How to Blog for Top Rank in Search Results

Getting to the #1 spot in the SERPs is usually not easy.  But if you remember that 93% of your competition does not know how to SEO their blogs, you should get very good results with these 13 steps to creating a top performing web page.

Before you start, your TOP KEYWORD is NOT your name (or your business name).

1 ) You need to know what the TOP KEYWORD is for your goal.  If you want to be found for “your product”, use Google Keyword Tool found in Adwords and be sure you are using the right keyword.  It is not uncommon to be surprised that you do not understand what words people use to find your product on search engines.  The keyword with the greatest search volume is your TOP KEYWORD.  There can be significant difference in search volume that come down to a simple “s” added to the end of what you thought was your best keyword.  Keep the keyword tool webpage open; you’ll need it again.

2 ) Craft your Headline carefully first.  Its vital that your Headline, Title (and URL if possible) contains the TOP KEYWORD.

3 ) The TOP KEYWORD should be the first word(s) in the Title and Meta Description!  It should also be the first in the Headline and the Content area (the blog) as well, but that doesn’t always work.  Watch out for lengths and keyword stuffing.  Do not repeat keywords in any tags.  The Title must be less than 70 characters.  The Meta Description is 150 characters or less.

4 ) Create a Category of your TOP KEYWORD.

5 ) Forget about SEO for a moment and just type your blog post.  Just get the words, images and concepts down.  You can edit later.  Remember you are still writing for humans. Make sure it reads well.  Ideally your blog post should be more than 300 words.

SEO for images;

6 ) Be sure the Alt Tags for your images contain keywords and at least one contains your TOP KEYWORD.

7 ) Be sure to repeat the TOP KEYWORD 3 times in the Content of your blog post if you didn’t already.  Once in the first sentence (preferably the first few words), once at the end, and once more somewhere else in the middle.   If its a long post, try to get the 2nd or middle keyword near the 300th character* position, precision is not important on this one.   But be sure 1 instance of your TOP KEYWORD is in the last sentence.

8 ) Bold or italicize the 1st instance of your TOP KEYWORD.

9 ) Do a search for your TOP KEYWORD on Google.

10 ) Using the #1 position on Google SERP, link the 2nd instance (the middle one) of your TOP KEYWORD in your blog post to that website.  Keep the search results page open; you’ll want to incorporate others into your blog post if possible. Be sure to use your TOP KEYWORD as the Anchor Text for the links!

11 ) Create Post Tags with the TOP KEYWORD and some other well chosen keywords from the keyword tool you left open in step #1.  Do not use keywords that are not in your blog post, or now is a good time to try to edit-in some of those other keywords into your blog post.

12 ) Put the same keywords you used in the Post Tags into the Meta Keywords.  Do no include any keywords that are not in your blog post!!!

Back to your SERP page results from step #9,

13 ) Link other keywords in your Blog Post to the #2 and #3 web sites if possible.  (Yes, I would even link to competitors, but thats a personal decision) You needn’t be too strict with this step.  Some creativity may be beneficial.

If you follow these steps, you’ll have a very well Search Engine Optimized page to present to the search engines and hopefully it will achieve top position on Google SERP.