Oh lovely. Just want this world needs — another acronym! Blah. Ask us how we really feel about acronyms. We’re on acronym burnout. Similar to buzzword burnout. That’s another subject we could get hot and heavy on, but today we’re talking about this acronym specifically… S.E.O.

Ahhhh… yes. We’ve all heard that term before. We know that if we have a website that we need this SEO thing. But what is it really?

(If starting with a definition is too simple for you, skip to the meat of this article hamburger. Nom.)

What is SEO?

SEO is Search Engine Optimization.

In short, it’s how you get found online. Think: Google. Some of you might be the rare bread out there that uses Bing or Yahoo. Or, if you’re a true millennial you’ll recall our middle school life blood… AOL. If you want to get lost in a Wikipedia hole about search engines might we suggest this link?

Search engines crawl the World Wide Web and index all the information and websites that exist. There is so much information on the internet. (Side note - not all of it is factual. Ha! But you already knew that, right?)

When someone either searches directly for you or your industry/services/product the goal is that your website shows up in that list.

Some of the simplest things can help your SEO specifically your copy (ie. words on your website) and images (photography).

When we, HBI, write your website we’re using keywords, direct messaging, and less fluff to make sure not only your site visitors but search engines can find what they’re looking for. We structure your site map and pages to be as clear and direct as possible to avoid confusion or clutter.

We’ve all read a long-form website before, right? Sorry, coaching industry but you’re the worst culprits of long-form website copy. But that’s a topic for another day.

We optimize your site for mobile viewing to make sure wherever someone finds you, they get the best experience possible. Aside from our general site build, we go through a checklist of SEO-boosting tasks to ensure your site will be ready to launch when you say go.

So, a quick recap. Three simple things you should be doing as you build your website to help with your SEO:

Use keywords (more on these below) and direct messaging. You can still be clever and carry your brand tone/voice, but eliminate the fluff and repetitive information.
Structure your pages with a site map, not only for a quality user experience but for search engine indexing.
Don’t forget about mobile optimization.

The rest of this article is going to approach SEO from the lens that your site is built on Squarespace. Why? Well, because Squarespace is the sh*t and it’s how we build (almost) all of the sites that we create.

Squarespace websites have tons of built-in features that help boost SEO but we also create with this in mind.

How much should you be doing? What are we doing? What kind of effects does SEO really have? When we create a website for our clients, we are here to set you up for success. That’s why as we prepare to hand over your site to you, we run through our SEO Checklist.

Our checklist is based on the one created by Squarespace. This helps us make sure we’re taking advantage of all the ways Squarespace has set up its software to work for us.

Our SEO Checklist

Site Design

We start by doing a general review of the site. Are things spelled correctly? Are buttons correctly linked? Are things in the right spot? Doing an overall edit at the end of the project helps make sure nothing got overlooked during our rounds of revisions when things can get shifted around. This is also when we add in our site favicon (the little logo up in the tabs in your browser) and social sharing images. When we set those ourselves, we have control over what visuals are shown when users share our link anywhere from on social media to text messages.

Spellcheck
All buttons linked
Add site favicon
Add social sharing images

Site Information

Once we’re sure the site is in pristine condition, we set up our site information. This includes the site title, site description and page descriptions, and page formats. We set up both a site description and individual page descriptions with short summaries using keywords so search engines are able to easily pick up what we want them to see. If your site has a blog, we also use SEO descriptions for each blog post. The more descriptions throughout the site, the more specific we can be while being able to cast a wide net and be picked up in those search results.

Site title
Site description
SEO descriptions
Page and title formats

Domain and URLs

Setting up your domain is quite possibly the most important step. Squarespace is very intuitive when it comes to connecting domains and depending on where your domain is hosted, it can take anywhere from 10 minutes to 72 hours. (If you use something common like Squarespace, GoDaddy, or Google, it tends to lean on the faster side.) We’ll go through all your pages and make sure each page URL is clear and descriptive of what the page is as well as short and to the point. Try to avoid long slugs to your pages. An example of a short slug would be /about. Avoid something like /about-hbi-the-team. Since we already added SEO descriptions to each page, we don’t need to worry about overloading the URL with keywords.

Setup and connect domain
Check all slugs

Location Information

This one isn’t always applicable but it does help your SEO to have your location on your site. This can be in your location settings in your back end as well as listed on your contact page. This will help search engines pick you up when users are searching for someone in your area. Even if you are a digital or online service that can work with anyone anywhere, adding your location will only increase your chances of being found if someone does use location in their search. It won’t keep you from being found by others in other areas. It’s one of those “won’t hurt, might help” things to consider. If you do have a physical location, we’ll definitely want to include your location information not just for SEO purposes but so users can find you!

Add a location

Things you can do after the launch

Once we hand off your site, it’s yours to play with, edit, and maintain. Chances are eventually you’ll have to make an update. Or better yet, you should be making updates. Building a site is not a “set it and forget it” situation. You’ll want to add a page, change an image, or edit a bio. You’ll want to make sure in any changes you make you make any updates needed for SEO. Just like we did when we created your site, if you add a new page, you’ll want to make sure the URL is accurate and there is a page description. Double check no links are broken within your site.

Verify your site with Google Search Console + Bing Webmaster Tools
Request that Google index your site
Connect Google Analytics

Stay in tune with your SEO. Don’t forget about it over long periods of time. Remember that Google Search Console is your friend. There are so many great ways inside that console to help get your site seen more. Mark your calendar to check in on your SEO at least once a quarter.

SEO Checklist