An effective search engine optimization (SEO) strategy includes a mix of on-page and off-page SEO. Even though search engine algorithms constantly change, what you do outside your website still matters. After all, 50 percent of ranking factors are tied into your off-page SEO strategy.
In this post, we’ll cover everything you need to know about off-page optimization:
• What is off-page SEO?
• Some off-page SEO examples
• The difference between on-page and off-page SEO
• The best off-site SEO strategy and best practices
• The best off-page SEO services
What Is Off-Page SEO?
Off-page SEO refers to the optimization efforts and tactics you employ outside of your website’s domain. These are tactics that don’t involve optimizing or publishing content on your site. Ultimately, your off-page SEO strategy aims to improve your site’s authority, popularity, credibility and relevance across the web.
On-Page vs. Off-Page SEO
So, what’s the difference between on-page and off-page SEO?
The “on-page vs. off-page SEO” debate is not actually a debate so much as an attempt to differentiate two equally important optimization practices.
Simply put, any SEO work you need to do on your website, such as content writing, falls under on-page SEO, while the rest of the tactics is off-page SEO.
Some of the on-page SEO tactics that an SEO agency may offer your business include the following:
• Content writing
• Internal linking
• Keyword research
• Uniform Resource Locators (URL) structure
• Meta and title tag optimization
• Alt text attributes
• Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) site security
• Monitoring page performance
• Breadcrumb navigation
• Core web vitals
• Ensuring mobile-friendliness
• Schema markups
• Page experience signals
The following are some off-page SEO services and tactics:
• Backlinks
• Social media for SEO
• Domain authority
• Local SEO
• Digital PR (Public Relations) campaigns
We’ll go over these off-site SEO services in the discussion below.
Off-Site SEO Strategy Best Practices for Businesses
1. Link Building
In answering the question, What is off-page SEO?, link building is one of the first things to come to mind. Link building, when combined with solid on-page and technical SEO foundations, is instrumental in driving organic traffic, especially in competitive industries.
In case you needed a refresher, link building is the process of building backlinks (or one-way hyperlinks) to a website to increase its search engine visibility.
Think of backlinks as votes of confidence given to your site. If that vote comes from a trusted source, like a government website (.gov), non-profit organization sites (.org) and content aggregators (e.g. Wikipedia), it’s a massive boost to your site.
Google representatives have often stressed that quality content is still the number one ranking factor. However, link building comes in as a close second – that is, quality link building that involves authoritative sites with high Domain Authority (DA) or Domain Rating (DR), such as the sites we mentioned above.
The best SEO experts will want you to get more quality links from authoritative sites. They know an off-page SEO strategy relying on spammy, dodgy backlinks won’t produce results.
Here are some of the link building techniques that work in 2022 and beyond:
• Use Help a Reporter Out (HARO) to become a resource for bloggers and reporters.
• The best SEO experts usually recommend publishing long-form content (1,500 words or more) that tackles a subject extensively.
• Find broken links and contact the resource owner and offer to replace the link to one of your pages.
• Find unlinked brand mentions and ask the content owner to link to the page that they mentioned
Providing fresh and quality content is one of the keys to getting more quality links from other websites. This strategy is one of the ways on-page and off-page SEO work together.
2. Increase Your Brand’s E-A-T
To be in Google’s good graces, you have to improve your content’s E-A-T, or Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness.
Expertise requires you to demonstrate how well you know your niche – an important aspect of your off-site SEO strategy. Apart from showing the right credentials, you must be able to present your readers accurate, useful and truthful information. The more you demonstrate your expertise, the more of an authority you become.
Like expertise, authoritativeness also can be shown through your content, such as videos, blogs, webinars and podcasts. If you have industry experts in your organization, use them to provide insight when creating your content. Another way is producing case studies that show (not tell) the results of your products or services and exemplify your knowledge of the subject. It’s real-life proof that you know what you’re doing.
And finally, trustworthiness is established after you have successfully demonstrated your authority. Another way to improve it is through technical SEO. For instance, in eCommerce, you shouldn’t just optimize your pages, but you must also have SSL certificate implementation. Google reports that 70 percent of page one results on the search engine results pages (SERPs) come from SSL-certified sites. This way, you show trustworthiness not just to site users but also to search engines. When your trustworthiness goes down, you may have to perform reputation management. A top-notch SEO agency with this type of service will be a big help.
3. Optimize Content Marketing and SEO
Content marketing and SEO go hand in hand. In fact, it’s hard to come up with off-page SEO examples without citing content marketing. Many believe content marketing is only about publishing content on your site. However, the best SEO experts will tell you it entails much more.
Content marketing is the strategic process of creating, distributing and publishing content that engages and delights your target audience. To achieve this, your content needs to be relevant, valuable and compelling. Other than link building, content marketing can also be part of your social media marketing and PR campaigns.
4. Optimize Social Media for SEO
Social media is one of the more interesting off-page SEO examples. While there are SEO link-building services, it won’t benefit your SEO much since social media is notorious for having “nofollow” links. When linking to an external site, a nofollow link has the rel=”nofollow” attribute in the code. Simply put, it doesn’t pass any authority to your site.
So, what’s the purpose of social media for off-page SEO? It’s for improving brand awareness and lead generation. It’s also a great way to generate organic traffic to your website. Therefore, SEO link-building services should include social media in the overall strategy.
5. Improve DA and Page Authority
Domain Authority and Page Authority (PA) are metrics developed by Moz that predict how well website pages and entire websites will rank. There are tools you can use to measure your DA and PA scores, which can be anywhere from zero to 100 and are based on many factors.
After checking your DA, there are several things you can do to improve your score, such as:
• Increase social signals
• Improve page load speed
• Make your site mobile-friendly
• Improve technical SEO
• Perform on-page optimizations
• Use other off-page SEO tactics mentioned earlier
6. Use Google Business Profile for Local SEO
Forty-six percent of all online searches are local searches. This means plenty of people go online to look for local businesses. One way to boost your local presence is by securing a listing on Google Business Profile, formerly known as Google My Business, and other citations. Make sure your business name, phone number, address and other info are consistent across all your profiles.
7. Digital PR Campaigns
PR campaigns are great for launching new products and services and announcing company events and promos. Some digital PR campaigns include conducting online interviews, press releases and advertorials. Advertorials are advertisements packaged as news stories. These are sent to online news media outlets.
Consider digital PR campaigns as part of off-page SEO services. It’s a great way to position yourself as an industry thought leader. These campaigns put your business in the limelight – increasing brand awareness and driving referral traffic.
How an SEO Agency Can Help
A seasoned SEO company like Thrive offers top-notch off-site SEO services. Our experts collaborate with your team to formulate a unique growth strategy for your business.
First, we perform a comprehensive site audit to determine where your business is in the digital marketing spectrum. We then determine the gaps in your internet marketing strategy, including off-site SEO services. Finally, our SEO company proposes actionable steps for your business to increase organic traffic.
Thrive is a results-driven SEO company with more than 15 years of experience. We work with businesses of all sizes. Call 843-353-6383 today or fill out this form to schedule a free consultation.
