If you’re like most small business owners, you wear a lot of hats. You’re the CEO, the head of marketing, the office manager, and maybe even the janitor. With so many balls in the air, it’s difficult to find the time (and energy) to focus on your website’s SEO. Fortunately, there are a few simple steps you can take to ensure that your Squarespace website is optimized for search engines. Here are our top five tips:
One of the best ways to improve your website’s SEO is to ensure that all of your pages have unique and descriptive titles and headers. This tells search engines what your page is about, which helps them index it correctly and rank it accordingly. Unfortunately, far too many Squarespace sites have generic titles like “Home” or “About Us.” Take the time to come up with something more creative and descriptive; it’ll be worth it in the long run.
Not sure where to start? Ask us!
1. Use descriptive page titles and headers.
One of the best ways to improve your website’s SEO is to ensure that all of your pages have unique and descriptive titles and headers. This tells search engines what your page is about, which helps them index it correctly and rank it accordingly. Unfortunately, far too many Squarespace sites have generic titles like “Home” or “About Us.” Take the time to come up with something more creative and descriptive; it’ll be worth it in the long run.
2. Utilize keywords throughout your site.
Keywords are at the heart of SEO—they’re how search engines determine which websites are relevant to a particular searcher’s needs. So, it’s important to include them throughout your site, particularly in your page titles, headers, image tags, and meta descriptions. Not sure which keywords to use? Try using a tool like Google AdWords Keyword Planner or Moz Keyword Explorer to do some keyword research.3. Optimize your images.
In addition to text, search engines also index images—so it’s important to make sure that your website’s images are properly optimized for SEO purposes, too. This means giving each image a unique file name (no more “IMG_1234”) and utilizing keywords in your image tags and alt text. Not sure how to do this? Luckily, Squarespace makes it easy with built-in tools for image optimization.4. Reference other websites with links.
When you reference another website (or piece of content) with a link, you’re essentially vouching for that site’s credibility—which tells search engines that your site is credible by association. However, it’s important not to go overboard with linking; too many links will actually hurt your SEO by making your site seem spammy. Instead, focus on quality over quantity by only linking to websites that are relevant to your industry or niche.5. Create fresh content regularly.
One of last—but certainly not least—important things you can do for your website’s SEO is to create fresh content on a regular basis. This could mean anything from adding new blog posts twice a week to uploading new product photos once a month—the important thing is that you’re consistently adding new content for search engines (and potential customers) to index.6. Pick the right template.
Your template choice doesn’t have a huge impact on your SEO, but it’s still worth considering. Some templates are better coded than others and some have more features that are conducive to good SEO (like having blog posts automatically tweet when they’re published). Depending on your goals, you might want to choose a template that makes your life easier further down the road.7. Write compelling meta descriptions.
Every time you create a new blog post or page on Squarespace, you’re given the opportunity to write a meta description—a short summary of what the page is about that appears in search results beneath the title of the page. This is your chance to persuade searchers to click through to your site instead of someone else’s—so make it good! Keep it under 155 characters and focus on writing something compelling that includes 1-2 keywords from your title.8. Use Squarespace’s built-in SEO tools.
Squarespace comes with basic SEO functionality built right in—all you have to do is turn it on! In Settings > Advanced > External API Keys, connect Squarespace to Google Analytics (if you haven’t already) and then turn on Google Search Console in Settings > Marketing > Analytics & Reporting > Connected Accounts > Google Search Console . Once these features are enabled, Squarespace will automatically submit new pages and blog posts as they’re published so they can get indexed by Google and other search engines more quickly.Conclusion:
By following these simple tips, you can ensure that your Squarespace website is set up for success in the world of SEO! Optimizing your site doesn’t have to be complicated or time-consuming—a little effort goes a long way towards helping people find your business online.Not sure where to start? Ask us!
