On-Page SEO Checklist

On-Page SEO is the foundation for ranking well on Google. On-Page SEO is the progress of optimizing only a single page inside a website. Don’t confuse this with the progress of optimizing your entire website. However, these two kinds of SEO optimization aren’t mutually exclusive. An action like installing an SSL certificate is an act of optimization for On-Page SEO. In this article, we will explain every fine detail about on-page SEO, and you can find a detailed checklist.

What is On-Page SEO?

Most people have basic SEO knowledge. They often think that On-Page SEO is just about placing keywords on a page. Keywords are critical to SEO. However, different criteria are important in On-Page SEO. These are as follows:

• Keywords
• Links 
• Visual contents
• User experience (UX)
• Title tags
• H tags
• Contents and content length

These are the key factors for On-Page SEO. It is necessary to understand these criteria that are important for On-Page SEO correctly. If you optimize them well, you will see how well your site will rank in search engines. You may also make it easier for people to find you this way.

In fact, there are two basic factors in SEO work for your pages to rank well. These are On-Page and Off-Page SEO optimization. Our focus will be On-Page SEO techniques. You need On-Page SEO optimization for your content to rank better in search engines and get more traffic. SearchMetrics was analyzed in 2015. This analysis includes the rates of factors that are effective in On-Page SEO optimization. According to this analysis, the two most important factors are related keywords and internal links.

Now, let’s show you how to do an On-Page SEO check and optimization step by step. You may optimize your web pages well just by following this checklist.

Performance 

You need to ask yourself some questions to improve your site’s performance. If you can’t answer these questions, don’t worry. You can use Dopinger’s site analysis tool to learn how is your website’s performance.

Do you follow your pages with Google Analytics?

First of all, you need a tool to measure the performance of your pages. You may use Google Analytics for this. However, in some cases, Google Analytics may be a difficult tool for users to understand. Apart from that, there are many tools that you can use for free and paid. You may access these tools on the internet.

Are you following your primary keywords?

Keeping track of primary keywords is not as simple as it seems. Keeping track of keywords is important to determine your current status and performance. You may use paid tools like Ahrefs for this. Or, you may search for free tools on the internet. Thanks to these tools, you will be able to follow your keywords step by step.

Scanning and Indexing

Scanning and indexing are two important factors that should not be ignored.

Can your pages be crawled?

If Google spiders cannot access your page, your pages cannot be crawled. Also, Google will not index you. Also, the presence of the Nolndex tag in the Robots.txt file is a matter of concern. The presence of this tag is an obstacle to the crawling and indexing of your pages. If you have noticed that a page is not indexed, you should first check your robot.txt file.

You may use the RankSider tool to check whether crawlable for your pages. After you enter the URLs of your pages, click on send. That shows what obstacles your page has in terms of crawlability. For page accessibility, you may learn how to do SEO analysis with Screaming Frog.

Are you sure that your page is indexable?

The first step to ranking on Google well is to have a crawlable page. The next step is to be sure that Google is indexing your page, indeed. There is a great way to check if your page is indexed. This way, copy your URL and paste it into Google. You may find that your page is not indexed when you search the page URL on Google. There are a few things you can do in such a situation. First, check if you are using the noindex tag. You should also make sure that there are no errors due to the site structure. You may find the most common errors in the site structure and their solutions online. If there are no errors, or you have fixed the errors, you may index your page. You may do this on Google Search Console.

Keywords

Without keywords, you won’t be receiving much traffic. So, make sure you ask yourself these questions.

Are you sure that you have the correct keyword targeting?

Some people have exaggerated dreams about keyword targeting and ranking. A new or non-authoritative site may aim to rank first in basic keywords with high competition and search volume. Instead, it would be more realistic to targeting in keyword groups called long-tail or trunk. Besides, the success rate it will provide in these two types of groups is quite high. There are some tools you may take advantage of in keyword research. These are tools like Google Keyword Planner and Google Trends. You may make more accurate and realistic targeting using these tools. You may learn how to use Google Trends in keyword research online.

Are you targeting the same keyword on multiple pages?

You shouldn’t target the same primary keyword across multiple pages. You may have a cornerstone or basic content in the keyword On-Page SEO. So, do not create content targeting this keyword again. This causes a duplicate content issue. You must create a strategy from the first moment to avoid this situation.

Are your pages for search purposes?

Search intent is shaped around four fundamentals. These are:

1. Getting information
2. Comparison
3. Transactional (Like gaining backlink)
4. Surfing

Understanding the purpose behind your target keyword will determine how you will structure your page. If you are going to create content as follows, you must create your content around the purpose of informing. These contents are:

1. How to made it?
2. What is it?
3. How to use it?

This situation is the same for e-commerce sites. The user may have searched your site for information about products and services. If so, the user is not yet ready to purchase the product. Because the user has not yet completed the research phase, this user is at the beginning of the journey to become a customer. You must be aware of this. That’s why you need to configure your page as an educational resource. If you complete this step well, this journey will go to the purchasing phase. For this, you must take advantage of the power of the call to action.

Have you used the keyword in the title?

In fact, there are different opinions on this subject. However, most SEO experts agree that you must use keywords in the title. You may contribute greatly to your SEO work by including your keyword in the title tag. In this way, you will achieve success. Therefore, make sure that you include your keyword in the title tag.

Are your titles clickable and interesting?

Google uses the words in your title tag to understand what your pages are about. But, there is another side to title tags that you should understand. That is the click rate. Making your headlines interesting will have an increased click-through rate. There is one more benefit to increasing your click-through rate. It is one of the easiest ways to get more organic search traffic without creating new content. You may access your site’s performance regarding the click-through rate via Google Search Console. You may access the necessary details from the performance tab in Google Search Console.

Did you use the H1 tag on your page?

Every page on your website must have an H1 tag. There is a way to detect your pages that do not have an H1 tag. You may find your pages without H1 tags by checking them on Screaming Frog SEO Spider. You should also remember that you only have to use the H1 tags once per page.

Is there a keyword in the Meta Description?

Google may display meta descriptions by determining the content itself. When creating your meta descriptions, you must include your primary keyword in the description.

This meta description should explain briefly your content with the relevant keyword.

Is your Meta Description interesting?

Your meta description should set the user in action. Just as your title tags. So, your meta descriptions should also be clickable. You may access many resources on the internet about how to write meta descriptions.

Is the keyword included in the URL?

According to analyses, pages with the primary keyword in the URL tend to perform better. Google also states that having your keyword in the URL is a ranking factor. However, this is a minor effect, but you should still use it. Your slug must contain the primary keyword which relevant to your content.

Is the URL structure poor?

URL structure is important for user experience. Short URLs are a minor ranking signal. Still, they perform better in the rankings. Long URLs are difficult to remember. It is also difficult to share them. Besides, there is no benefit in having long URLs. So, cut off all the redundancy in your URLs. Only include your target keyword phrases.

Have you included the primary keyword in the first paragraph?

You want Google to understand what your page is about. So, you have to understand something clearly. In nature, you should use your target keyword phrase in the first paragraph. Or even in the first sentence. Doing this is an excellent way to achieve the goal.

Is keyword density more than it should be?

You should not be aggressive in keyword density. You must write your content in the most natural way possible. Thus, the keyword density will make its own way. Search engines may perceive your content as spam if the keyword density is higher than normal. So, create your content as naturally as possible. Pay attention to the use of keywords in this context too.

Do you include LSI keywords on the page or content?

Structuring your pages around the primary keyword is one of the main purposes. This is also a smart strategy. You would target ranking for these keywords. Besides, you should try to rank those pages for all variations that are related to keywords. These are called LSI words. You may use many tools to find LSI words and other variations of primary keywords. You may access these tools on the internet. The best tool you may use for this is Google Trends. You may make a comprehensive analysis thanks to Google Trends. You may also specify LSI keywords.

The Content

A site rests on the pillars of quality content. Remember to follow these steps to create quality content.

Is your content original?

You must ask yourself a question while creating your content. This question is how to create higher quality and valuable content than existing content on this subject. This way, you may create more quality and prominent content than your competitors’ content.

There are two factors many businesses have ignored in this regard. The first of these is the user experience. The second is the support of the contents with visual elements. Many sites create pages and content by ignoring the user experience. Website owners are reluctant to invest in page and site design. Likewise, they ignore supporting the content with pictures, videos, or graphics. At this point, pay attention to these two points to stand out from your competitors. This way, you may get a good ranking with your content.

Are there spelling and grammar errors in your content?

Use grammar checker tools to find spelling and grammar mistakes. Google states in its Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines that it does not like spelling and grammar mistakes. Therefore, be careful not to include spelling and grammar errors in the content you create.

Is the length of your content sufficient for SEO?

Long contents perform better in search engines. However, extending the content unnecessarily to create long content is not the right move. The content must have topic integrity from beginning to end. Also, your content should be in a natural flow. You may find all the details about the ideal content length for SEO from online resources.

Is your content interesting?

People need to read your content before they act. If users find your content interesting and adequate in terms of SEO, that is a positive sign for your page. Your bounce rate will decrease. If you have done a good job, the searcher will take action on your site. You may perform the operations listed below to make your content interesting.

1. First of all, write the content in a friendly language taking the visitor into account.
2. State the key points of your content in a way that draws the user’s attention.
3. Link-related content.

Does your content contain long paragraphs?

This is a negative situation if your content contains long paragraphs in blogs. Users find long paragraphs unattractive. Also, the contents lose their readability. So, keep your paragraphs as short as possible. This way, you may create content that users can read and scan.

Do you include subtitles in your content?

You must use subtitles in your content. Be sure to also use H2 tags, H3 tags, and H4 tags in addition to H1. Also, take care to create subtitles in a logical framework. Use H tags in hierarchical order in the subheadings you create. In addition, you should add a table of content to increase reader experience.

Do you use keywords in subheadings?

Your content does not just consist of your main title. Therefore, including the main keyword in your main title is not enough. You should include variations of your primary keyword in your subheadings. Of course, you shouldn’t over-optimize your content, but sprinkling variations of your main word will help the ranking process.

Does your content contain lists or rankings?

Certain parts of your content should include rankings or lists. This way, you make it easier for users to read and engage with the content. While creating the content, putting yourself in the readers’ shoes would be better. Do you read big paragraphs easier than listing? Your answer is probably “no”. That’s why being careful with readability is important. The listing will increase it.

Is your content up-to-date?

It is so important that your contents are up-to-date. You should determine that the information contained in the content is still valid. If this information is out-of-date, you should check your content in certain periods to update them. You should do this check at least once or twice a year. Also, choose to update your existing content instead of creating new content on the same topics. This ensures that your page gets more traffic and a better ranking.

Visual Content and Elements

A site with a lack of visuals is dull. Therefore, you should use images more often. But how? Let us explain.

Do your pages have more visual content than your competitors?

Unique and high-quality visual content makes your pages more unique than your competitors. These visuals may be videos, pictures, PDFs, and graphics. You should enrich your pages by using more visual content than your competitors. Especially the graphics that you create can provide to getting backlinks.

Are the visuals you use high-quality?

Using visual elements alone is not enough. Therefore, the visuals you place on your pages must be of high quality. You may use paid or free tools for this. Also, you may get professional support from experts. In both ways, you can create high-quality visuals. However, it doesn’t mean that you should use big files. When you use high-quality visuals, file sizes will inevitably increase, which can cause a slow load. So, you can use the best combination for file size and quality. In this way, you will provide a better user experience.

Are the visuals you use appropriate sizes?

You should adjust the visuals’ dimensions according to the page’s design. It should be neither too big nor too small. You must also adjust the visual dimensions according to the flow of the content. As we mentioned before, a higher size will cause speed problems on your website.

Are the visuals you use compressed?

It is important to use high-quality visuals. However, you should not negatively affect your page speed while doing this. That’s why you need to compress the images you use because uncompressed visuals are one of the primary causes of a slow site.

Are the file names of the images you use descriptive?

Google recommends using descriptive filenames for visuals. What does it mean? This means you have to save your visuals based on your content. This allows you to rank your visual content in related keywords because you will help the search engine spiders which crawl your website.

Do you use descriptive subtags in the visuals you use?

Google’s spider uses subtags to understand what an image is about. That’s why you should always use descriptive subtags for every visual on your page.

It will help search engine bots to crawl your website, and when image alt texts include relevant keywords, they will also be ranked on image search on search engines.

Is the visual content you use relevant to the keyword?

No matter what type of visual elements you use, they should be relevant to your content. Your web pages shouldn’t include any irrelevant elements. The images should be proper and purposeful for your content.

Links

Giving good links will increase your credibility. Neglecting them, on the other hand, will decrease your site’s value.

Do your pages have internal links?

Internal links are a powerful method of helping your site. Internal links help your site in several ways. First of all, it allows your site to build authority. They improve the crawlability and indexability of your site. It also ensures that other important pages on your site get high rankings. That’s why you must create a strong link network between your pages.

Do you use breadcrumbs?

Breadcrumb is important. If you have a large website, it is more important. It also has a positive effect on user experience. That is the reason why you must use it. You may find all the details about using breadcrumb online.

Are your internal links useful?

Internal links whose sole purpose is ranking are not a great or correct idea. Remember that the main purpose of your page is to please the user. Every internal link should serve a purpose. They should also help the user in some way. As long as you link to relevant and valuable pages, it means you have created your internal link network well.

Do your pages have external links?

You must link to relevant and reliable sources. This way, you increase the quality and reliability of your page. This method will support your backlink strategies. The websites you use as an external links also may give backlinks to your website. High-authority websites will provide more credibility.

Are there broken links on your pages?

Broken links impair the user experience. You need to address them. Also, you should inspect your page and site to detect and fix broken links. You may use the Screaming Frog SEO Spider tool for this. Don’t forget that broken links will decrease website authority.

User Experience (UX)

Everything boils down to user experience. Put yourself in the shoes of the user.

Do your pages open in less than three seconds?

Page speed is one of the most important user experience factors. To increase the ranking of your pages, you should optimize the page speed. If your website doesn’t load speedily, the visitors will leave your website, increasing the bounce rate. Visitors should enjoy spending time on your website, but it will not be a good experience if it is slow.

Are your pages mobile-compatible?

All web searches will be made from mobile devices soon. So, your website must be mobile-friendly. That is more important now with Mobile-First Indexing because most people use their phones to make search instead of their computers.

Is the SSL certificate available?

Google stated something a few years ago. Google state that SSL certificates will be part of their algorithm. Also, it will have a ranking factor. Google Chrome now labels websites with the label secure or insecure. This tagging is a great deterrent for users on e-commerce websites. Having an insecure tag is not good. It affects both your performance in search engines and your business.

Do you include pop-up ads on your pages?

Google stated a while ago that the rankings of pages containing too many pop-up ads will be lower. In fact, this is quite annoying for users. Having too many pop-up ads will cause users to leave your website. When you use pop-up ads, users must encounter them whenever they visit a second or third page on your website.

Do your pages contain moderate ads?

The livelihoods of some businesses and websites depend on advertising revenue. However, some of them exaggerate this too much. The presence of advertisements on all sides of the pages disturbs the user. This always affects the user experience. Therefore, you should place the ads by considering the user experience as well as the advertising revenue.

Is your website design useful and modern?

You have to take balance design and user experience in terms of SEO. Optimize your design to keep it modern and useful. Don’t hesitate to invest in the design of your website. People will spend more time on attractive and useful websites. If the visitors find your website challenging, they will not spend time.

Are your pages sharable?

You should present social media sharing buttons to users with informational content. If your content is good, it is more likely to be shared. So, make it as easy as possible for the user to share your content. They will not want to make an effort if you don’t, but just one button will encourage them to share.

YMYL and EAT Score

We are not done yet! Don’t forget about the YMYL and EAT scores.

Do you have advisory content in health, finance, or legal issues?

Websites that provide advice on such matters will be under greater scrutiny going forward. This situation came to the fore with the core algorithm update called Medic. The Medic update took place on August 1, 2018. The main reason for this situation is that false or unproven information in these areas may harm a person.

More About On-Page SEO

On-Page SEO optimization is a part of On-site SEO optimization. You may use many SEO tools while doing your On-Page SEO optimization. After performing your On-Page SEO analysis, you may start optimizing. There is something you should not forget when doing On-Page SEO optimization. This is link-building. This way, you may establish a large number of links to your page. Thus, you will increase the traffic your page will receive. You should also pay attention to your site’s structured data. This way, you provide information about your page and categorize your content. It will also be useful to use schema markup for your structured data. Use Dopinger’s Schema Markup Generator to create schema markups for your content.

The shareability of your page is another factor that may increase your traffic. The ability to share your pages as blog posts means reaching more users. 

Check out our on-page SEO services if you need professional help!

Conclusion of the On-Page SEO Checklist

On-Page SEO optimization is very important to get a good ranking on Google. Its optimization only focuses on one page on your website. On-Page SEO optimization is more than just putting keywords on the page. While optimizing On-Page SEO, you must meet many different criteria. We explained these different criteria of On-Page SEO. This way, you will rank higher in search engines.

You will also be much more successful in attracting users’ attention. There are two main factors for your pages to rank better. These are On-Page SEO and Off-Page SEO. We focused on On-Page SEO techniques here. Also, we talked about some analysis and research. We hope this article will be your inspiration.