2 Horrible Tips We’ve Seen About SEO for Blogging

Hey, there blogger fanatic. If you’re reading this you’re probably trying to figure out SEO for blogging. You want more traffic to your website because you’re a budding author, professional blogger, or just love writing and want more readers. No matter the reason, we’re sure you’ve Googled (or looked and looked on Pinterest) all the tips you can about SEO. You’ve done everything you have been told yet NOTHING makes sense. Amiright? It’s not working, and your SEO is just completely overwhelming. You started the blog to write, after all, not figure out the world of SEO and become an expert.

What is SEO?

We get it. You know what SEO is- but for the newbies, let’s define our terms here. SEO is “search engine optimization.” This essentially means it’s the process of using certain words (keywords) in your blog or website to rank on page 1 of Google. Why page 1? Because page two is where good dreams go to die. Nobody goes there. For example, the keyword of this blog we’re writing is “SEO for blogging.” We want to rank for that because we want YOU, the person wanting to learn about it, to read this article and hopefully learn to trust us.

It’s important to trust us because we know we are different than all the other SEO “experts” out there (not better or worse, but different) and we truly believe we can help you. So we’re going to write this blog with that keyword in mind and put the keywords in certain places throughout this article. And look- it worked! Here you are!

We digress.

Who Gives the Worst SEO for Blogging Advice?

Ironically, famous bloggers that have SEO courses give the worst advice out there. Here’s the thing- you’re probably doing your SEO wrong. And you’re probably really frustrated. And here’s the other thing- it’s easier than you have been taught. And if you’re getting the feeling that you’re just missing something or something isn’t quite right, you are in fact onto something. We have taken many courses on SEO to see what’s out there, and let us tell you- they are all mostly misguided.

Most of the courses we’ve taken, from famous bloggers, give such bad advice we had to write a blog on that bad advice and also call them out. AND- we then created a course just for you to clean the slate and get you started on the right foot.

These bloggers that have made it big and then (predictably) come out with an SEO course for their followers, don’t tell you that they actually got their traffic with paid ads. And when you look at their website and do an SEO audit on it, you see they do their own SEO wrong. It’s a shame really. And as SEO professionals for a combined 20 years, we (Anna and Beth) have had enough.

2 of the Worst Tips for SEO for Blogging

Alrighty, prepare yourself. These 5 tips or advice are things you’re probably doing (but it’s not your fault). But they are hands down horrible pieces of advice. Let’s dig in and learn what we can do better.

1. Use Google Suggest for Keywords

No. Just no. This is hands down the one SEO for blogging tip that makes us gawk. All keywords are not the same- and this advice treats them as though they are. There are keywords for local businesses, national businesses, blogs, products, and more. And every different type of keyword has different metrics we need to look at. Google suggestion does not give us all the information to pick a keyword your audience will be searching for. Metrics we look at when picking keywords are:

• Search Volume
• Click Rate
• Cost Per Click
• Buyer Intent
• Top five pages for that keyword
• and more!

What to do instead: use a keyword tool like Ahrefs, SEMRUSH, or Ubbersuggest.

2. ONLY look at Keyword Search Volume

As we mentioned above, there are many metrics to look at. Many bloggers with courses on SEO will tell you to just look at the search volume. And if it’s high- it must be good. This is NOT true, and horrible advice.

Let’s look at an example with the keyword: “How old is Taylor Swift?” When you put it into a keyword tool, you’ll see it has THOUSANDS OF SEARCHES a month:

 

So there are 35 thousand searches a month. If we JUST looked at this metric it would seem perfect. That’s so much traffic potential. However, if you look at the click rate, only 5,300 people actually click on a result from the search engine results page (SERPS). That’s only a .15% rate, which is pretty bad.

More than that though, we want to understand WHY the click rate is so low. So let’s put that keyword into Google and see what comes up:

Do you see what we see? The answer to the keywords questions is immediately available- the searcher doesn’t even have to click on the website to get the answer. This is why we NEVER just look a search volume. It’s very deceiving.

On top of a low click rate, it has high competitiveness. This blog would cost a lot to rank, but not bring in a good ROI or any ROI at all. A lot of work for little benefit. And we know, as a blogger with a family and probably 9-5 job, you don’t have time for that nonsense.

Instead: pay the price for a good keyword research tool and get ALL the metrics. Any tool you buy with all the metrics is worth its weight in gold.

Want to learn more GOOD advice when you tackle your SEO for blogging?

We want you to, too. Our SEO for bloggers course takes you in-depth to keywords, writing, and even processes so you don’t lose your mind. We’ll clear the slate by teaching you what you’re doing wrong, what to do instead, and how to do it in many different ways. You won’t regret it! for 50% off, use the code: SILVER.