The Ultimate SEO Guide for Accountants

The Ultimate SEO Guide for Accountants

Search engine optimization is a strategy no business with an online presence can do without. If a small business does SEO poorly, it ends up in the same place that a TV show that airs on an obscure channel in the middle of the night does. It may be a wonderful show, but it is hard to gain a following because it is hard to find. People are just most likely to visit a site that appears higher in search results, while those on the second or third pages receive significantly less traffic. However, with the right small business SEO services in place, a small business can beat the competition and get a great ranking in search results. Here is the ultimate SEO guide for Accountants so that you can dominate search results and increase your website traffic.

What is Search Engine Optimization Anyway?

Search engine optimization or SEO is the process of optimizing your business’s website so that it can be found and indexed by search engine crawlers, which are bots that crawl the internet, finding and ranking content. 

Successful SEO for small businesses involves using several key components of content marketing.

Keyword research–

This is when you learn which terms and phrases your potential customers type into search engines. In finding out what people are searching for to find related businesses, to find information about your business, or to find information about a topic related to your business, you can create content that is useful to them. Any good keyword strategy is monitored and updated regularly as the trends of how people search are always changing. 

Copywriting–

If your pages are uninformative or confusing, people will move away from your site not too long after entering. At the opposite end though, if you create useful content that is laid out well, readers will be more likely to read your whole webpage. This will ultimately increase the average time a user spends on your site. The overall average for site on the top 10 of google results is three minutes and ten seconds. 

Content Marketing–

A well-crafted content marketing strategy emphasizes writing blog posts with each focusing on a specific keyword that can inform and engage your target audience. 

Link building–

The number of internal links (linking to existing content within your own site) and external links (when a different site links to your content) is an indicator that SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages) used to determine the quality of your site. 

Usability and UX–

SERPs will downgrade you if you have a clunky, slow-to-load, or hard-to-navigate website. Then of course a well-designed page keeps visitors around longer too.

Local SEO–

A good local SEO strategy will involve incorporating the tactics listed above, but focusing specially on your immediate surroundings. 

The Ultimate SEO Guide for Accountants

Tip 1: Focus on technical SEO

Technical SEO is the process of optimizing the structure of your site pages so that the crawlers can properly “read” and index your site. 

Even if your actual writing is amazing, problems with technical SEO will hamper your site’s ability to rank highly. So before creating new content, invest in the quality of your content from a technical perspective. 

• Create a sitemap and submit it to google–depending on what tools you use to build your site, there are plugins you can use to create a sitemap. Yoast SEO is one for WordPress users that generates a sitemap automatically and keeps it up-to-date when you publish new content. 
• Prune old pages that don’t perform–If your site has a lot of pages that don’t get traffic, your rankings will be negatively affected. 
• Fix broken and old links–The SERP robots will downgrade your content if you consistently send your reader to outdated or broken links.
• Optimize your images–Use relevant images with appropriate captions. You should also use the “alt text” section to give a description of the image. 

Tip 2: Optimize On-page SEO

On-page SEO is all about the words on the page. While the key point is always to create interesting content that naturally incorporates your target keywords, it’s also important to structure your posts in a way that gives you the best chance of being located in a search. 

• Optimize page titles and headlines–Your headline is a big factor in your click-through rate, which is itself a key part of how SERPs determine their rankings. The click-through rate is the percentage of people who view your headline and end up clicking on it. Something catchy that is about 60 characters long so that it doesn’t get cut off. If the title is too long, the SERP will insert an ellipse at the end of the character limit. 
• Use proper header tags–The headers you use for each section of your post can be optimized to contain relevant keywords. Also, by making your site clear to readers, you will boost those time-on-site metrics.
• Clean up your meta tags–Every content management system allows you to enter meta tags, which are essentially just descriptions of your content. These tags are used by search crawlers to make sure the description of your site matches the content on the page. In using relevant keywords and descriptions in your meta tags, you ensure the crawlers know what your page is about. 

The 50 Best SEO Keywords for Accountants