algorithm, the search engine matches indexed data to the search query.
5. The search engine shows the user the results, ranked from most to least relevant.

What is on-page SEO?

On-page optimization is the process of making your websites content and layout more search engine-friendly with the goal of raising rankings. 

On-page SEO strategies include things like:

• Optimizing content for specific keywords
• Writing concise and descriptive meta descriptions and titles
• Writing quality content with clear structure
• Using internal and external links to connect information
• Optimizing images for performance and usability
• Crafting optimized URLs for pages. andposts
• Implementing schema markup

Focusing on on-page SEO is typically the most effective route for folks new to SEO. If you write or publish content on your site, you should be familiar with on-page SEO best practices. Working these steps into your publishing routine can push your SEO goals forward before you know it – all without needing to learn any code.

Keyword Optimization

Keyword optimization is the process of researching and selecting search query phrases and then curating content that is most relevant to those phrases.

It is difficult to have an SEO strategy without keyword optimization. The point of SEO is to earn more traffic and interactions using search engines as a connection between you and users. Search engines usually cannot fully understand your site – what you’re an expert in and what you can provide a user – without the presence of a keyword strategy.

Meta titles and descriptions

Meta titles and descriptions serve as meta data for each of your webpages. Search engines use them to understand what your content is about at a high level, then serve them to searchers.

If you have a WordPress website, you can use a free tool like Yoast SEO to add meta titles and descriptions, and ensure that they are optimized.

Content and Structure

When optimizing for on-page SEO it’s important to focus on how the content on the page – text, headings, etc. – is actually formatted and structured.

Writing an SEO optimized blog post is a good example of how to properly structure content for SEO. Best practices for ideal content structure includes things like:

• Only using one H1 tag per page.
• Nesting H2-H6 tags properly.
• Using bulleted and numbered lists where appropriate.
• Using tables and similar content types to communicate complex information.
• Including the use of bold and italic text to emphasize information.

Link Strategy

Developing an SEO link strategy means building relationships with other pages and websites using links that go back to your site in order to boost your site’s authority and provide context to search engines. Links that lead back to your website from someone else’s are called backlinks. Be careful when collecting backlinks; links from poorly rated websites can actually hurt the way Google sees and ranks you.

Image Optimization

SEO image optimization involves making sure that search engines can easily understand the context and purpose of an image on your website. Remember – search engines cannot “see” images like humans can. The bots need context in other ways.

• Minimizing their file size in order to improve page load speed.
• Choosing the correct image format.
• Using thoughtful alternative text, image names, and captions to provide context about the content of an image.

Images are a frequently overlooked aspect of on-page SEO. People tend to focus on things like text and links. However, optimized images both improve the overall “SEO juice” of your site and get you rankings on Google Images.

URL Structure

SEO-friendly URLs are short, descriptive, include the page’s target keyword, and use include hyphens to separate lowercase words.

We use URLs to link people from one place to another. They serve as something like a web page’s “address” – telling browsers where to go to find certain files on a server. Search engines want page URLs that are clear for users, logical, and concise.

Schema Markup

Also called structured data, or just schema, schema markup is a chunk of HTML code added to a website that provides detailed context for search engines about exactly what the page is about and who it is for.

Schema markup was first developed in 2011. It was created by developers from Google, Bing, and Yahoo with the goal to standardize the vocabulary sites use to communicate context for a website. Rich snippets in search engine result pages rely heavily on schema markup.

What are the types of schema markup?

• Article/NewsArticle: News articles, blog posts, etc.
• Product & Offer: E-commerce products and stores.
• Local Business: Specifically for physical businesses.
• Organization: Generally describes the details of a company, like name and social profiles.
• Event: Describes events like shows, conventions, concerts, etc.
• FAQ: Allows the content to show up as frequently asked questions on the search result page.
• Recipe: For websites that publish recipes that include ingredients, steps, and reviews.
• How-To: Guide with step-by-step directions to accomplish something.
• Person: For people, like authors, actors, politicians, or other public figures.
• Breadcrumb: Helps to map the navigation of a website.

What is off-page SEO?

Off-page optimization relies on links and other indicators from websites other than your own to communicate the relevance, credibility, and authority of your website. Think of off-page SEO like your personal reputation. How do people know you? What do they think of you? Do they judge you based on who you spend time with? Google and other search engines want to understand the relationship you have with other sites to get an idea of who you are.

Off-page SEO strategies include things like:

• Backlink strategy
• Social media
• Competitor analysis

Both on-page SEO and off-page SEO include methods and metrics about your website. However, while on-page SEO involves optimizing parts of your website, off-page SEO is all about how your website interacts with other websites.

Backlinks strategy

Backlinks are links from other sites that lead to yours. Search engines care about how many backlinks you have, their quality, what pages they go to, what the referring domains are, and what anchor text the site uses for that link.

Two aspects must be considered when analyzing and repairing backlinks:

• Link quality: You can get a backlink “score” that considers the number of backlinks your site has compared to their quality. Fewer good backlinks is better than more bad backlinks. You don’t want spammy links, links from AI generated directories, links from pages full of ads, or links that contain poor language about your brand.
• Link relevancy: Search engines care about how relevant a backlink is to your industry. Google will actually lower your rankings if a lot of your backlinks are irrelevant.

What makes a good backlink and/or link-building strategy?

1. Removing links that are irrelevant to your industry.
2. Removing links that come from low-quality or spammy websites.
3. Gaining positive links at a steady and consistent pace (guest posting, PR mentions, influencer marketing, forum participation, online directories, etc.)
4. Gaining links from reputable and high-authority websites.
5. Being choosy about the anchor text sites use to link to you.

Social Media

Using social media helps boost content production, increases brand awareness, drives traffic, and builds backlinks. Google looks at all of these things favorably; understanding that social media profiles are powerful ways to establish a brand and connect with searchers.

(Keep in mind that, while social media is a great help for SEO strategies, Google has stated that social media does not directly act as a ranking factor.)

Competitor Analysis

Competitor analysis is the act of reviewing the websites and performance of your competitors to find how you can improve your own rankings based on their strategies, their strengths, and the opportunities they have left unattended.

How do you perform competitor analysis?

1. Make a list of your biggest competitors and the links to their websites.
2. Visit their sites and social media; observe what you can about their marketing and how they use SEO in visible ways.
3. Use online tools to compare metrics such as domain authority, backlinks, traffic, and rankings.
4. Look for opportunities such as content they have not covered, good sources for backlinks, keywords they aren’t rankings for, etc.

What is the difference between on-page SEO and off-page SEO?

Both on-page SEO and off-page SEO have the same goals, work to establish a good relationship between your site and search engines, involve user experience and keyword focuses.

How do you optimize SEO for AI?

Optimizing SEO for AI – trying to be included as a cited source in AI summaries – means optimizing for the requirements of AI tools. There are two types of AI SEO: Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO). These methods do not replace traditional SEO, but the two can work in tandem.

Methods of optimizing for AI searches include:

• Being concise, to-the-point, and conversational
• Focusing content on answering specific questions
• Using technical SEO like schema to provide rich, detailed context
• Building robust keyword strategies that build authority around a certain topic
• Formatting content to make it easy for AI to grab definitions, steps, lists, and answers

AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)

The process of optimizing your content to make it easy for platforms like Google’s AI Overviews and AI voice assistants (Siri, Alexa, etc.) to cite your content when they generate answers to searches.

When do you use AEO?

• If you’re targeting social searches
• If you’re providing comparisons, such as the cost or value between products
• If you publish content like FAQs, support, guides, etc.

If you want to learn more, check out our complete guide to Answer Engine Optimization (AEO).

GEO (Answer Engine Optimization)

The process of optimizing your content to make it easy for AI search tools (ChatGPT, Gemini, etc.) to mention, cite, and recommend you when they generate answers to searches.

When do you use GEO?

• If you’re writing long-form content and/or evergreen content.
• You are trying to establish yourself a a thought leader, expert, or primary source for information.
• If your content includes original data or multiple perspectives to answer questions.

AEO and GEO can (and usually should) be used in tandem; they are not mutually exclusive.

If you want to learn more, check out our complete guide to Generative Engine Optimization (GEO).

For a full view of AI SEO, check out our comprehensive guide.

What is technical SEO?

Technical SEO involves optimizing the infrastructure, organization, and performance of a website in order to increase rankings. This type of SEO can overlap with on-page and off-page SEO. It tends to involve more binary results, objective decisions, technical tools, and code.

Methods focused on the more technical aspects of SEO include:

• Site architecture
• Web core vitals (speed, performance, etc.)
• Mobile optimization
• Structured data
• Indexing management
• Website security

Site Architecture

Site architecture is the method of connecting, sorting, and arranging the pages and posts on your site to optimize them for search engines.

Important elements and steps for optimized site architecture include:

• Hierarchy/Siloing
• Flat Structure
• Internal Linking
• SEO Optimized URLs
• Breadcumb linking
• Navigation menus

Web Core Vitals

Improving Web Core Vitals means improving three metrics about your site: Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS), and Interaction to Next Paint (INP.) Search engines use these metrics to determine how fast and responsive your site is and how good the experience is for a human user.

• Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): This metric measures the loading speed of a given page by determining how long it takes for the largest image or group of text to load.
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): This metric measures how visually stable the site content is by determining how much of the page layout will shift after initially loading.
• Interaction to Next Paint (INP): This metric measures how interactive the page is by testing how quickly elements reacts to user input.

Mobile Optimization

Google uses mobile-first indexing, so optimizing a website to ensure a fast and smooth experience on mobile devices is very important for SEO.

Important elements and steps for a mobile optimized website include:

• Ensuring that the design and layout will automatically change based on screen size.
• Optimizing images, CSS, and caching to ensure fast loading pages.
• Making sure that mobile elements like hamburger menus and buttons are the correct size.
• Avoiding pitfalls like pop ups and unplayable content.

Structured data

Structured data (also called schema) is how you can give search engines additional context via specialized text. That way you can be ranked more specifically and Google can provide more details about you to searchers.

(We already discussed schema above in another section – that’s how important it is!)

Indexing Management

Indexing management is the process of optimizing sitemaps, site files, site content, and links for technical accuracy and legibility by search engines. If search engine bots cannot properly crawl, interpret, and archive details about your site, you won’t appear in search results.

To nail indexing management for your site, you should learn about and optimize:

• XML sitemaps
• robots.txt file
• noindex tags
• Canonical tags
• Duplicate content
• URLs
• 404 errors
• 505 errors
• Internal linking

Website Security

Many things you do to keep your website secure matter to Google; search engines want to know for sure that they are sending traffic to a safe website. If you prioritize standard website security, these points shouldn’t be unfamiliar to you. Google does penalize websites if it detects any spam content or phishing scams

Website security for SEO includes setting up or implementing

• HTTPS/SSL certificates
• Up to date software, like plugins and themes
• HTTP security headers
• Web application firewalls

Tools and Resources for SEO

There are so many tools out there that can help you with SEO. Some are paid and some are free. Here are some of our favorites.

• SEMRush* affiliate link
• Google Analytics
• Google Search Console
• Web Page Speed
• Lighthouse
• Yoast SEO
• SEO Tools for Google Chrome
• Pixlr
• Accessible Color Palette Generator

SEO Frequently Asked Questions