I’ve been writing for a living since 1993 I’ve also been an SEO author since 2007. I frequently receive inquiries from other writers who want to pursue this kind of writing, asking me what I learned about SEO. How did I come to know SEO? I learned by myself, and then later created an SEO copy writing course.
If you don’t have the time (or cannot afford) to pay for classes, the fundamentals is simple and all you need is time. This is the method I used.
What is Search Engine Optimization?
If you’re interested in learning something, begin at the beginning. When I started my journey I didn’t have any knowledge about terms like keywords density, blackhat techniques and how to write metadata tags or backlinks and so on. Therefore, I began from scratch by Google the abbreviation “SEO” and doing some deep reading. When I’d finished reading at least five or six articles I had a solid understanding of what this industry was really about.
Learn SEO Terms
When I was looking into the subject of search engine optimization and what it was all about, I came through industry-specific terms such as anchor texts, longer-tail keywords along with Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI). Since I wasn’t sure what they were I recorded them and then looked at them in a separate way.
Once I had a better understanding of SEO of the concepts, I attempted to determine the way each concept fits within the overall plan of SEO. In addition, once you begin to read about SEO and SEO-related topics, you’ll begin to develop an “big picture” idea of the essence of SEO.
I think of it as solving a jigsaw puzzle. You know the final picture is expected look like based on the image in the packaging, however you need to determine the place where each piece (each SEO idea) will fit into the overall plan.
When you learn SEO, it’s important to Know What To Avoid Doing
There’s a wealth of information to absorb when taking the initiative to study SEO. It can be confusing to find some of it confusing, making it difficult. This is why it’s equally important to understand what you should to avoid, in the same way as to know how to act.
To reduce confusion, all I did was direct to the instructions of Google. Why Google? It’s because it’s the most used search engine of all time and provides nearly 50% of the search results around the globe. For me, it was logical to determine how to avoid falling foul of the rules they enforce. Also, you should be aware of the numerous SEO tools, including paraphrasing and writing tools available free online which can assist you in determining your plan.
I began by reading the Search Engine Optimization Starter guide (pdf document). It’s Google’s Adwords Learning Center is also an excellent place to find out the basics of SEO. While it’s true that the AdWords Learning Center is for advertisers, it’s a good resource for SEO writers as a large portion of the techniques you put into advertising using Google are exactly the kinds of things you must be conscious about as an SEO copywriter.
Learn SEO Conclusion
This is how I began. However I’d have been remiss if did not inform you that if your goal is to become an SEO expert – and earn a living by writing SEO contentit is essential to be prepared for an ongoing process of learning. This is due to the fact that the guidelines for search engines change constantly. Google has stated that it implements more than 500 adjustments per year to its algorithm for searching. Therefore, in order to be informed I read about the subject from sites like WebProNews, SearchEngineWatch, and DailySEOBlog constantly.
