Types of SEO: On-Page vs Off-Page vs Technical SEO!

When it comes to SEO, there are a lot of different things that you need to think about in order to get your website ranking as high as possible.

You have on-page SEO, off-page SEO, and technical SEO – but what do all of these things mean, and what’s the difference between them?

On-page vs Off-page vs Technical SEO!

On-page SEO is all about optimizing your website so that search engines can find it and rank it highly.

You need to make sure that your website’s title tags, meta descriptions, and URLs are all properly formatted, and that you’re using the correct keywords throughout your content.

Off-page SEO is all about getting other websites to link to yours.

The more links you have pointing back to your website from other quality, relevant websites,

the more likely it is that Google will see your site as an authority and rank it highly in their search results.

Technical SEO is a set of guidelines about how to make sure that your website is adequately optimized for search engines.

It involves using things like schema markup, canonicals, and hreflang tags to make sure that your website’s code is as clean and effective as possible.

What is On-Page SEO and why is it important?

On-page SEO is all about how you format your website.

It has to do with the way that your title tags, meta descriptions, URLs, and keywords are structured.

But it also has a lot to do with having quality content that uses the right keywords in the right places.

Typically, On-page SEO will give you between 50% and 80% of the ranking factors that you need in order to rank highly on search engine results pages (SERPs).

This means that if you focus on optimizing your website properly,

you’ll be able to get a good amount of traffic from the search engines without needing to do any Off-page SEO.

It is the process of optimizing your web pages to work with search engine algorithms.

It includes analyzing the ‘text’ (words, content) & ‘structure’ (Html tags, headings, subheadings etc.) of specific pages.

On-Page SEO includes all the opportunities a website owner has to influence how a search engine rates a page.

Basically, it is about optimizing your web pages so that, when google’s crawler visits them, you have a better chance of ranking higher in the SERPs (search engine results pages).

Hence increasing your chances of having more visitors that are interested in your specific niche or subject.

It is one of the most important factors to take into consideration when working on your website’s overall SEO strategy.

It is usually worth spending time working on (and updating), as you can see how Google ranks specific pages, and make changes accordingly.

Just like Off-page SEO, it also needs to be done correctly in order for it to improve your search engine rankings.

Basic On-Page SEO includes,

• keywords density
• readability analysis
• Meta keywords, descriptions & attributes
• Content layout
• Image ALT tags and the surrounding content surrounding the images.
• Importance of Headings (H1, H2, H3 and so on).
• URL structure and what is in a URL?
• Keyword Research/On-Page Research.
• How to handle keyword stuffing, duplicate content. etc. etc.

On-page SEO has two components:

1)  Technical On-page SEO

Technical optimization is the process of editing, checking and modifying your website’s source code & Html.

It involves adjusting elements like meta details (title tags and descriptions), alt text of images, redirects, using schema markup and setting up internal links.

Modifying your website’s source code can improve the ranking of a specific page on google search result pages (SERPs) by improving its weight or value in search engine algorithms.

2)  Content On-page SEO

Content optimization is the process of editing, checking and modifying the text & content of your website.

It involves making sure the target keyword is included in the web page’s meta description, title tags, h1 heading tags etc.

Additionally, it requires analyzing your web page’s content to ensure that it covers all aspects of targeted keywords.

With On-page SEO you are optimizing individual web pages to rank higher with search engines & increase their traffic.

It is a vital part of any website’s digital marketing strategy because, without it, no amount of off-page optimization can bring you high rankings on Google SERPs.

In conclusion, It is the process of modifying your web page’s source code & content with the sole aim of improving its ranking with search engines.

This is what On-Page SEO is all about.

You should also consider what Google wants from Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs), which include:

“Helpful, trusted and visually appealing results,” and what users want from Google: “Rapid and relevant search results”.

What is Off-Page SEO and why is it important?

Off-page SEO is essentially about getting other websites to link back to your website.

The more websites that link to yours, the higher you’ll rank in search engine results pages (SERPs) – and the better your click-through rates will be.

To do effective off-page SEO, you need to figure out which keywords you want to rank for,

and which keywords are being used by other websites in the results pages.

Then, you have to find a way to get links from these websites so that you can get your content indexed faster.

Off-page SEO is very important because it allows search engines to find your website organically, without being paid for through PPC ads.

Even though it’s being called SEO, off-page SEO is more about marketing than anything else.

Off-page SEO refers to link building, or any activity dealing with external website links.

When search engine spiders crawl internet pages, they pay more attention to links than most webmasters realise.

This is because Google considers websites that are linked to as being an indication of authority on a subject.

Google also takes into account two indicators when determining if a site is an authority on a topic.

The age of the domain and the number and quality of websites that link to your webpage.

Off-page search engine optimization involves building authority through gaining other sites to link back to your website.

This is called building ‘link popularity, which enhances the performance of Google search rankings.

Because if other authority sites link back to your website, this is an indication that your site gives valuable content.

Off-page SEO techniques include creating content that industry influencers may want to discuss or write about,

encouraging visitors to link to your website, and finding directories that accept backlinks.

A few of the most popular off-page SEO techniques are:

1. Backlinking is when external sites link back to your websites, for various reasons.

Some examples include linking to blog posts, linking to products on e-commerce websites, or just generally linking out for the sake of authority.

2. Commenting on blogs in your industry is an invaluable method of getting backlinks to your site.

When commenting make sure you leave helpful and insightful comments and include a link back to your website (if it’s appropriate).

3. Guest blogging is when you write for another website.

You can either ask to guest blog or offer your services as a guest blogger on websites in exchange for exposure and links back to your webpage.

4. Submitting articles to article submission sites is one of the most common off-page SEO techniques.

Sites like eHow, Suite 101, Associated Content and Hub Pages reward writers by linking back to their websites.

5. Directory submissions entail finding directories that regularly accept backlinks, like human-edited online directories.

For example, if your site discusses hiking in the Appalachian mountains, you would submit your link to a directory for hikers.  

These sites are less competitive than article submission sites because there is usually a short queue and low requirements.

Also, these sites usually have high domain authority which will result in a high page rank.

6. Social bookmarking is one of the most popular off-page Search Engine Optimization techniques because it not only gets your webpage shared across the internet,

but also increases its link popularity because you are submitting links back to your site on social networking platforms like Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon and Delicious.

As you can see, there are many off-page SEO techniques that will increase site traffic and raise your website’s PageRank!

What is Technical SEO and why is it important?

Technical SEO has to do with the way that your website is structured.

It involves using things like schema markup, canonicals, hreflang tags, and other elements of code to make sure that your website’s content is clean, organized, and search engine friendly.

Technical SEO is important because if you don’t do it right, then the search engines will have a hard time crawling your site.

Which in turn leads to increased load times for visitors, decreased conversion rates, and lower average page views.

Hosting is very important for technical SEO, use cloud hosting (Cloudways) for the best results.

Also, try to get a theme (Themify Ultra) that is SEO optimized and speedy.

Technical SEO includes checking,

• Structured data
• Schema markups
• Duplicate pages
• Canonical tags
• Broken links
• Orphaned pages
• Crawl errors
• Website loading speed

Semrush is the complete SEO tool that saves you time doing tasks manually.

It also helps with off-page SEO by making it easier for search engines to find your website and index your content.

In short, on-page SEO is about optimizing your website for the search engines,

off-page SEO is about getting links from other websites,

and technical SEO is about making sure that your website’s code is clean and effective.

By understanding the difference between these three types of SEO,

you’ll be able to create a comprehensive SEO strategy that will help your website rank higher on the search engine results pages.

Difference Between On-Page And Off-Page SEO?

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the technique used by web developers or designers to increase the ranking of their websites,

and thus enhance the visibility of a website or a web page to users of search engines.

It helps to increase the quality of the website which automatically increases the traffic to it.

SEO strategy can be divided into two types –

1. On-page SEO
2. Off-page SEO

On-Page and Off-Page SEO are entirely different from each other, but they both play crucial roles in a successful SEO practice

What is On-Page SEO?

Another name for on-page SEO is on-site SEO.

This technique helps in optimizing the different pages of a website, which increases its rankings.

There are many factors and techniques involved in on-page SEO and we will discuss them below;

On-Page SEO techniques

1. Title Tags

Your title tag gives your audience and search engines a hint about what the content on your blog is all about.

Most importantly, your title tag should include each keyword you are targeting.

People need to think about an effective title tag, which must include the keyword for a popular page.

For instance, the keyword in this content is “content marketing”, the title tag contains the targeted keyword “content marketing”  

2. Headings

H1 is the tag, which is used to give the largest headings for a topic on a page.

Search engines focus on these headings and people need to target the keywords in these headings.

These headings must also target the content written under them.

Most CMS software like WordPress automatically adds the H1 tag to the title tag.

To check if your title tag is wrapped up in the H1 tag, click on the ‘Text’ icon.

However, apart from ensuring that your keyword appears in your title tag,

you should also make sure it appears on one of your subheadings 

3. URL Structure

The URL of your content should contain your targeted keyword.

For instance, take a look at the illustration below;

The keyword here is “content marketing” and it is contained in the URL.

4. Alt text for images

Alt text can be added to a URL or image.

This text is not visible to a user unless he hovers the mouse cursor on it.

The text helps the users to understand the purpose of the image.

Search engines also use the same technique by going through the description mentioned in the alt text.

It is a good technique to include keywords in the alt text, which will help the search engines to understand the content of the page.

5. Keywords and phrases

Keywords are an integral part of SEO.

They are words, and phrases that internet users type into the search query on search engines.

They give internet users and search engines a clue as to what your content is all about.

For On-Page SEO practice, your keywords should appear in the first 100 words of your content,

that is your keywords should appear in the first paragraph of your content.

In addition to this, include your keywords naturally into your content, you don’t want to do keyword surfing,

Just ensure your keyword is evenly distributed in your content.

6. Meta description

A Meta description is a summary of not more than 156 characters that gives visitors and search engines a clue of what your content is about.

It is a part of on-page SEO practice and it involves wrapping up your whole content in a few words.

Your meta description should contain your keyword.

SEO Plugins like Yoast or Rank Math comes with a meta description feature that allows you to type in your meta description in its excerpt box.

One thing to note is this, if your meta description is missing, Google will create one for you.

For more illustrations, check the image below;

The word represented in bold letters is the keyword.

7. Speed of page loading

SEO depends so much on the site’s performance.

Google on the other hand is very keen at ranking websites that offer a great user experience to users.

Page speed is a key factor for ranking.

Google officially announced that site speed was going to be a ranking factor in their algorithm.

A slow website harms your site’s SEO and user experience.

For instance, most people will abandon a site that takes seconds to load.

Apart from page speed, you should also ensure that your site is responsive to mobile devices, this is because in 2016,

Google announced that they were experimenting with mobile-first indexing,

which means that Google will look at the mobile version of a site to see if it is relevant to what searchers type into the search query.  

You can check your page loading speed with GTmetrix, Google page speed tool, and Pingdom.

For speed, it is recommended to choose a fast & reliable host (Cloudways) with a well-coded theme (Themify Ultra).

8. Content of the page

The content available on the page must be useful for the people who visit it.

People can search for general as well as specific topics and if they visit a page that has relevant information, they will like to see it.

Another thing is that the content should be free from plagiarism and any spelling or grammatical mistake.

9. Internal linking

Internal linking is also a good thing for on-page SEO.

People can visit various parts of the website through those links.

If various topics on a page are also linked, people can click that link to reach the desired topic on the same page.

Importance of on-page SEO

On-page SEO is a technique due to which people and the search engine can reach a website.

The WebPages are easily indexed by search engines and navigation also becomes easy.

This helps in increasing the ranking of the website.

What is Off-Page SEO?

Off-Page SEO refers to the SEO techniques outside your website.

While you do not have total control of these techniques, there are steps you can take to boost your authority if you remain focused.

Off-page SEO techniques

1. Backlinks

Backlinks are one of the main focuses of off-page SEO techniques.

It involves reaching out to other sites and requesting that they link back to your website.

Gaining backlinks from authoritative sites increases your domain authority as well as your ranking ability on search engines.

This is because links from an authoritative site to yours give Google the impression that you are providing valuable content to users.

When a website gets a lot of links from other websites, its ranking increases automatically.

The main factor that leads to the increase in the ranking is the presence of backlinks on the website.

Here are some of the ways of creating backlinks.

-The content available on the website should be accurate and to the point, as it increases the value of the website.

-Links can be generated if the content is shared on various social media websites.

-Another way is email marketing where an owner of a website can send emails to the influencing people and this may help in increasing the ranking.

-Guest blogging will also provide backlinks for the websites.

The quantity of links is very important but another thing that can increase the ranking is the presence of valuable content.

After getting enough links for the website, the SEO professionals think about the quality of the links.

The first step, in this case, is to create content that can be shared among the users.

The quantity of links depends upon the number of competitors for a website.

However, there are a few factors to consider while considering link building

1. Domain authority of the site.
2. The Relevance of the domain to the content on your site.
3. The Anchored text.

2. Domain Authority

Domain authority as the name implies is a measure of how powerful or authoritative your site is to search engines.

It’s on a scale of 0-100 and it tells search engines how much they can trust your site.

However, domain authority is dependent on a few factors,

1. Number of referring domains
2. Total site traffic
3. User Experience

Importance of off-page SEO

Off-page SEO is important because it tells search engines that your contents are important to other websites.

In simple terms, others like your content and link to your website.

Backlinks are always an important factor for ranking in search engines. That way google rank your articles.

This technique is used to increase the authority of the domain.

In this, the website gets a lot of links from other websites and compiles them together.

The presence of backlinks on the website is the main and foremost factor responsible for increasing the ranking of the webpage.

Although the quantity of the backlinks matter but the quality of the content should never be compromised.

Off-page SEO is important because it tells search engines that your content is valuable to other websites which in hand increases the engagement to your Content.

On-page and off-page SEO techniques are very useful for increasing the rankings of a website. Both of them need valuable content.

Off-page SEO needs backlinks while on-page SEO is based on keywords, which can be provided in the links, URLs, and text.

However, Both techniques are helpful to increase the ranking of a website.

But content is of utmost importance. “A good content gives out a good connect”.

So, the main focus should be to check out demanding keywords and add them up in your work.

Wrapping up

SEO is a complex and ever-changing field, and it can be difficult to keep track of all the different techniques that you need to use in order to optimize your website.

By understanding the difference between on-page SEO, off-page SEO, and technical SEO,

you’ll be able to create a comprehensive SEO strategy that will help your website rank higher on the search engine results pages.

In this blog post, we’ve talked about the difference between on-page vs off-page SEO vs technical SEO.

Hopefully, by reading it you have a better understanding of these three terms.

If not, please let us know! We can help answer any questions or concerns that you may have.