SEO For Beginners

I had the pleasure recently to teach a class on SEO at Lowell Makes. They’re our neighbors here at Western Ave and they have a really cool concept. You pay a membership and you get to use all their shop tools for yourself or your business. They have a wood shop, metal fabrication, 3D printing and a bunch more. What’s nice is that it’s community grounded. Members teach other members how to use the tools and once a year they host a Skill Share day. Everyone is encouraged to teach a class on something and it’s completely free for the public to come and listen.

I was asked to teach a class and I figured I’d do one on SEO since I get so many questions about it. Here is some of what I went over in that class that anyone can implement right now.

1. Focus on Quality Content

Content is the key to SEO. Write helpful, relevant, and original content that answers your audience’s questions. A good tip would be to begin entering your product or service on the Google Search Bar. Google then attempts to prefill with suggestions. Those suggestions come from what people are looking up most, so if your website can answer some of those questions, you’re doing good.

2. Use the Right Keywords

Identify keywords your audience would be searching for. Use these keywords naturally in your page titles, headings, descriptions, and content to help search engines understand what your page is about.

3. Name Your Pictures Properly

When you upload your pictures, don’t just leave the filename as IMG_0173.jpg. Instead, change it to something relevant to what it is like blue-ceramic-mug.jpg. Most web building tools will allow you to add alt text and a description as well. Make sure you use these fields to explain a bit more of what the audience could be looking at.

4. Create an SEO-Friendly URL Structure

Keep your URLs short, readable, and remember to use your keywords. For example: draftstudios.com/beginner-seo-tips is better than draftstudios.com/page123?id=456.

Hope you found this digestible and goodluck!