There are all kinds of ways to make money from a blog or website. You can sell ads, write sponsored content, or work with content partners. You can create an online store or use affiliate links to send your readers to someone else’s online store. You can even create a subscription model where readers need to pay to view content.

However, none of these strategies will work unless you have a consistent stream of people coming to your site. That’s why the first step in making money from your blog or website is to build an audience. That’s where search engine optimization (SEO) comes in.

Every time you Google something, Google’s algorithm works to select stories and posts that will answer your question. SEO is all about understanding these algorithms. This way, when someone Googles something that relates to your website or blog, they don’t have to dig through multiple pages of results to find yours. It will be right at the top.

For example, here is an article in which I wrote:

Now, when someone is looking for “How to start a business”, they find my article in the first place. According to Google, I am the highest authority on starting a business. Not Bill Gates. Not Elon Musk.

The former England major in his mid-20s with no business background ranks ahead of Gary Vaynerchuk, Oprah Winfrey-all.

There are many things that went into this top ranking that I will do my best to explain in this article. But before I do that, let’s first address one broader question.

In short, a lot.

You might think that using social media is the best way to get your blog or website seen. I don’t want to discount them. Facebook instagram, Twitter And everything else can be a powerful tool to help you build a following.

But, there Are two big parts about being highly rated on google search results:

So now we know what SEO is and why it’s important. But, how do we actually optimize our content? How do I make online content that appears on the front page of Google, Bing and other search engines?

Related: your SEO Checklist: 4 steps to optimizing your website

Search engines don’t just care about the words on the page. They also take into account factors including the quality and consistency of your site speed and authority. There are tons of other factors that go into website SEO, but let’s break down those two.

Speed

There are a ton of reasons why you should want your website to run as fast as possible. Web users are notoriously impatient, and they’re bound to leave your site – maybe forever – if it only takes two seconds to load. At the same time, increasing the speed of the website can lead to an increase in conversions, downloads and views.

Entrepreneur contributor Thomas Smale has two great strategies you can use to improve the speed of your website.

First, optimize the images. He writes: “Research shows that, on average, more than half of a website’s memory is loaded with images. One of the easiest ways to improve page load times is to optimize all images for the web.”

Chances are, you can make your image files much smaller without sacrificing quality. For example, there is no need to load a 5000 pixels by 5000 pixels image into a field that is only 500 pixels. This image is 100 times larger than it should be, and it could be the difference between a fast loading site and a slow one.

You should also think about the density of your image. Most computer screens only show images at 72 pixels per inch (ppi), which means everything is clearer than it is wasted – like watching a high-definition Blu Ray movie on an old TV.

So even if your image is 500 pixels square, you should check the ppi to make sure it is set to 72. Often images are set to 300 ppi, making your image file four times larger than it should be without improving quality.

The second proposal of Smale is optimization for mobile devices. He writes: “Users now spend an average of 69 percent of their media time on smartphones. However, many commercial websites still perform poorly on mobile devices. It’s something businesses can’t afford .”

There are all kinds of things you can do to improve mobile phone performance. For example, if you are building your own website, you can implement accelerated mobile pages to simplify your mobile pages and speed up the process.

If you are using one of the popular web hosting sites for your site, you should check how this host performs on your mobile. Entrepreneur contributor Shogun Onibalusi has found that Duda performs better on mobile than WordPress, Wix or Weebly, but you have to do your own research to find which one works best for your content.

Related: Marketing campaign

Body

Power comes from a variety of sources – users, other websites and search engines – but really, it all comes down to trust.

How long has your site been relevant, and how long have you been creating content around this topic? Equally important, are other experts using your site as a source? Are they referring to him or referring to you?

For example, the entrepreneur has released his online list of the top 500 franchises every year since 2001. We break down each of the businesses – why they made the list, company history and more.

We’re not just a franchise expert – we’re an expert. So when we write an article about franchises, our credibility helps push that content to the top of Google. If you were looking for “Cheap franchises,” you’ll see something like this:

But this does not mean that we are the authority in everything. There are many topics that we do not cover in Entrepreneur. For example, if we were to write an article about the world Cup, we would not expect to operate ESPN or FOX Sports. These sites cover football every day.

In the same way, you can carve your own niche on Google. The more common you are, the more likely you are to come across a website with more authority than yours who has written on the same topic. But, if you can create content specific to one audience, you can avoid the behemoths in your industry and find your way to the top spot on Google.

For example, entrepreneur Special products editor Andrea Huspeni runs a website called this dog lives, which calls itself “a trusted resource for dog parents to discover the latest local developments in their community.”

An article titled “8 of the most dog-friendly offices of 2018″was recently published in This Dog’s Life magazine. Now, if you’ve been Google “Dog-Friendly offices”, you won’t find a story from that dog’s life. The first place will be taken by the article of a much larger website, fortune.

Note the date published in this article – it was published in March 2016. This is a good example of how long Google’s best score can last. Over the past two years, people wanting to learn about dog friendly offices have been going fortune reading this article.

Fortune’s article also provided an opportunity for this dog’s life. Since this is from 2016, it is possible that these proposals may be outdated. Dog lovers may instead opt to search for something more specific like ” Dog-friendly offices in 2018.” And guess who’s on the front page for that search, ahead of Fortune’s article?

Just that bit of specificity allowed this dog to rank on the front page on Google-even reaching No 1 at the time.

Related: 4 reasons why quality SEO will cost you, and why it’s worth it

Google isn’t going to magically rank your site in the top 10 just because you write a post. You have to help search engines by predicting what people will look for to find your story. For example, suppose I’m writing an article for an entrepreneur about kids having to run their own lemonade stand.

If I were writing a headline article about lemonade stands for a printed newspaper, I might try to write a funny or punny title, such as (bear with me on them):

And if someone reads my article in a printed newspaper, they might see a picture of lemonade, or read a bit of history and find out what it is.

But no one on the Internet searches for terms like “Lemonade” or ” Sugar, water and lemons.” They may be looking for “how to be Beyonce,” but they don’t want a story about lemonade standing as an answer.

If you are writing an article for the Internet, it is important to be clear. Here are some top SEO headlines for an article on how to run a lemonade stand:

These names are simpler, and they reflect how a potential user would search for information about lemonade stands. That’s significant.

The key search term in each of my titles is “Launch lemonade Stand” because I want people to find my article when they search for information about launch lemonade stand. When choosing your own keyword, you should try to think about how people will search for the information you offer.

Related: what exactly is SEO?

Once you select your key search term, you should use it in the column.

Putting a keyword in the title is important, but it’s not the only thing you have to do to optimize your story.

You should also include your keyword throughout the story, including in your Intro and in the “title 2”, or H2, tag somewhere in the piece.

One potential way to add keywords is to use linked links-adding related links with similar titles can add keywords without actually changing the content of your article. In my story on “How to start a business”, I added a link to a story about “How to start a business online”. This story is more specific than mine because it only applies to online businesses, but it still contains the keywords I used.

Use internal links to other stories on related topics from your site. For example, I could add a link to my lemonade stand story article about child entrepreneurs or how parents can earn extra money for College.

If you have a budget, online tools like Searchmetrics or Brightedge can help you determine how often you should use a keyword in an article, as well as additional keywords you should include in your article. If you can’t, that’s fine. Just try to use your keyword or search term as much as you can without going overboard.

Related: 10 search engines you don’t know about

You should still write how you talk to people, not a machine.

Search engines punish short articles (think less than 300 words) that jam in keywords without saying anything. Google and others prefer longer articles.

Depending on the subject, what “more” actually means can actually vary. For an article about lemonade costs, 700 words may be more than the average. For an article on how to start a business, search engines may require something closer to 4000.

This is another difference between writing for search engine optimization and writing for a newspaper. In a newspaper, every word occupies a physical space on the page. Every unnecessary word is a waste of space.

Online, it’s worth taking the time to make sure you’re clear, even if it takes a few extra words.

You should also write in an accessible way. Try not to get too in the weeds, even if you’re talking about something technical. If you write with easy-to-read prose, search engines will be more likely to rank your story well and, more importantly, your readers will rate it.

Which brings us to the last stage of search engine optimization …

Related: Meet the Real search engine Optimizer

And you have to get other people to share it, too.

It’s pretty simple: if people share your article, it means they think other people should see it. Isn’t that the whole point of a search engine – pointing people to posts, websites and information they need to see?

In the same way that you might be more likely to buy a product or service after someone recommends it, Google and other search engines are more likely to commit to your page after others have shared it.

You should use social media to start this conversation so that others can recommend your post. You can use one of two strategies to do this:

Ideally, you could do both of them at the same time. For example, Deputy editor-entrepreneur Lydia Belanger interviewed alisha Marie in an article titled ” What this YouTube star with 7.3 million subscribers is doing to combat burnout.”

Belanger shared the story on her Twitter account with 4,500 followers, which is already a good start. But then, the article got more firepower behind it when it was shared on the entrepreneur’s official Twitter and Facebook accounts, which have about 3.4 million followers each. In addition, Marie posted the article on Instagram, tapping into her 3.7 million followers.

Corralling all these sources, Belanger’s story has been published by more than 10 million combined subscribers.

Related: SEO 2018: 15 Rules for dominating online search results

There are many ways to create partners who will share your content. You could do what Belanger did and interview someone with a great social following. You can agree to swap stories with other websites or blogs in your industry where you share your stories and they share theirs. You can create Facebook groups with like-minded people who want to read and share their work.

But, it is also important to grow your own social following. So you should not rely on the involvement of others. You can start a conversation that gets you recognized on Google.

In a post from April 2018, Entrepreneur Contributor Deep Patel offered seven ideas for growing your social following. To their words:

However, as with all things, the number one key is simpler. If you work to grow your social media platforms with discussion, consistency and patience, you will do just fine.

Related: 9 key questions to ask an SEO company before hiring it – or shooting

Summary: To optimize content for search engines, you have to do three things.

One of the best ways to earn traffic is to improve your site’s search engine optimization. Ranking on the first page of a search results page (SERP) can bring literally millions of people to your site. You can use this traffic to sell ads, write sponsored posts, or even create a thriving online store.

To optimize your content, you must first understand that SEO starts with building your website. Work with the developer or research what Google and other search engines expect from your site and then do what you can to make sure they get it. Focus on making your site as fast as you can. Over time, you should try to build your credibility on topics that are important to your site.

Next, you need to write a message that targets a specific keyword or search term. Make sure you use this keyword in the title as well as throughout the article. You should use relevant links and internal links that link to your site and tell Google what the article is about.at the same time, make sure you write something that informs the reader and not just target Google’s algorithm.

Finally, you need to create an online conversation about your part through social media. Use partnerships as well as your own platforms to create buzz around your site that even Google can’t ignore.

If you can do these three things, you can create top-rated articles and put the power of Google in the palm of your hand.

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