Summary: <br> How to reach out to Dan Shure:<br> <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/evolvingdan/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"> </a> <a href="https://twitter.com/dan_shure" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"> </a> <a href="http://www.evolvingseo.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"></a><br> How do you rank a keyword with 10 searches a month and get thousands of monthly page views?<br> Dan Shure, from Evolving SEO podcast and blog, lays out how use an SEO content strategy to rank a keyword in 10 searches a month and more in <a href="https://dev01.sureoak.com/podcasts/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">this week’s podcast</a>. Rank higher and get more page views by implementing Dan’s commonly missed on-page factors, discover how Google is changing off-page SEO factors, and learn surprising <a href="/insights/link-building-strategy" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">SEO link building tricks</a>.<br> On Page SEO Ranking Factors<br> With the 200+ ranking factors, it’s difficult to determine the crucial ones. Dan Shure highlighted four commonly missed but top ranking factors.<br> 1. Keyword Alignment<br> First things first:<br> <a href="/insights/keyword-analysis-optimization-podcast" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Understand your SEO keywords</a> and know what you want the page to rank for.<br> Seems obvious, right? But, Dan often finds clients who want to rank for a keyword, but don’t actually have content to support it.<br> Find your target keyword and create content with ranking in mind. You’ll need to understand your business’ audience, their searches, research on <a href="/seo-tools/keyword-rank-checker" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">current ranking</a> sites, and more to properly align your keyword and your content. If you'd like expert help in your keyword alignment, <a href="/services/keyword-research-service" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">we offer advanced keyword research services</a>.<br> 2. Keyword Placement<br> Once you have the content, you need to ensure the keyword is included in a few key spots. It doesn’t need to be plastered in every possible location.<br> Dan Shure recommends these places:<br> Title tag<br> URL<br> Top heading (H1)<br> (A little bit) in the content<br> Don’t need to obsess over alt-tags and other headers. Focus on getting your keyword in the places that matter.<br> 3. User Experience<br> “2017 was the year that <a href="/insights/google-algorithm-updates-podcast" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Google cleaned house</a> on web pages designed to get users to do what you wanted, not what the user wanted to do,” Dan shares.<br> A lot of successful websites were penalized for being focused on the site’s goal. Sites with distracting sidebars, sites designed to get emails, mobile sites with pop-ups all ranked lower because they were not user-focused.<br> Design (or redesign) your site with <a href="/insights/improved-customer-experience-podcast" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">a strong focus on supporting the user</a> to avoid these penalties.<br> 4. Comments<br> While a number of major websites have removed the comments tool, Dan warns against following their lead.<br> “Google has confirmed on a few occasions comments are indeed a ranking factor.” They are a sign of community and engagement, which Google values in their algorithms.<br> He recommends maintaining the comments section and creating content that is comment-worthy to build genuine engagement.<br> On-page optimization is a critical part of your SEO strategy - check our our <a href="/services/seo-optimization-services" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">SEO optimization services</a> to see how we can help.<br> Link Building Strategies<br> On the episode, we also dug into off-site ranking factors. Dan highlighted user search behavior and site speed.
