With the rise of AI-powered features, search engines are not just directing users to information but delivering answers directly.
This shift is redefining how people interact with the web, raising questions about the future of SEO, content discovery, and digital marketing.
Here’s what’s coming next.
From ChatGPT to Grok 3: The breakneck pace of AI advancements
The world has seen rapid and significant advances in AI technology and large language models (LLMs) within two years.
Looking back just three years ago, Google’s Gemini and Meta’s LLAMA did not exist, and OpenAI’s ChatGPT was later released in late November 2022.
Fast-forward to January 2025, the public was introduced to DeepSeek R1. This open-source large language reasoning model astounded the AI community with its speed, efficiency, and affordability, especially compared to OpenAI’s o1 GPT model.
A few weeks later, Elon Musk’s company xAI launched Grok 3, which impressed users by topping a key AI leaderboard with its complexity and fewer guardrails (see: unhinged mode).
More recently, Anthropic released Claude 3.7 Sonnet and Claude Code, an LLM that excels at code creation and debugging to a degree that has made many software engineers a bit uneasy.
These LLMs are just the beginning of AI’s rapid progress, with more breakthroughs on the way.
Google’s AI Mode: A glimpse of the future
AI isn’t just bringing new products – it’s transforming existing ones, too.
Engage with web search in a chat-like manner through multimodal understanding.
Refine long-tail queries in a back-and-forth manner.
AI Mode, powered by Gemini 2.0, enhances research using a “query fan-out” technique to gather real-time data from multiple sources and generate detailed, in-depth summaries.
This may make SEOs uncomfortable, as it potentially reduces clicks to publisher sites and further promotes a zero-click ecosystem.
With Google integrating Gemini 2.0 into its suite of products and its dominance of 89% of the search industry, its AI innovations demand close attention.
These technologies will likely be added to search, and AI Mode offers a preview of what’s ahead.
Two terms for the future of search: Agentic and deep research
We’ll likely hear two terms used more often in the AI and search space:
Deep research models can browse the web and focus on conducting intensive, in-depth research to provide users with informative summaries on complex topics.
Unlike previous LLMs, which use a single-step information retrieval system through RAG (retrieval-augmented generation), deep research and agentic models can:
Conduct multi-step research through a series of actions, pulling information from multiple sources to provide comprehensive summaries to the user.
Take proactive actions, such as executing tasks and complex instructions.
Google’s Project Mariner and OpenAI’s Operator already showcase these capabilities by allowing users to perform tasks within their browsers while understanding multi-modal elements such as text, images, and forms.
Suppose you want to plan a trip to Tokyo and know the best season to go, the weather, and where to stay.
Typically, this type of research takes a few days or weeks, and you gather information from various sources, such as travel websites or YouTube videos.
A deep research model can do the heavy lifting by searching the web, gathering information, and summarizing relevant content, which saves you time.
It can also “read, listen, and watch” various sources to provide a thorough answer.
An agentic model could also book your hotels and flights, navigating checkout flows to complete the purchase.
AI is moving in this direction as companies like Google work toward AGI (artificial general intelligence) – machines that can reason across diverse tasks like humans.
Deep research and agentic models are key milestones in building practical AI solutions for everyday use.
As AI search capabilities advance, users will likely rely even more on AI tools for quick answers rather than clicking through to websites or articles.
AI Mode and future search innovations could accelerate this shift by prioritizing fast, AI-generated summaries over traditional browsing.
As zero-click searches become the norm, you must rethink how you measure value and engagement.
Traditional KPIs may no longer accurately reflect user behavior, so focusing on brand visibility and awareness will be more critical than ever.
Increased personalization
LLMs and AI systems are revolutionizing search by personalizing responses with unmatched speed and scale, surpassing traditional algorithms.
Leveraging Google’s vast user data, AI can train on existing information and refine queries in real-time to deliver more tailored results.
As these systems continuously learn, they will become even better at recognizing, remembering, and adapting to individual user preferences.
As AI-driven search becomes more personalized, it’s worth considering whether hyper-niche content is the key to reaching your audience.
Multimodal search
Google’s AI-powered multimodal capabilities are already embedded in many of its products, including Project Astra, an AI assistant unveiled at Google I/O 2024.
During a live demonstration, Astra used multiple tools – such as Google Lens – to identify objects in real time and respond to voice queries.
Distinguished between similar names (“Bob” vs. “Rob”).
Even created a story about the figures.
While some of these advanced features haven’t been integrated into Google Search yet, multimodal search through Google Lens and voice search is already shaping how users submit queries.
As Google develops these capabilities, you should anticipate what’s next, look beyond text-based queries, and optimize for image, video, and audio search.
Commercial queries can still draw users to websites
AI-generated results have reduced clicks for informational queries, but commercial and transactional searches still offer opportunities for website traffic.
During the decision-making process, potential buyers research extensively – comparing products, reading reviews, and exploring multiple channels before making a purchase.
While it’s unclear how AI-generated search will impact this journey, think about how AI can streamline multi-touchpoint decision-making while still driving users to your website.
When users move closer to making a purchase, user-generated content – like reviews – will still play a crucial role in conversions.
Content quality still rules
Despite AI’s growing role in search, one thing remains constant: high-quality content is essential.
Whether users rely on traditional search engines or LLMs, visibility will still depend on the strength of the content itself.
Since both Google Search and LLMs use RAG to pull from vast datasets, ensuring these systems have access to accurate, high-quality information is critical.
Content demonstrating E-E-A-T (experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness) will continue to rank higher in AI-driven search results.
Your brand will also play a bigger role in search visibility, making it essential to create valuable, well-optimized content across multiple formats.
https://i0.wp.com/dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/The-next-wave-of-search-AI-Mode-deep-research-and-beyond-800x491-xNi10d.png?fit=800%2C491&ssl=1491800http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png2025-03-31 13:00:002025-03-31 13:00:00The next wave of search: AI Mode, deep research and beyond
AI models like ChatGPT reflect societal biases that exist in their training data. Here’s a simple way to see this in action:
Ask it to draw a nurse. You’ll likely get a woman.
Now, ask it to draw a CEO. You’ll probably see a man.
Here’s what I got:
This gender bias isn’t just limited to images. ChatGPT can perpetuate stereotypes and biases around:
Gender roles and professions
Cultural perspectives
Socioeconomic assumptions
Historical narratives
Geographic representation
For example, when asked about “traditional family values” or “successful business practices,” ChatGPT might default to Western, male-dominated perspectives without acknowledging other viewpoints.
What does this mean for you?
Always cross-reference important facts from multiple sources
Be aware that ChatGPT’s responses may reflect societal biases
Ask follow-up questions to get different perspectives
Use ChatGPT as a starting point, not the final authority
Consider whose viewpoints might be missing from its responses
Remember: ChatGPT is an incredibly powerful tool, but it’s trained on human-created data—which means it inherits human biases. So, use it wisely by staying critical and conscious of these limitations.
How to Use ChatGPT: Step-by-Step Beginners Guide
If you’re new to ChatGPT, getting started is easy.
You’ll be using it like a pro in just a few steps.
Step 1: Choose the Right ChatGPT Account Type
There are three ways to access ChatGPT, depending on what you need.
Guest Access
You can try ChatGPT right away with “Guest Access.” No need to sign up.
Turn memory on, and ChatGPT will learn from your past conversations.
You won’t have to repeat yourself every time you start a new chat.
Over time, it’ll remember details and give you more relevant responses.
Turn memory off and every session starts fresh.
This is great if you prefer more privacy.
Or don’t want past conversations influencing future replies.
You can also erase stored memories.
Click “Manage memories” in the “Personalization” window.
And you’ll see a new window where you can erase all memories or delete specific ones.
Personalizing ChatGPT: Make It Work Your Way
ChatGPT doesn’t have to sound the same for everyone.
You can easily customize it.
Just go to “Profile” (at the top right) > “Customize ChatGPT.”
Then, enter basic details like your name and profession.
Next, customize ChatGPT’s personality.
You can specify:
Tone: Friendly, casual, professional?
Response length: Brief and direct or in-depth?
Persona: Strategist, a teacher, or something else?
For example, if you want it to write in Backlinko style, you could type:
Write in the Backlinko writing style. Be direct and cut the fluff. Every sentence should be actionable. Do not use long complicated words when a simpler, shorter word exists.
If you’re not sure what to write, you can ask ChatGPT.
Here’s one way you can do that using your brand’s messaging document.
Upload the brand guide to ChatGPT and write:
Attached is [YOUR BRAND’S] content guideline. In under 1,500 characters, summarize [YOUR BRAND’S] voice, tone, and personality.
Advanced tip: I’ve noticed that ChatGPT doesn’t always stick to the personality I want. If you see that, too, do this:
First, give it this instruction.
“You have different personas. When I write [keyword], use that persona.”
Then, define the persona:
For example, for Backlinko, I write:
“[backlinko]: Be direct. Write clearly. Use short, punchy sentences with a confident tone. Make it easy to skim and focus on real, tested advice. Skip the jargon and write using the active voice. Keep the language simple (6th-grade level).”
Now, whenever I want ChatGPT to respond in Backlinko’s style, I start the chat with [backlinko].
The great thing about this?
You can add multiple personas for different tasks. And then you just add [keyword] to call that persona into the chat.
Some of my favorites include:
[80/20]: Focus only on the 20% of knowledge or actions that drive 80% of results. Prioritize key takeaways.
[teacher]: Break concepts into step-by-step explanations with real-world examples, analogies, and case studies.
The final section in customization is “What should ChatGPT know about you?”
Here, you personalize ChatGPT to your life and work.
What should you add?
Think about how you’ll be using it, then add relevant instructions.
For example, if you’re vegetarian with some dietary restrictions and you often use it for meal planning, you can write:
My family is vegetarian. One of our children has a peanut allergy, and the other doesn’t eat onions. Always make sure that the meals you create follow these restrictions.
Here’s another example if you use ChatGPT for work.
Say you have an ecommerce store.
You could add:
I sell handcrafted plant baskets made from sustainable materials. I have customers all over the world who are eco-conscious. I write in a warm but expert tone. I’m knowledgeable but never preachy. I have a small marketing budget. I do mostly organic content and paid ads.
Control Your Privacy
By default, OpenAI may use your conversations to improve the model.
If you’d rather keep chats private, you can turn this off.
Go to “Profile” > “Settings” > “Data Controls” and toggle “Improve the model for everyone.”
Once you do this, it won’t use your conversations for training.
And that’s it.
Your AI is now customized for you.
Go test ChatGPT with a few questions.
And see how well it adjusts based on your customizations.
Still not customized the way you want it?
Go back to settings and keep refining.
Step 3: Learn to Write Better Prompts
If you want high-quality answers from ChatGPT, you need to write better prompts.
Bland or generic answers usually mean a prompting problem.
Why?
Because when you give ChatGPT a vague question, it has to fill in the gaps.
And from what I’ve seen, it plays it safe by giving you the most generic explanations.
You don’t want that.
So how do you fix it?
Let’s get Google to help.
In its prompting guide, Google states that a good, detailed prompt includes four elements:
Task: What you want ChatGPT to do (explain, analyze, compare)
Context: Relevant background info (who, what, where, why)
Persona: The role ChatGPT should take (expert, teacher, consultant)
Format: How the response should be structured (step-by-step, bullet points, examples)
Adding just task + context makes a big difference.
Use all four, and you get much better answers.
Let me show you the difference in answer quality between a basic and an optimized prompt.
A basic prompt:
Give me unique marketing tips for a tour guide.
What do you get?
A generic list that can work for any tour guide anywhere in the world:
Now, add task + specific context:
Since ChatGPT has specific details to work with, the answer is more relevant.
We’re not done yet.
How about using all four elements using this prompt?
Act as a tourism marketing expert with 20 years of experience. I’ve just started a tour company in Málaga, Spain. The competition is fierce, so I need to stand out. Your task: identify three unique viral marketing strategies. The output should be a numbered list with one real-world example for each.
That level of detail gives you a more hyper-specific answer:
Step 4: Get Better Results With Frameworks
Frameworks help ChatGPT focus its thinking so its response becomes clearer and more organized.
So, instead of saying, “Give me an SEO strategy,” or “Give me content ideas,” specify a framework.
For example, in the Málaga tour guide prompt above, try using the STP framework (Segmentation, Targeting, Positioning).
You might say:
Act as a tourism marketing expert with 20 years of experience. Use the STP framework (Segmentation, Targeting, Positioning) to develop a unique marketing strategy for a tour guide in Málaga, Spain. Identify a specific segment of travelers, explain the best way to target them, and position the tour guide’s services for maximum appeal.
Much. Better. Answer.
But what if you don’t know any frameworks?
No problem.
Just ask ChatGPT.
All you have to do is choose the best one.
Step 5: Refine ChatGPT’s Responses with Follow-Ups
ChatGPT’s first answer isn’t always the best, especially for complex topics.
How do you improve it?
Keep asking questions.
Here’s what I mean.
Imagine you’re a social media manager launching a smart water bottle that reminds users to drink.
Your first prompt might be:
Give me a list of interactive social media campaign ideas. Context: We’re launching a new product: a smart water bottle that reminds users to drink. You’re a social media strategist with 10 years of experience.
ChatGPT gives you a list:
It’s a good start.
But it’s not enough to have a clear launch strategy.
So, you dig deeper.
If the reply is too generic, ask for more details.
If the answer is too theoretical, ask for clear, actionable steps.
Or you can focus on one thing in the list.
Keep refining your questions until you have everything you need.
By doing this, ChatGPT becomes more of a collaborative partner.
And you get a final output that’s a blend of AI and your knowledge and topical expertise.
Why not add everything in one big prompt?
You could.
But it’s not always the best approach.
Yes, some prompts are simple enough that they don’t need iterative refining.
But for complex ideas, refining step by step gives you more control over the output.
Personal insight: When conversations with ChatGPT get longer, it can go into a rabbit hole and lose track of the original task. When this happens, I bring it back with a prompt like:
“Go back to the original task. Do you remember it?”
If the response shows that it has forgotten some details from the original prompt, remind it explicitly:
“We were working on [ORIGINAL TASK]. Pick up from where we left off.”
This helps bring the conversation back to the task you set out to do.
Fun Ways to Use ChatGPT for Life and Work
One of the most powerful things about ChatGPT?
It can take on different roles.
It can be your personal assistant, researcher, strategist, problem-solver, and more.
ChatGPT as 24-7 Personal Assistant
ChatGPT can be your assistant for work and daily life.
Need help with life planning, SEO, or optimizing your habits?
Done.
For example, you can use it to review legal documents.
Upload a PDF, like a client agreement, and ask it to explain the legal jargon. Or point out unfair clauses.
It’s great for mundane tasks, too. Like cleaning up video transcripts.
Paste (or upload) the transcript.
And ask ChatGPT to organize it better.
Saves you so much time.
Personal insight: I recently used ChatGPT to help me organize my Obsidian vault (Obsidian is a personal knowledge management tool.)
I wanted a clean, scalable folder structure that matched my use case.
So, off to ChatGPT I went and wrote this prompt:
Create a folder structure for Obsidian that helps organize personal insights, research, and notes. The folder structure should make finding and linking notes easy while keeping things simple and scalable. Strictly limit to five main folders. Make sure it’s organized so it’s easy to expand over time. Your output should be in a clear, hierarchical bullet format.
This response gave me a solid starting point to structure my folders.
It also saved me time by giving me a clear framework to customize instead of figuring it all out from scratch.
ChatGPT as Your Analyst
ChatGPT is also great for processing and analyzing data.
A few things it can do:
Clean up raw data
Identify patterns
Extract insights
Side note: Data analysis works best with the paid plan. The free version may not always deliver the same level of detail.
Here’s a great example of how you can use its data analysis capabilities for digital marketing.
Let’s say you run an online store.
You want to analyze your competitor’s Google Shopping Ads using the Product Listing Ads (PLAs) data you got from Semrush.
Do this:
Upload the data to ChatGPT and use this prompt:
Analyze this Product Listing Ad (PLA) data for BestBuy.com from Semrush. Give me the top five takeaways that will help me. Show your work.
Just like that, ChatGPT will identify patterns and trends from the Semrush data:
Expert tip: Want to double-check the analysis? Add “Show your work” to your prompt. This tells ChatGPT to explain its thought process so you can verify and refine the answer.
ChatGPT as a Thought Partner
ChatGPT is great for learning and skill development.
For example, you can use it as a conversation partner when learning a new language.
You can also use ChatGPT to stress-test your thinking.
It can challenge your assumptions and poke holes in your reasoning.
I even use it to analyze my content outlines for writing projects.
Fun fact: Being nice to ChatGPT can lead to better responses. Research shows that using polite, supportive prompts leads to better answers.
http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png00http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png2025-03-31 11:43:412025-03-31 11:43:41How to Use ChatGPT to Get 10X Better Answers
Writing quality content should be a key aspect of every SEO strategy. But when is your content considered good or high-quality? And does quality mean the same for your users as for Google? In this article, we’ll discuss creating content and how you can make sure it hits the mark. It will require some creative writing skills. But don’t worry, you don’t have to become the next big author! By focusing on the right things, you can create high-ranking quality content that your users will happily read.
What is quality content?
That is the million-dollar question. Knowing how to write good content helps you get more visitors, higher conversions, and lower bounce rates. But who determines the quality of your content? The easy answer: your users. However, this also makes creating the right content more difficult. Because every user is different and has a different search intent. They have, however, one thing in common: every user knows what they want.
Although your users eventually determine the quality of your content, you can take a few steps to ensure you end up with well-thought-out, readable, and attractive content. In other words, content that’s eligible to be considered high-quality by your users and search engines. Luckily, a lot of the aspects that users will appreciate about your content are the same as the aspects search engines look for in quality content.
How search engines determine quality content
Search engines want to present their users with the exact content they seek. Content that is helpful, reliable and people-first and aligns with their current search intent. To help you create good content, Google has an acronym that you can consult: E-E-A-T.
Search engines decide on what is content quality by assessing a number of things – relevance, clarity and helpfulness, credibility and uniqueness. This all ties into the importance of E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) in any strategy around brand or topical authority.
Alex Moss – Principal SEO at Yoast
The acronym E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness. In their ongoing search for the best content, Google has added this acronym to their search quality raters guidelines. They use this to assess and judge the quality of online content. Although it’s especially important for so-called YMYL websites (“Your Money Your Life” – sites that are related to well-being, health, finances or safety), these guidelines apply to all content out there.
Why is quality content important?
Quality content is the foundation of a strong brand, helping you establish authority and expertise in your industry. Well-crafted content speaks directly to the needs of your audience, providing valuable insights that position your brand as a reliable source. Whether it’s through blog posts, social media, or in-depth guides, delivering high-quality content builds long-term relationships with customers, fosters engagement, and strengthens brand credibility.
Beyond its impact on branding, quality content plays a crucial role in SEO. As mentioned above, search engines prioritize helpful, well-structured, and informative content that truly benefits users. By focusing on producing valuable content that answers queries effectively, you can achieve higher rankings in the search results. This leads to increased visibility, organic traffic, and better engagement, which will help you grow your website sustainably. To scale content creation effectively, check out this guide on scaling content. Additionally, if you mainly write content for your clients’ website, make sure to check out our article on writing valuable content that your clients will love.
7 steps to start creating high-quality content
To ensure the quality of your content, there are 7 steps that you can follow. Let’s go into them in more detail.
1. Write for your readers, not yourself
If you have an ecommerce site, you want readers to know about the products or services you offer. If you’re a blogger, you want readers to get to know you and the topics that interest you. However, it’s also important to consider what your users want to read about. What interests do they have? What events or news do they follow that you can relate to your business? And what ‘problems’ are they trying to fix that have led them to your site?
The first step in creating high-quality content is ensuring it contains the information your audience is looking for. To find out what your users are looking for, you have to conduct proper keyword research. This will help you determine what subjects to write about and what words your audience uses. Keyword research also helps your rankings, as more visitors and lower bounce rates tell Google that your page is a good result to show in their search results.
2. Think about search intent and your goal
Search intent is the reason why someone conducts a specific search. It’s the term used to describe their purpose. For example, do they have a question they need answered? Or do they want to buy something online? Someone’s search intent makes a difference in how they consider the quality of your content. If it fits their need at that moment, then they will stay on your page longer. But if they need an answer to a question and the page they land on only tries to sell them products, they’ll be gone before you know it.
Match goals to different search intents
It’s important to consider search intent while creating content for a specific page. That’s why we advise you to match your goals to users’ different search intents. Is one of your goals to increase newsletter subscriptions? Then, you should add that subscription button to pages where users with an informational intent land. Does a visitor have a transactional intent (meaning: they want to buy something)? Make sure they land on a product or category page dedicated to the product they are looking for.
Of course, experience tells us it’s not always that black and white. Still, it’s good to consider your users’ search intent. It helps you determine the focus of your content and what call-to-actions you want to add. A great way to get started is by adopting a content design mindset. This mindset helps you produce user-centered content based on real needs. Also, we recommend looking at the search results for some input to create great content.
3. Make your content readable and engaging
Do you want to get your message across? And do you want people to read your entire blog post or page? Then, make your content easy to read. This means that you should:
Think about the structure of your text and the words you use. Too much text without any headings or paragraphs, also known as a wall of text, tends to scare people off. Use headings and whitespace to give your readers some air while reading.
Try to limit the use of difficult words and be cautious of the length of your sentences. Both can make your content harder to understand, which will slow down and frustrate your reader.
Variation in your text will make it engaging. Use synonyms and alternate longer sentences with shorter ones to mix it up.
Another important thing to focus on: Have fun! And be conversational in your writing. This helps you write high-quality content that is different from your competitors’ and helps users get to know you and your brand.
Experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness can all be used to improve your content. So how can you make sure to include these in your writing? We’ll go through them one by one and give you some pointers.
Share your experience
Although the acronym started as E-A-T, they added another E shortly after. This newly added E stands for experience. They prefer content that showcases knowledge or skills gained through first-hand experience. This can be gained through personal involvement or observations related to the topic at hand. To give an example, someone who has worked as an optician for many years will be experienced in the topic of eyesight. Or someone who has a prescription themselves will also have experience on the topic.
The second E in E-E-A-T stands for expertise. Although it makes sense that this would be an important factor in determining the quality of content, it is trickier to evaluate. So what Google does is find out what it can about the author itself. What is their reputation when it comes to the topic at hand? What is their background? And what other (reliable) sources are they referring to? When it comes to this criterion, it will pay off to be clear about your expertise and where it comes from online.
Related to expertise, the next letter stands for authoritativeness. An authority can be defined as a person or organization having power or control in a particular area. When you’re an authority on a topic, you often have the proper knowledge on it. That’s why official websites often have a higher chance of being perceived as the authority on a topic. But also aspects like qualifications and being associated with well-known organizations count towards this. If this one is tricky for you, don’t worry. It’s just one of the aspects Google looks for when determining quality. If this one doesn’t fit your blog or business, just focus more on the other letters in the acronym.
The last one probably doesn’t come as a surprise, as this is something we all look for when browsing online. The trustworthiness of the content before you. Whether it’s for a product you want to buy or information that you’re looking for, trust plays a big role in how serious you take online content. If it doesn’t feel right, a user will hesitate in the best case and leave your website in the worst. Google’s guidelines are quite clear on how they determine the trustworthiness of a website: “An unsatisfying amount of any of the following is a reason to give a page a low-quality rating: customer service information, contact information, information about who is responsible for the website or information about who created the content.” So make sure to be clear on these and look for other opportunities to show your trustworthiness.
Another key element of writing high-quality content is ensuring it’s up-to-date and relevant. This means you have to update your content occasionally to ensure people can find the right information. But why is this so important? It shows your users that you’re on top of recent developments and can always provide them with accurate information. In other words, it builds trust and keeps your audience returning to your site.
Keeping your website and blog posts updated is also important for SEO, as this shows Google that your site is ‘alive’ and relevant. So, make sure you schedule a time to update your content regularly.
The five steps we’ve discussed so far will help you write content that is easy to read and user-centered. Now, we’d like to highlight an equally important step: working on your site structure. It’s important because it will help users and search engines find your content.
Site structure refers to the way you organize your site’s content. When you structure your site well, search engines can index your URLs better. It helps Google determine the importance of your pages and which ones are related to each other. A good site structure allows users to find their way around your site more easily. It will help them find quality content in the search results and on your website. That’s why there’s much to gain from perfecting your site structure.
7. Use Yoast SEO to perfect your content
The last tip I want to share is the content analysis in our very own Yoast SEO plugin. This feature gives you real-time feedback on your content while you’re editing your page in the backend. It monitors whether you use your chosen keyword often enough and in the right places, it looks at text length and gives you feedback on readability. For example, it tells you when you use the passive voice too much, whether you’re using enough subheadings, gives you feedback on word complexity and the use of transition words. All of this and more is available in the free version to help you improve the readability and quality of your content.
The content analysis in Yoast SEO Premium goes a bit further and also does the following:
Allows you to optimize your text for related keyphrases and synonyms
Recognizes different forms of your keyphrase, so you can focus on writing naturally
Recognizes singular and plural, and also tenses of verbs
Gives access to our AI features, like Yoast AI Optimize, suggesting changes in your content
Gives you access to all the Yoast SEO academy courses, including our SEO copywriting training!
Buy Yoast SEO Premium now!
Unlock powerful features and much more for your WordPress site with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin!
Good, high-quality content will positively affect your SEO in the long run. So, before publishing post after post (or page after page), make sure to keep the following in mind. Make sure to write for your readers, make your content readable, match search intent with your goals, be trustworthy, keep your content up to date, and work on your site structure.
The result? Good content that your readers will appreciate. This will positively affect your number of visitors, conversions and eventual revenue. If you want to learn more tips and tricks, make sure to read our guide to SEO copywriting!
Shopify has become the leading online shopping platform in just a few years. It has become an anti-Amazon, helping small and large retailers worldwide run successful online stores with minimal effort. Although the ecommerce platform makes everything easy, there’s a lot you can do to improve the SEO of your online shop. In this ultimate guide, we’ll help you get on the right track by giving you many tips and tricks. In addition, we’ll tell you the best SEO app, and we have a Shopify SEO checklist for you!
While Shopify helps you set up everything correctly from the start, there are some things to consider when considering SEO. As with all content management systems, you must optimize your store to ensure it performs well for customers and search engines.
With Shopify SEO, you’re building a technically sound store that is tuned to what potential customers are looking for. You will use SEO in such a way that you build a much better solution than what your competitors are doing. You use research to find out what customers need, and you use the power of high-quality content to draw people in.
The Shopify SEO tips also have to do with what you do to market your store in other places — both online and offline. At Yoast, we practice holistic SEO and advise you to do the same — it’s the only way to get sustainable results.
Yoast SEO for Shopify
Want to outclass your competitors and boost your Shopify store’s organic traffic? Yoast SEO for Shopify has everything you need, from creating top-notch content to making your products eligible for rich results in Google. Our 24/7 support team and valuable SEO courses will ensure you stay ahead of the curve.
Shopify ensures you set up your store quickly and that customers and search engines can reach it. It already has some basic SEO features, and you can use SEO apps such as Yoast SEO for Shopify for many of the other tasks. Of course, this being a closed platform, your control over SEO is limited to what the developers allow.
For instance, you have to use the built-in URL structure and a system to manage your products in so-called collections, but these can be suboptimal and might cause duplicate content issues. In the rest of this guide, we will go through the SEO basics you need to cover and how Shopify and Yoast SEO can help you.
It’s an excellent platform to host your online shop, but there’s a lot you can do to make it perform even better. SEO can help you get your store noticed on Google and other platforms while making it more attractive to potential customers. In this guide to Shopify SEO, we’ll give you loads of tips — and a checklist — to make your ecommerce site successful.
1. Define who you are and what you stand for
To kick things off, we need you to think about who you are. Why does your business exist, and why do you need people to visit your store and buy your products? What makes you stand out from the competition? If everyone sells the same products, what would be your number one reason for people to come to you?
Define a mission for your store. A mission is an effective way of explaining what you have in your head. It provides a line that you can connect to your values and principles. You can use your mission as input for your online store’s SEO and marketing strategy. We have a post explaining exactly what you need to do to define a good mission and what to do with it.
Branding and storytelling are essential — so is having a mission!
2. Conduct keyword research for your store
SEO for your Shopify store must start with keyword research. Keyword research for online stores produces a list of terms you want your products, services, or store to be found. It will also give you insights into your audience, which words they use, which solutions they prefer, and how they behave. If you do it well, you can instantly fill in your SEO strategy for your site.
Various tools out there can help you get those insights quickly. You could use Google Trends, Answer the Public, or more professional tools like Ahrefs and Semrush — Yoast SEO for Shopify even integrates with Semrush. You can even use generative AI tools like OpenAI ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, or Google Gemini to inspire you.
Do thorough research and find out which terms are used most often. Find out what people usually search for and which phrases have search volume that you might aim for. Remember that trying to aim for the most popular head terms only might not make the most sense — try to aim for more long-tail keywords that still attract traffic.
It would help if you also looked at the different search intents around your products or services. No one goes from not needing something to buying it in the next second. The buyer journey has a number of steps, and you need to provide content for those steps.
3. Look at what the competition is doing
When doing keyword research, you must also see what your competition is doing. There are a ton of competitors operating in every niche you can imagine. Whenever you are looking at entering a market — or growing your piece of the pie — you must look at the competition. Who are they? What do they stand for? What’s their offering? Their prices? Service? How do they talk about the product? Who are they targeting, and by which terms do they do that?
Looking at your competitors gives you an idea of who to beat. You might find a weakness in their store or a strategy you might use. Or, you can find something that inspires you to work from. Please look at their content; are they writing thoroughly and with expertise about the product? Is that something you can improve on?
Shopify SEO tips in a handy checklist
This is a pretty epic Shopify SEO article, and we can imagine it is hard to keep track of all the great tips. Luckily, we put all the main tips in a handy little Shopify SEO checklist. Download the pdf and get started on the SEO of your store!
4. Write unique and high-quality product descriptions
Together with product photography, product descriptions are the life and blood of your online store. With good product descriptions, customers can get a good feel for a product without having it in hand. The problem is many online shops count on the descriptions manufacturers supply to stores. You can probably guess what that means: the same descriptions litter the web, causing duplicate content issues.
Writing your product descriptions can help you establish trust with the consumer. Having your content in your own words makes you more unique and lets you stand out from the crowd. Do keyword research for the products to determine which terms your consumers use. Use those terms in your descriptions and craft a compelling piece of content from that. Incorporate the details from the manufacturer, like SKU and product titles, but don’t rely on their descriptions.
Helping you improve your product descriptions is one of the standout features of Yoast SEO for Shopify. The app gives you suggestions while writing your descriptions and tips to help you improve both readability and SEO.
Taylor Stitch gives you everything you need to know about a product on one screen
Just as your product descriptions should be excellent, your titles and meta descriptions should also be epic. Title and meta descriptions are essential aspects that you can focus on to improve Shopify’s SEO. Use your keywords tactically and write something enticing those consumers want to click.
Shopify automatically generates titles and meta descriptions based on a straightforward template. You can edit your products’ titles, meta descriptions, blog posts, pages, collections, and general site settings.
Go to a specific page and open the search engine listing preview. Add a title and meta description for the search results pages here. These differ from the regular titles and descriptions, as these are specifically meant for the search results. You might have a specific title visible on your store and choose something else to show on the search results pages.
Quickly edit the information that will show up on the search results pages
You can edit these in Shopify, but Yoast SEO makes this process much more manageable. This SEO app comes with the incredible power of variables — and generative AI. Using variables, you can automatically generate part of the title and the meta description based on your settings. Of course, it’s always better to write both yourself, but this allows you to automate some parts, which can be helpful when you have many products. The same goes for AI in Yoast SEO!
6. Create SEO-friendly URLs in Shopify
SEO-friendly URLs are easy to read, relatively short, and consistent. Unfortunately, the CMS is inflexible, and there is little wiggle room to improve your URL structure. If you sell ugly Christmas sweaters, your Shopify collection URL looks like this:
The only thing you can change in this setup is the last part. Many people feel that there should be a way to have Shopify give more control over the rest.
7. Fix your site structure with internal linking and proper navigation
One of the most impactful tips to improve your Shopify SEO is fine-tuning your site structure and navigation. The more logical your site is, the better and easier customers and search engines like Google can navigate it and find what they need.
Your site structure should follow a logical path, and your collection system should make sense. Please keep it simple. You can see collections as categories, so use the collections to keep customers from having trouble understanding your site. It’s also nice if they don’t have to wade through a million products to find what they need. Make sure to give the collection overview pages the love they need. At the least, give these a proper description.
Internal links are essential
Internal linking helps you give the most critical pages proper weight. By linking to your product pages from various parts of your online shop, you signal to search engines that these are important. With proper anchor texts, you can identify the destination and tell search engines in words what to expect from that link. All of this helps search engines understand your site.
For your navigation, keep it as straightforward as possible. Use recognizable terms and destinations; your menu should describe where a click would lead. Contact us says a lot more than Touch base, right?
Your most important pages should appear in your navigation. While the age-old three-click rule for navigating to all the pages on your site was debunked quite a while ago, there’s still a lot to be said for keeping everything within reach. Your most important pages should be accessible without digging for them.
8. Make products findable with an XML sitemap
XML sitemaps are like maps detailing all the routes to the different parts of your website. Search engines use sitemaps to discover new and updated content. This also applies to your online shop. Shopify will automatically generate an XML sitemap based on your site structure. Your XML sitemap will include product pages, collections, blog posts, and pages.
You can find your sitemap at the following URL, with example.com being your domain, of course:
https://example.com/sitemap.xml
There’s a set limit for XML sitemaps of 50.000 URLs. As many sites have more than that, they will generate sub-sitemaps with fewer URLs. The Shopify sitemap, for instance, can contain up to 5.000 URLs, after which the platform breaks these up into smaller parts. This also has the added benefit of speeding up the loading times of these sitemaps.
To a certain extent, Yoast SEO for Shopify lets you control what appears in your XML sitemap. For instance, you can add a noindex to determine that a specific page or post won’t appear in the search results. You can also decide whether archive pages should or should not appear in the XML sitemaps. For the most part, though, your out-of-the-box settings will be good enough. But if you want to tailor your crawling, you can.
Yoast SEO for Shopify helps you determine what does and doesn’t appear on Google
9. Streamline the number of Shopify apps you use
While trying out every Shopify app under the sun is exciting, keep yourself in check. Many apps are bulky and heavy on JavaScript. Adding many apps will add much extra code to your store, as everything must be constantly loaded. One of the most crucial performance improvements you can make is to keep the number of apps low. Think about what you need for your store, pick the best apps that do that job, and remove the rest.
10. Optimize images for SEO
Images are an essential asset for every online store. Customers can only get a good feel for the product with great photos. But you need to offer all those images in the best way. Optimizing your images is one of the best and quickest tips to improve your Shopify SEO.
The importance of good product images
Good product images make it clear what a product is all about. It helps consumers view products from all angles without having the product in their hands. Product images need to be good, as they are one of the main drivers of conversion. Good photos also can catch the eye of the shopper. Great photos stand out in visual search engines like Google Images, Instagram, or Pinterest.
Optimize the file sizes
One of the essential tips to improve the SEO of your Shopify store is optimizing your images. It’s also something everyone can do — whether you are a seasoned ecommerce SEO expert or just starting. Optimizing your images, compressing them, and giving them proper names helps!
Lazy loading images
Another effective way to improve the loading times of your images is by lazy loading them. With lazy loading, the images will only load once they appear on the screen. Of course, you should always load all your images, as you want the images at the top of your browser window to always be visible. For the rest, lazy loading is a good choice.
Preventing CLS
While at it, check if your theme enforces width and height attributes on img tags. This helps avoid cumulative layout shift (CLS), one of Google’s metrics to determine your Core Web Vitals scores. CLS happens when elements move around during loading because image boundaries haven’t been defined. This causes jerkiness, and that’s a sign that your user experience is lacking for Google. You can try this by running your online store through Google’s page quality checks at web.dev/measure. You can also learn why and how to optimize your site for CLS on that site.
Many sites still have visual elements that can use a proper width and height specification to prevent CLS
Add alt text and good file names
Alt text is crucial for both SEO and web accessibility, and there are essential tips to follow when writing them for your product images. Firstly, it’s vital to be descriptive in the alt tag and clearly and concisely describe the product’s features, manufacturer, and model number.
You can add an alt text in Shopify’s media editor
File names also help Google understand your image. Suppose your file name is DSC37612.jpg, which says nothing about what the image contains. Add something useful. For example, if you sell iPhones and the photo shows a close-up of the back camera of an iPhone 15, you can give the file a name like this: iphone_15_back_camera_closeup.jpg. You see this, and you know right away what the image contains. Try to add relevant keywords as well if it makes sense.
11. Add a blog to your Shopify store
You can create a blog on Shopify quite easily. Compared to WordPress, it has a basic blogging engine that functions appropriately, and you can get started without much effort. Blogging on your ecommerce store can be an excellent way to enhance your SEO strategy as you try to reach an audience via search engines. It’s a beautiful way to offer customers more insights into your products and company.
Starting a blog on Shopify is very easy. Open your online store and navigate to blog posts in the sidebar. You can add a blog post from here by clicking the green button. By default, the blog is called News, but you can change that to anything you want. You could also run several blogs side-by-side. If you need help setting up your blog, we have a more detailed post about adding a blog to your store. Check it out!
If you have Yoast SEO for Shopify installed, there’s another way to improve your blog posts. Click Apps > Yoast SEO, and you’ll see an overview of all your products, collections, pages, and blog posts ready for you to optimize. Open the post you choose to edit, and you’ll get the full Yoast SEO readability analysis and SEO analysis. You can manage everything, from crawling directives for search engines to defining the proper article structured data.
Optimizing your store with Yoast SEO for Shopify it get noticed by Google
Is blogging good for my Shopify store?
Blogging can be a good asset for your Shopify SEO strategy. For many fledgling stores, growth mainly comes from paid ads. Focusing on content marketing through a blog allows you to expand your reach and form a connection with your customers. But, as with everything, it depends on how you use it. Don’t go at it randomly; you need to strategize.
First, you have to determine the goal of your blog. Do you want to reach new customers, build your brand, form a bond with your current customers, or do something else? What type of content would you want to share — or, instead, what content resonates with your customers? Think about how the user might find you — in other words, map out the user journey. And don’t forget about keyword research! Use those insights to build a content strategy for your Shopify store.
When you have a strategy, you can build the blog content on your store. Use cornerstone content as a basis and add articles supporting that main content, so you can fully describe your topic from all angles — and connect everything by proper internal linking. Be sure to write high-quality, unique content that comes across as trustworthy and authoritative.
Yoast SEO for Shopify
Get more organic traffic by creating the best product and blog content. Make your products eligible for rich results in Google. Plus, you’ll get access to our top-notch SEO courses and fantastic support team (24/7). Check out the Yoast SEO for Shopify product page, or get the app now!
Your theme is an essential part of your online shop. Your chosen theme influences many things — from branding to user experience to conversions. Everything depends on how awesome your Shopify theme is. Luckily, there’s ample choice in the Theme Store, and many of these should function perfectly fine for your store.
Let’s go over a couple of things you should look out for when choosing a theme:
Determine what you want and need: Will you run a store with a single product or a theme that can handle thousands or more? The theme store has a handy selection of themes for stores with large and small catalogs. What type of design do you need? What options do you need?
Figure out your budget: Themes in the Shopify theme store run from free to a one-time payment of a couple hundred dollars. Check what you are willing to spend. Free works for some, but then you hardly get support from the developer. Paid themes often come with more options and tend to be better built.
Check the themes in the marketplace: Quite a few themes are available. Shopify has even structured these into several collections, such as catalog size or the type of industry, such as clothing or electronics. You can filter on different properties, like features you need for the product pages or what’s available on a shop’s homepage. Now, almost 200 themes are available in the Theme Store.
Read the reviews: You are probably not the first to pick a theme, so it’s a good idea to read the reviews of people who worked with it.
Check the support the developer offers: Every theme comes with documentation and support, but the level and quality of support differ from developer to developer. Read the documentation and check around. Don’t be afraid to ask your questions.
Ensure the Shopify theme is lean and mean: Many themes want everything and appeal to every store owner. But that means that there’s bound to be stuff built in that you don’t need. Keep in mind that all those features come at a price. Try to find a theme that has low overhead and loads lightning fast.
You can try the demos and check out other stores that run the theme: The theme store offers demos for all the themes, and you’ll need to check these out. Also, Shopify provides examples of stores that run the specific theme you are looking at. It’s a good idea to closely examine those online stores and run them through their paces. For instance, run a performance test on web.dev/Measure and see how they do. You’d be surprised at the results.
Check mobile-friendliness: As consumers increasingly use their mobile devices to shop, your online shop must function correctly. Again, the theme store allows you to see a mobile view of the theme.
Test the user experience: The theme store also gives you a good idea of how users might experience the store. Click around, see the various layouts, and check how images load, how the animations work, the structure of the menu, and how it all feels. You can also try out the theme on your store to get an even better sense of how the theme feels and performs.
Pay extra attention to the shopping cart: Does it feel like it wants customers to move through the process as quickly as possible? Or are there elements that take away focus? Are there other distractions? Is there room to expand the basic cart with upsells/cross-sells, promotions, and the like? Test your cart to see if you can reduce shopping cart abandonment rates.
An example of a Shopify theme in the Theme Store
For total control, build your own Shopify theme
Having your own theme built might not be something you start with, but it offers many opportunities to take your store to the next level. With a self-built theme, you are in control, and you get to define what it looks like, what it needs, and how it functions. You can make it as lean or as complex as possible.
Building your theme is a good idea if you reach the limits of what’s possible with a pre-built theme. Only so much customization is possible in an existing theme — both in a technical and design sense. You have much more control over the conversion optimization options if you do it yourself.
Building your theme is quite complex, and you must consider what you want and need. It would help if you planned to ensure you avoid issues later. Of course, it’s possible to go into the nitty-gritty yourself, but there are also agencies out there that can help you get this done. The developer section of Shopify has ample documentation to help you learn more about building and adapting store themes.
8 technical SEO optimizations for Shopify
Much of what you should focus on for Shopify SEO in your day-to-day activities is content-focused. You are working on your product descriptions and content marketing, and you won’t be rebuilding your theme every day. Still, there are several things you can do to improve your Shopify store in a technical SEO sense. Let’s go over a couple of highlights.
1. Optimize for speed
As a managed platform, Shopify works hard to provide users with a speedy experience. Shopify focuses heavily on speed to help customers quickly improve those all-important loading times. Fast converts!
If your store loads slowly, customers will leave it and try a competitor. Luckily, the CMS prioritizes performance. For instance, it has an automatic content delivery network (CDN) for hosting your content on servers near your customers. In addition, it has a performance report that gives you insights into how well your store is performing regarding loading speed. For this, Shopify uses Lighthouse to get real-world results on your store’s performance.
While it provides a good platform by default, there are other things you can do to speed up your online store. For one, you should pick a highly optimized, lightweight theme — or get one built based on your specifications. Ensure that you properly optimize images on your site and take care not to use too many photos. Discard those sliders — nobody uses these anyway — and don’t install tens of apps you hardly use.
Regularly running a Lighthouse test gives you great insights into the performance of your Shopify store
2. Prevent duplicate content
We’re talking about duplicate content when a product or content appears on multiple URLs. This is not ideal, as Google might need clarification about the main one. Therefore, duplicate content can hinder your search performance.
Thanks to Shopify’s preference for collections, a specific product you add to a collection will be visible on two different URLs:
Not ideal! Luckily, the second one is canonicalized to the first one, but this causes a headache. Recent themes, like the Dawn Shopify theme, have improved and now automatically output the correct URL.
3. Working with product variants
Shopify works well with product variants like sizes or colors. You have plenty of options to make different combinations of whatever you like. The thing with variants is that it’s hard to get them to show in Google properly. You might not need that depending on your needs, but if you want the different variants of products to be indexed, you might be better off turning your variants into individual products.
Of course, you must provide sufficiently different product descriptions for each to appear individually in Google.
4. Faceted navigation or product filters
Shopify has only a handful of filtering options for your online store—no Amazon-style mega menu for you! Luckily, there are ways to add more filters to your navigation. There are two options: add your custom filters if you use an Online Store 2.0 compatible theme or add an app to manage them.
The first option is relatively straightforward but might be limited, while the second option opens up a world of possibilities. Product filter apps give you more control over how you want to categorize and visualize the faceted navigation. They also come with intelligent options that make it easier to load filters based on loads of variables dynamically.
Whatever you pick, ensure that the parameters generated by the faceted navigation don’t end up in the search results pages — block them in the robots.txt liquid file with a disallow rule.
5. Editing robots.txt to determine what ends up in search engines
The e-commerce platform hired top-notch SEO people to help expand and improve its capabilities. One of the things that came out of that team pretty quickly was the new ability to edit the robots.txt file. Having complete control over robots.txt gives you more ways to control what Google can and can’t do in your store. This takes away one of the most significant issues SEOs have with Shopify.
The robot.txt file is one of the crucial tools that you can use to optimize your online store or your website. It gives a way to tell Google how you want them to crawl the site. Ideally, you use this to prevent search engines from crawling less critical pages or sections of your site. For huge ecommerce sites, this is very important.
You can find your robots.txt file at https://example.com/robots.txt. Here’s what a standard robots.txt of Shopify looks like:
Shopify automatically disallows crawling for several parts of the store. It does this well; most users don’t have to touch this file. However, adding rules to ensure that more advanced features don’t generate duplicate content in the search results for more complex or expansive sites might make sense.
You can edit the robots.txt liquid file by visiting your Online Store admin page. Go to the theme section and select Actions > Edit code. Find the template section and click Add new template. Click the dropdown and select robots.txt from the bottom. Click Create Template, and you can start editing.
6. Structured data for your products
Structured data is essential in this day and age. This data is coded in a specific vocabulary — Schema.org — that search engines read to better understand your website. Structured data describes every part of your website to Google, so it knows all about your authors, articles, types of pages, businesses, and how they connect. Of course, there’s also Schema structured data for products.
With product structured data, you can describe your product to search engines. You’ll tell them about the product’s name, description, images, SKUs, prices, reviews, etc. Search engines like Google might give your product listings rich results in return for this valuable information. A rich result is a highlighted search with price information, availability, and even star reviews. Getting this is essential for online shops.
An example of a rich snippet for a product in Google
Luckily, most themes and Shopify itself output some product structured data. If you need a more complex setup without coding, you can use one of the structured data apps in the App Store. But there’s also another possibility: Yoast SEO for Shopify.
Yoast SEO for Shopify outputs structured data automatically
On WordPress, Yoast SEO has one of the best implementations of structured data out there. We built a complete graph that describes and connects every nook and cranny of your site. Google loves this! We bring that to Shopify in our Yoast SEO app so we can help you tell Google all about your products and their details.
You must follow some steps to get Yoast SEO to output Schema. A lot of structured data is added automatically, like Product information on product pages, but we need your input on other details. First, go to Apps and open the Yoast SEO for Shopify app. Go to the settings and click the Schema tab in the sidebar. Click Site Representation and fill in your store name, upload a logo, and fill in the social profiles. Now, your site is ready to rock.
Schema structured data for your articles and pages
Yoast SEO does a lot more with Schema structured data. For instance, we tell Google about your business — the name, logo, and social handles. The SEO app is flexible, so you can determine which parts of the Schema structured data you want to turn on or off should you ever want to integrate with another service.
Yoast SEO for Shopify has an additional structured data option to set yourself up for posts and pages. You can now describe the pages in detail. For instance, you can tell Google that your contact page is exactly that using a simple selection in the app. After that, Yoast SEO will add ContactPage Schema structured data to your contact page — ready for Google to enjoy.
This also goes for articles. Yoast SEO adds Article structured data to every article by default, but you can easily change this. There are news articles, reports, scholarly articles, and more options. By defining this, you give search engines more details on what they can find on the page, and they have to guess less.
7. Manage your redirects
Redirects are incredibly important and helpful when working on your site structure. With a proper redirect, you can send a customer from one URL to another URL without them noticing it. This is useful when you remove pages or products and don’t want people to stumble on dead links.
Shopify has a redirect feature built in. For one, it automatically adds a redirect when you change the slug of an existing post. If you need to do large-scale work on your site, you can upload CSV files with your redirects. You can also use the URL redirect feature in the admin settings navigation section. It’s a straightforward redirect feature with just two fields: one for the old URL you want to redirect and one for the new URL you want the old one to point to.
You can manage redirects via a simple URL redirect feature
8. Add your store to Google Search Console
With Analytics, Google Search Console is an essential tool for insights into your store’s performance in search. It gives you an idea of how your site does in a technical sense — crawlable, fast, and with valid structured data — and in a visibility sense. How do people see your pages and products, and how do they interact with them? Adding your store to Search Console is a must.
A quick rundown
Adding your Shopify store isn’t complicated:
Open Search Console and log in,
Add a new property
Choose either way if you’ve bought your URL from a third party
Choose the URL way for your examplestore.myshopify.com or examplestore.com URLs you got from Shopify (this is the only way that works)
Temporarily turn off the password protection (if needed)
Enter your domain name (including https://)
Copy the HTML file
Open your site theme settings
Click Actions > Edit code
Find the theme.liquid file and paste in the HTML tag below the head tag
Save and wait for Google to verify your site
Yoast SEO for Shopify makes adding the verification code to your ecommerce store easy. You no longer have to touch any code to do that! Open the Yoast SEO app, go to the settings, and click on Webmaster tools in the sidebar. Find the webmaster tool you want to verify — Google, Baidu, Bing, or something else — and paste the verification code you received into it. Click Save, and you are good to go. Check the head of your site to see if the code is correctly added
What are the biggest SEO issues with Shopify?
Shopify is one of the best ecommerce platforms out there. It does most things reasonably well, and with some finetuning and care, it’s a solid platform to build your online store.
Most SEO issues arise from its handling of different products and their variants. Products on the ecommerce platform can live in multiple places/URLs in your online store, and that can confuse search engines. Luckily, the CMS adds canonical URLs to signal to search engines that the one in the /products/ section is canonical. Unfortunately, you cannot do much about this, but be aware of the limitations.
Another area people could improve is Shopify’s rigid URL structure. It uses a system based on subfolders, making for unnecessary long URLs. For instance, you can find the contact page on a regular site on example.com/contact/, but on a store, that’s always example.com/pages/contact. Unfortunately, there’s nothing you can do about this.
Shopify is listening to its community and has begun to roll out several improvements that make it even more attractive as an ecommerce platform. Let’s hope they keep their focus and help you get the best results with your store. In the meantime, SEO apps like Yoast SEO for Shopify and the tips and checklists in ultimate guides like the one you are reading now help alleviate the various issues.
What is the best SEO app for Shopify?
Shopify is extendable, and you can choose from a broad selection of apps that help you improve your store. Some apps help ship your products, design your store, and offer customer services. Too many to choose from! Of course, there are also some SEO apps to take note of.
Some apps help you optimize images, others help with Schema structured data, and there are all-in-one SEO suites. The best one? We’re biased, but we think Yoast SEO stands out from the competition.
Yoast SEO for Shopify: Your SEO expert
WordPress fans have enjoyed using Yoast SEO for more than a decade — it’s the most popular SEO plugin for a reason! Yoast SEO is for SEO experts by SEO experts. But we didn’t make it for experts only. We’ve made SEO accessible so everyone working with WordPress can use Yoast SEO and get a fair chance in the search results. Over 13 million websites trust Yoast SEO, and our WordPress SEO app has over 25,000 five-star reviews on wordpress.org. Now, Yoast SEO is also available for Shopify. We’re ready to help shop owners get more out of their stores.
Yoast SEO for Shopify helps store owners improve their site technically and comes with an advanced SEO and readability analysis. The app will suggest improvements to your product page descriptions, helping you create the best ones.
These analyses also work on your Shopify blog. Content marketing plays a massive role in getting your store noticed on Google. The Yoast SEO app helps you write high-quality, readable content that resonates with potential customers.
Yoast SEO for Shopify helps you write awesome product descriptions that serve both customers and search engines
The best structured data for your Shopify store
To enhance your Shopify store’s organic traffic, it’s crucial to capitalize on the benefits of rich results, which increase search visibility and edge out competitors. Yoast SEO provides rich structured data/Schema.org output in JSON-LD format, supporting various types such as Product, Organization, WebSite, WebPage, BreadcrumbList, Article, and Offer. Yoast SEO also ties all its structured data together in a single graph, which helps search engines understand your store.
Additionally, Yoast SEO has integrated with the popular review apps Judge.me, Loox, Ali review, and Opinew, to generate the necessary AggregateRating schema to show your reviews in Google. Furthermore, the Yoast SEO breadcrumb block can conveniently be added to Shopify themes v2.0 to increase your store’s structured data and help boost its organic traffic.
Product variant schema
Product variant schema allows you to organize items like size, color, or material under one parent product to improve how Google displays them in search. Using properties like brand for the manufacturer, color, materialsize, and unique identifiers like sku, you can define each variant clearly. Adding this structured data helps search engines understand and showcase your product variations more effectively. Our Shopify SEO app makes it easy to implement this schema, ensuring your variants are optimized and compliant with Google’s guidelines.
Yoast SEO for Shopify outputs a lot of structured data for product variants
Of course, that’s only part of what the SEO app does. Be sure to check out the product page for Yoast SEO for Shopify or the Shopify SEO app store listing to find out more. In addition to the app, our SEO content gives you all the knowledge, tips, and tricks you need to make the most out of your SEO.
The Yoast SEO for Shopify training improves your skills!
In this guide, we gave an overview of what you can do to improve the SEO of your store. Of course, there’s more to the CMS — and to ecommerce itself. Luckily, we can help you on both fronts. Our SEO solutions come with training courses, and Shopify is no different. You’ll find an ecommerce SEO online course and training explicitly showing how to properly set up Yoast SEO for Shopify. Be sure to check out Yoast SEO Academy. Please try the ecommerce and Shopify training and bring your online store to the next level.
Conclusion on Shopify SEO
Shopify is a popular platform for hosting your online store. Rightly so, because it is easy to use and performs well out of the box. Of course, there are many things you can do to improve your store’s performance by focusing on Shopify SEO. This ultimate guide to Shopify SEO gives you an excellent place to start.
Tracking brand mentions across social media and news platforms
Starts at $49 per month; 14-day free trial available
1. Brand24
Best for spotting sudden spikes in mentions and identifying key influencers
Pricing: Starts at $199 per month; 14-day free trial available
Brand24 is an AI-powered media monitoring tool. It lets you track online mentions, analyze sentiment, and spot early signs of PR crises.
This tool stands out by tracking more than social media and news platforms. It also monitors podcasts and influencers, giving you a complete view of your brand.
Here’s what I love about Brand24:
Spot Sudden Spikes in Mentions to Immediately Act on Them
Brand24 uses AI to detect unexpected spikes or drops in brand mentions. It’s marked with an exclamation mark in your dashboard so you don’t miss it:
This is important because online conversations can change fast.
A spike in mentions may mean a PR crisis. A negative review might be going viral, or a complaint is spreading fast.
On the flip side, it could signal an opportunity to capitalize on. Like a post about your brand going viral in a positive way, or an influencer giving you a shoutout.
But how do you know whether the spike is positive or negative?
Brand24 uses AI to analyze the sentiment behind each mention. It checks if the spike is caused by positive buzz, negative feedback, or neutral chatter. This way, you can take the right action fast.
For example, Barbie had a significant spike in mentions in 2024 due to the Golden Globes event:
Brand24 tells you why the spike happened and shows you where it’s coming from. In the screenshot above, you can see it flagged Barbie’s spike due to the Golden Globes event.
It highlights key details like:
Why the spike occurred (Golden Globes event)
Which platforms drove the mentions (Instagram, TikTok, YouTube)
What type of sentiment was detected (positive admiration and awards)
The summary may not explicitly say “positive” or “negative.”
However, you can infer sentiment from the language used (“high admiration,” “winning awards”) and cross-referencing with the Sentiment tab at the top.
Track Podcast Mentions of Your Brand
Brand24 scans thousands of podcasts and alerts you whenever someone mentions your brand in a podcast title or description.
This way, you don’t miss critical conversations happening in the audio space.
You can view podcast mentions in the general Mentions tab. Or filter them by source:
People talk about brands on podcasts all the time. Whether it’s a CEO interview, product review, or deep-dive industry discussion.
But since podcasts aren’t text-based, these mentions are easy to miss.
Podcast tracking helps you:
See when influencers talk about your brand
Respond to negative mentions fast
Use positive mentions in your marketing
Identify Key Brand Influencers
Brand24 helps you find the most influential people talking about your brand. You can rank them based on number of mentions, reach, audience size, and impact:
Here’s why each filter matters and how you can use them:
Mentions: See how often someone talks about your brand. High mentions mean they’re actively discussing you, whether positive or negative. Use this to engage or address concerns quickly.
Reach: Shows how many people might see their posts. Use this to prioritize working with influencers with high reach to spread your message.
Influence score (impact): Shows how persuasive or credible the person is. This helps you spot trustworthy advocates or negative influencers before misinformation spreads.
Make Reports in One Click
Create reports to share insights with your team or clients.
Brand24 supports various formats like email, PDF, and Excel.
You can also create infographics:
Pros & Cons
Pros
Cons
Track podcast mentions
Doesn’t scan podcast transcripts; only tracks mentions in episode titles and descriptions
Identify potential PR crisis early on
The dashboard isn’t visual, so it may look overwhelming for beginners
2. Reviewflowz
Best for collecting reviews on autopilot
Pricing: Starts at $15 per month; 14-day free trial available
Reviewflowz is a powerful review management platform. It helps you collect, keep an eye on, and show customer reviews.
Here’s what I liked about Reviewflowz the most:
Launch Targeted Review Request Campaigns
Reviewflows automates review collection in two ways:
Email campaigns: Send automated review requests after purchase, with customizable templates and follow-up scheduling
Magic links: Generate unique URLs that take customers directly to your review form—perfect for adding to receipts or sharing via SMS
Best part?
When you set up an email campaign within Reviewflowz, you can choose when to request reviews:
Always request reviews from your email list to get as much feedback as possible
Only request reviews when a star rating drops under a certain threshold (lets you improve your reputation when your review score starts to drop)
Quickly Reply to Your Customer Reviews
Link your channels (like Slack, email, and Microsoft Teams) to get instant alerts for new reviews:
These notifications let you be in the loop and address critical reviews in time.
Once connected:
Slack: New reviews are sent directly to a public Slack channel in your workspace
Email: Reviews land in your inbox
Microsoft Teams: Reviews show up in a designated Teams channel
Zapier and Webhooks: You can set up automations to trigger custom workflows
You’ll see all reviews in real time. From there, you can decide which ones need immediate attention—whether it’s a low rating, critical feedback, or a chance to thank a happy customer.
Plus, you can use AI to create and send automated replies to happy reviewers that are always within your brand’s tone.
Show Best Reviews on Your Website
Display your best reviews automatically with Reviewflowz’s customizable, mobile-friendly widgets.
Each widget automatically updates with new reviews and lets you filter by rating to showcase your strongest feedback.
Choose from:
Masonry: A stack of reviews, which turns into a list on mobile
Slider: An interactive slider that shows up to three reviews horizontally and one on mobile
Then select the review sources, the number of reviews to display, and which reviews to show based on star ratings:
Pros & Cons
Pros
Cons
Email campaigns to gather more reviews with ease
Doesn’t track social media mentions
Customizable review widgets to showcase your feedback
AI-powered review responses
3. myPresences
Best for managing brand presence on different platforms and engaging with reviews
Pricing: Starts at $15 per month; 14-day free trial available
myPresences is an all-in-one online presence and reputation management platform.
It helps you appear in business directories, track customer reviews and engage with them.
Plus, you can display feedback on your website.
Here’s what I like about myPresences:
List Your Business Where It Matters Most
Listing your business on every platform takes a lot of time. It’s also prone to mistakes.
And when you update a phone number, move, or change a website URL, fixing it everywhere can take weeks.
myPresences makes it easy to list your business details on more than 2,000 directories.
You enter your business details once. Then, this tool pushes your business info on your chosen platforms.
But why does this matter? Is getting listed on Google not enough?
Not really.
Customers may use many different platforms to find your business, such as local directories and industry platforms.
Or they may check your website on a review site before they buy from you.
If you rely only on Google, you might miss out on potential customers who search elsewhere.
For example:
If your business is local, you’ll need to be on Yelp, TripAdvisor, and Google Business Profile (GBP)
If you manage a SaaS brand, being on review sites like G2, Capterra, and Trustpilot is crucial since some consumers go here before making a purchase
If you provide medical, legal, or real estate services, niche directories matter (Healthgrades, Avvo, or Zillow)
Check and Respond to Reviews Across Platforms
myPresences centralizes reviews from all major review sites. This helps you check and respond efficiently.
You can see a quick overview of your star rating distribution across all platforms in a pie chart:
Additionally, you can automate your responses with AI:
This lets you quickly respond to common reviews while keeping a consistent tone.
Showcase Customer Reviews on Your Website
myPresences allows you to show your best reviews on your website.
You can use customizable widgets for this:
Popup: Individual reviews appear as a small floating box on each page. They don’t take up much space and can appear sitewide.
List: A simple, single-column format. It’s ideal if you want them stacked clearly in one spot.
Grid: A three-column layout for showcasing many reviews at once. It’s great when you want to highlight volume and variety.
Carousel: A dynamic slider that rotates the reviews for an interactive experience. Perfect if you want to save space and make the page engaging.
You can avoid the task of copying and pasting reviews on your site. myPresences pulls in reviews automatically and updates them in real time.
This gives you fresh and authentic social proof.
Pros & Cons
Pros
Cons
Add your business details on directories that matter in your industry
Listing your details on business directories costs extra, up to $5 each. This can increase your expenses.
Manage all reviews in one place
4. Semrush Local
Best for managing local business reviews in one place and keeping listings accurate
Pricing: $50 per month + the plan you choose ($139.95/mo for Pro)
Best for tracking your brand mentions across social media and news platforms
Pricing: Starts at $49 per month; 14-day free trial available
Mention is a social media listening tool that monitors your online presence and analyzes brand mentions.
Let’s take a look at Mention’s key features:
Track Your Brand Mentions Across Channels
Mention tracks more than one billion sources. It checks for real-time brand mentions on social media, news sites, blogs, and forums.
All these are in one dashboard. You can expand each mention and see the preview of the post that includes your business name. And even know the sentiment behind the mention:
Mention also provides a link to each source. This takes you straight to the original post so you can join the conversation directly on the source site.
Create Real-Time, Visual Reports
Mention lets you make reports based on what matters most to you. This helps you analyze your brand’s online presence better.
You can either choose from predefined templates for quick insights:
Or customize reports by selecting the exact data you want to track:
In both cases, reports are real-time and visual.
Mention also creates automatic highlights. Like sudden mention spikes:
This lets you see key trends at a glance, so you don’t have to sift through long reports.
Pros & Cons
Pros
Cons
Covers a wide range of sources
Only supports text, podcasts are not included
Prompt notifications about your brand mentions
FAQs
How Do I Manage My Online Reputation?
Managing your online reputation involves:
Monitoring brand mentions across social media, news, and review sites
Responding to customer feedback
Encouraging happy customers to leave reviews
Addressing negative content with strategic responses
Keeping business listings accurate across all platforms
How Long Does It Take to See Results from Reputation Management Tools?
Reputation management tools provide insights immediately. However, improving your reputation by collecting more positive reviews, content, and SEO can take weeks or months, depending on your strategy.
Can Reputation Management Tools Remove Negative Reviews?
No, reputation management tools can’t remove negative reviews. They help you improve sentiment over time, and report false reviews if necessary.
What Metrics Should I Track to Measure Reputation Improvement?
Track the following metrics to improve your reputation:
Review ratings: Changes in star ratings across platforms
Brand sentiment: Positive vs. negative mentions over time
Mentions and reach: How often people discuss your brand online
Crisis alerts: Any sudden spikes in negative mentions
Ready to Choose Your Online Reputation Management Tool?
The best ORM tool for you depends on what you need most:
Want to track brand mentions? Brand24 and Mention help you stay on top of conversations.
Need help collecting reviews? Reviewflowz lets you automate review campaigns.
Need to manage your business details on business directories? For a local business, use Semrush Local. For a SaaS brand or professional services business, go with myPresences.
After choosing the best tool for your needs, expect the following:
First month: Set alerts, connect accounts, and test automation
Second month: Track trends and respond to reviews
Third month: Improve your strategy and let automation handle more tasks
Pro tip: Even the best tools need active engagement. Check in often. Respond to feedback quickly. This keeps your online reputation strong.
Want to discover more tools to help with your marketing processes? Check out our article on 33 digital marketing tools that suit various business needs and budgets.
If you publish writing, you’d be crazy not to use artificial intelligence.
It’s like telling a carpenter not to use a drill. You can build a deck without one. But why would you?
Writers have always embraced new tools to improve their craft.
The challenge with AI, or any technology, is that we want the easy way out.
We hope the tech will magically automate everything. And for mediocre content, AI is the perfect solution.
But creating exceptional content is HARD. No matter what tool you use.
For example, I used AI extensively to write this article.
Yet, it still took me 40+ hours to produce.
Why?
AI has made me realize how much I can improve my content. And you can, too.
I asked our content team about how they use AI in their writing and editing.
Our senior writers Yongi Barnard, Kate Starr, Shreelekha Singh, and senior editors Chris Hanna and Chris Shirlow shared their workflows and insights, which I’ll feature throughout this article.
These talented folks help Backlinko generate almost 800,000 sessions per month.
Below are seven timeless writing practices supported by AI.
Let’s start with planning your writing project.
1. Use AI to Define Your Audience
Without a deep understanding of your audience, even brilliant insights can fall flat.
AI makes reader research way easier.
You can analyze thousands of real conversations in minutes. No need to spend weeks on interviews or surveys.
A Faster Way to Do Audience Research
Using this article as an example, I wanted to understand how people felt about using AI for writing.
The best place for unfiltered thoughts? Reddit.
So, I Googled “reddit using ai to write good content” and found dozens of threads.
I gathered a handful of community discussions and exported them as PDFs.
I’m researching for a piece about using AI to write good content. I’ve attached five relevant Reddit threads. Please analyze these conversations and create a table of:
Desires: What do people want to achieve?
Pain points: What problems or challenges do they face?
Objections: What concerns or resistance do they express?
For each theme, please include a relevant supporting quote from the discussions.
The result was eye-opening.
The analysis revealed patterns I hadn’t considered.
It also included quotes that captured the audience’s raw emotions and language.
This helped me ground my writing in real experiences.
You don’t have to follow my exact process. For instance, Kate Starr, our senior writer, uses various sources for audience research:
“I often feed different data sources to AI. This includes Google’s People Also Ask sections and client conversation transcripts. The key is finding real conversations where your target audience expresses their challenges.
I recently took a consulting call transcript and created a detailed customer persona. This helped shape our entire content strategy”.
The key is to use AI to:
Process large amounts of audience data quickly
Identify patterns you might miss manually
Connect insights to real human experiences through quotes
Tip: Create a folder of interesting community discussions. When you find an engaging thread, save it immediately. You never know when that insight will be useful for future content.
2. Use AI to Find Your Unique Angle
It’s easy to get inspired by popular content in your field and remix those ideas.
That’s exactly what AI does by default, too.
A better approach?
Find perspectives that other content and most LLMs overlook. This makes your writing fresh and engaging.
Here’s how to do it in three simple steps.
Step 1: Gather Your Source Material
Find the top 3-5 posts for your topic.
You can do this for social media posts, articles, and emails (if you have access).
For instance, I found three posts on AI writing and copied them to a Google Doc before exporting the text file.
Step 2: Get AI to Summarize the Data and Suggest Ideas
Take your source materials from Step 1 and ask AI to create a comprehensive analysis.
Here’s a prompt:
I’ve shared several articles about [TOPIC]. Please analyze them and create a detailed breakdown with these categories:
Common Patterns:
List 3-4 approaches that appear frequently
Include specific examples from the articles
Note any patterns in structure or presentation
Assumptions Made:
List 3-4 assumptions these articles make without questioning them
Point out any gaps in evidence or logic
Identify claims that could use more support
Missing Views:
List 3-4 important perspectives that aren’t being discussed
Note any audience needs that aren’t fully addressed
Highlight opportunities for deeper coverage
Notable Elements:
List any unique or particularly effective approaches
Point out strong evidence or examples
Identify innovative structure or presentation
Here’s the output for using AI in writing:
Category
Details
Common Patterns
Tool comparisons focusing on features over strategy
Basic “input/output” workflow examples
Generic productivity benefits without specifics
Heavy focus on prompt engineering
Assumptions Made
More AI usage automatically means better content
Readers already understand AI fundamentals
One-size-fits-all approaches will work
Ethical concerns can be handled with simple disclaimers
Missing Views
Quality control processes and measurements
Strategic frameworks for tool selection
Real examples of human-AI collaboration
Cost-benefit analysis for different approaches
Notable Elements
One article included detailed workflow diagrams
Another featured mini case studies of failures
Several had good ethical guidelines
One included original research on AI output quality
After analyzing, ask the AI for new ideas based on the opportunities it found.
Here’s what Claude came back with for this article:
Step 3 – Analyze and Refine Your Angle
Sometimes, the angles are usable with the first output.
But often, it’s a dance between you and the robot to find something compelling.
Here’s how this process shaped this article:
While plenty of tool comparisons and basic workflows existed, few posts offered strategic frameworks for using AI effectively.
As I dug deeper, I noticed something more fundamental.
Everyone was focused on making writing easier. Tools, prompts, shortcuts.
But they were missing the tough reality:
Creating top-notch content is difficult. With AI or not.
That became my angle: How to use AI thoughtfully while embracing the necessary work of writing great content.
Pro tip: Your first insight often leads to an even better angle. Don’t be afraid to evolve your thinking beyond what the initial analysis shows.
3. Use AI to Create An Outline
Nearly every exceptional piece of content starts with a detailed plan. But many writers skip this step.
You risk wasting hours writing in circles or missing the brief entirely.
That’s why our team never writes a draft without a thorough outline.
With AI, creating that outline just got a lot easier.
Strengthen Your Draft Outline Through Collaboration
It’s tempting to ask AI to create your entire outline (losing your unique perspective). Or ignore AI completely (missing valuable insights).
A better approach?
Treat AI as a thoughtful discussion partner.
Our senior editor, Chris Shirlow, emphasizes using AI strategically during outlining:
“I use my own competitor analysis to create outlines first. Then, I’ll use AI to spot potential gaps. For example, when outlining an email marketing guide, AI might suggest adding a section on automation that I hadn’t considered”.
The key is to start with your own research. This ensures the foundation reflects real expertise. Then, use AI to refine and expand your thinking.
With this article, for example, I started with some loose structural notes:
Demand
Audience
Angle
Structure
Research
Writing
Visuals
Enhancements
Editing
Then, I prompted Claude with some attached reference material.
Hey Claude, I’m writing an article about using how to use AI to write better content. I’ve prepared my brief and a very loose outline. I’ve also attached an article that inspired the idea.
What are your initial impressions of my approach?
Claude’s analysis (I’ve summarized the output):
Strong Points
AI positioning: Framed as a tool (like a carpenter’s drill) rather than a replacement
Timeless focus: Principles over specific AI tools/prompts for longer relevance
Credibility: Using concrete case studies and personal examples
Areas for Development
Structure: Consider combining overlapping principles (e.g., “Audience” and “Research”)
Implementation: Add more specific examples of AI enhancing each practice
Meta-narrative: Strengthen how we’re using AI to write this very article
Balance: Include section on AI limitations for completeness
From the AI’s first output, we started our collaboration.
Claude helped me name each element “practices” instead of “tips.
We challenged each other on the substructure of each practice.
Then it suggested H2s—many of which I didn’t like.
Through a LONG chat and many pauses of me returning to my document, we landed on an outline.
Here’s how the structure evolved through discussion:
Version 1
Version 2
Version 3
Version 4
Version 5
Demand
Deep Research: Moving Beyond Surface-Leval Facts
Talk to Your Customers First
Define Your Audience
Use AI to Define Your Audience
Audience
Audience Understanding: Creating Content That Deeply Resonates
Build Your Audience Map
Find Your Unique Angle
Use AI to Find Your Unique Angle
Angle
Strategic Positioning: Finding Your Unique Angle
Develop Your Unique Angle
Create a Clear Outline
Use AI to Create an Outline
Structure
Narrative Architecture: Building Clear, Compelling Flow
Structure Your Content Flow
Research Your Topic
Use AI to Research Your Topic
Research
Evidence & Examples: Making Ideas Concrete
Show, Don’t Just Tell
Writing Engaging Content
Use AI to Write Engaging Content
Writing
Voice & Style: Crafting a Distinctive Presence
Find Your Brand Voice
Add Valuable Supporting Elements
Use AI to Add Valuable Supporting Elements
Enhancements
Enhancement Elements: Amplifying Impact
Add Powerful Enhancements
Edit for Impact
Use AI to Edit Your Draft
Editing
Refinement & Optimization: Polishing for Performance
Polish Your Final Product
This iterative process helped me:
Make headings more action-oriented
Create a consistent pattern (“Use AI to…”), which also helps for search engine optimization
Let’s look at how AI can help you turn this outline into content through research.
4. Use AI to Research Your Topic
Research has always been the foundation of excellent writing.
Pre-internet, research meant hours in libraries digging through catalogs, journals, and textbooks.
Then, digital changed everything. But it created a new problem:
Information overload.
Now you have instant access to millions of sources.
Blog posts. Academic papers. Community discussions. Expert interviews. Analytics data.
But do you have time to process it all?
That’s where AI shines.
It can scan thousands of sources in seconds, helping you catch insights you might miss.
Let’s explore how to use it effectively.
Using AI for Primary Research
When you do interviews, gather raw data, or run surveys, you create unique content that’s hard to copy.
The trick is to use AI throughout the research process—not just for analysis.
Planning Better Research Questions
The quality of your research depends on asking the right questions.
For example, when writing this article, I initially planned to use only my own AI experiences as examples. But something felt missing.
So, I started a discussion with Claude:
Me: I’m finding limitations in my thinking. I could add more perspectives by surveying our editorial team about how they use AI.
AI: This could significantly strengthen the article. Multiple writers demonstrating how they tackle AI challenges would make your points more powerful than theory alone.
Consider:
What specific insights you need
The most efficient way to gather them
How to make participation easy
With Claude’s validation, I developed survey questions through an iterative process.
If you want to try this approach, here’s a template to get started:
Before we design specific questions, please evaluate this research approach:
Target: [describe who you’ll survey/interview]
Goal: [what you need to learn]
Method: [how you plan to gather data]
Timeline: [your constraints]
Identify any:
Potential issues
Missing opportunities
Ways to improve efficiency
Then, the research questions:
Help me create [survey/interview] questions about topic.
Consider:
Audience: [describe participants]
Time constraints: [expected time commitment]
Key objectives: [list 2-3 main goals]
Required output: [what you need to create]
Structure questions to be:
Focused yet open-ended
Easy to answer quickly
Specific about examples needed
Finally, test your questions:
Here are my draft questions. Please analyze them for:
Clarity and potential confusion
Leading or biased language
Gaps in coverage
Logical flow
Example:
After several rounds with AI, my original idea of “let’s survey the team” changed to:
A focused survey using conditional logic
Clear examples of what I needed
A friendly, collaborative introduction
Specific prompts for AI usage
The result? Rich insights from the team that enhanced this article.
Getting More from Expert Interviews
Want to fully engage with your interview subjects while capturing all the details? AI can help.
Start by recording your conversations (with permission, of course). Have a real dialogue. Follow interesting threads. Then, let AI help you extract every valuable insight.
Here are some simple prompts:
Prepare your interview.
Please help me prepare for an expert interview about topic.
Review this background material and suggest:
Key discussion areas to cover
Follow-up questions for each area
Potential examples to request
Data points to validate
Process the recording.
I’ve shared a transcript of my expert interview about topic. Please:
Create a structured summary of key points
Extract specific examples and case studies
Identify unique insights or perspectives
Pull compelling quotes
Note areas needing clarification or follow-up
Validate insights.
Here are my key takeaways from the interview. Please:
Check if conclusions are supported by the transcript
Identify any assumptions I’m making
Suggest additional context needed
Note alternative interpretations
Making Sense of Raw Data
The challenge of research isn’t gathering data—it’s finding the story in it.
When our editorial team finished the AI usage survey, I faced this exact situation.
I wanted to process the responses quickly, but also to capture every valuable insight.
Here’s how AI helped me analyze the responses:
Get a high-level overview.
I’ve shared our team’s survey responses about AI usage. Please:
Identify common patterns across responses
Note unique or unexpected approaches
Highlight particularly detailed examples
Suggest potential themes to explore
Drill down to the specifics.
For the [specific practice], please analyze:
Different approaches team members use
Most successful use cases
Common challenges or limitations
Specific tools or prompts mentioned
Notable workflow differences
Extract supporting material.
From these responses about topic, please:
Find compelling quotes that illustrate key points
Identify concrete examples with clear outcomes
Note any interesting AI prompts shared
Suggest potential visuals or diagrams
This analysis revealed that our team uses AI differently for each practice. Some excel at research, others at editing.
For instance, everyone stressed the need to use AI carefully. And not fully depend on it.
Pro tip: Before using AI to analyze data, clearly define what “valuable insights” means for your project. This helps AI focus on what matters most.
Using AI for Secondary Research
Secondary research meant spending hours reading papers, reports, and discussions.
Not anymore.
AI reshapes how we process existing content.
Let’s look at some use cases.
Extracting Audio and Video Content for Gems
Some of the best insights are buried in hour-long podcasts and conference talks.
Founders share behind-the-scenes stories. Experts reveal their frameworks. And industry veterans discuss trends they haven’t written about yet.
But watching hours of video isn’t always practical.
AI can save time here.
Here’s how I used AI to extract powerful insights from founder interviews for my ecommerce growth strategies article:
First, I found a podcast where Who Is Elijah’s founders shared their journey to $20M in revenue.
Then, I used Rev AI to transcribe the full interview.
Instead of reading through 19,000 words of transcript, I had Claude analyze the conversation with this prompt:
I’m writing about ecommerce growth strategies. Please analyze this founder interview and:
Identify key decisions that drove growth
Extract specific metrics and results
Find unique insights about their process
Pull compelling quotes to support each point
The analysis revealed a fascinating story about operational efficiency:
They cut their team from 44 to 21 people
Shifted from full-time specialists to agency partnerships
Rebuilt their systems from scratch
Turned unprofitable (-60%) campaigns into winners
This single podcast gave me both a compelling case study and practical lessons readers could apply.
Synthesizing Complex Documents
Academic papers and industry reports contain valuable data. But they’re often dense, jargony, and hard to apply practically.
Shreelekha Singh, our senior writer, uses detailed context to get better research results from AI.
“When writing about AI in healthcare, I always share my article’s specific objectives and approach with Perplexity.
I’ll outline that I need evidence-based analysis focused on measurable outcomes. Not just predictions.
This detailed context helps AI find more relevant research papers and case studies.”
Another example:
When writing an article about information gain, I needed to wrap my head around Google’s patent application.
But it’s written in technical language that would make your eyes glaze over.
Instead of getting overwhelmed, I used AI to help me interpret this complex material.
I uploaded the patent application to Claude and asked about information gain signals.
Claude helped identify and explain relevant metrics like “UserActionSignals” and “ClickSatisfaction” in plain language.
I quickly learned Google’s process for evaluating and testing new information.
The same approach works for:
Academic papers and studies
Technical documentation
Industry reports
Legal documents
Research data
The takeaway?
Think of AI as your study partner. One that can read a 100-page document in seconds and explain the key points in plain English.
5. Use AI to Write Engaging Content
LLMs generate pretty good output with minimal prompting.
But producing engaging writing in your authentic voice? That’s where AI can be rather underwhelming.
I’ve been trying to write with AI since 2021, and I’m convinced the models have a default writing style.
AI LOVES writing in contrasting pairs: “Not this. But that.”
It also enjoys phrases like “transform,” “game-changing,” “leverage,” and “optimize.” (Not that there’s anything wrong with these words.)
And if AI could write your entire project in a list, it would.
If you’re often dissatisfied with the output, let me show you how to get better results.
Create Excellent Reference Materials
The more specific context you can give AI, the better the output matches your style.
This means defining your writing style clearly.
How?
Create detailed guidelines, including:
Reader personas
Target grade level
Headline formulas
Tonality
Examples
Opening hooks
In addition to your guidelines, make it your mission to create the perfect article or chapter to use as a writing sample.
Once you have your guidelines and examples, you’ll be more satisfied with the AI output.
For example, I’ve created a dedicated project in Claude for Backlinko. It has over 20k words of reference materials.
Every time I start a new conversation, Claude has this context readily available.
There’s no need to explain our style requirements over and over.
Tip: If your AI tool doesn’t have a project feature, you can save your resources in a folder on your computer. Then, you can use them in your chats.
Build Progressive Context
Your conversation with AI should evolve as your content develops.
Take this article section as an example. I started a dedicated chat on “Using AI for Writing.” I shared:
The outline
The article draft so far
Team survey responses
My goals for this section
When I write the next section about supporting elements, I’ll start a new chat. But I’ll include this completed section as reference material.
This progressive approach helps AI maintain consistency while adapting to each section’s unique needs.
Shreelekha uses a similar method.
“I create different projects for different aspects of my writing. This helps me maintain focus and ensures AI has exactly the context needed for each task”.
Depending on your LLM, this sectional approach will help manage your daily credits as long chats burn through your usage.
Pro tip: Write the first 10% of your project from scratch. This will set the tone for your piece and give AI a clear direction for better outputs.
Embrace Messy Collaboration with AI
The best AI writing output happens through conversation.
Share your half-formed ideas. Question its suggestions. Challenge it to think deeper.
For instance, when writing this section, I asked AI to expand on my outline. But I didn’t just accept the first response.
Instead of settling for general advice about “prompting for a specific tone,” I asked for concrete examples of how AI’s default writing differs from Backlinko’s style.
This led to identifying specific phrases and patterns.
For instance, here’s how my opening hook evolved through AI collaboration:
You might go sentence for sentence, idea for idea, until you strike gold.
It can be tedious, but it’s better than doing it alone.
Find Perfect Examples (When You Need Them)
LLMs excel at suggesting relevant examples and case studies to strengthen your writing.
Shreelekha uses AI to brainstorm examples when she’s stuck:
“I describe the concept I’m trying to illustrate and the type of example I need. AI often suggests angles I hadn’t considered, which I can then research further.
Here’s my go-to prompt template:
“I’m explaining [concept]. I need an example that shows [specific aspect]. Ideally from [industry/type of company]. The example should demonstrate [desired outcome].”
For instance, while writing about data visualization, I needed examples of companies using charts effectively in their content. I gave AI these parameters, and it suggested looking at HubSpot’s State of Marketing report—which perfectly illustrated my point about making complex data accessible.
But don’t just take AI’s suggestions at face value. Use them as starting points for deeper investigation. When AI suggests an example, I:
Verify the details independently
Look for additional context
Consider alternative examples
Evaluate if it truly serves my argument
Chris Shirlow emphasizes this balanced approach:
“The key is to start with your own ideas and research. Then use AI to expand those concepts and find fresh angles. Never let AI drive the direction of your content.”
6. Use AI to Create Content Assets
Content assets like checklists, calculators, and infographics turn your writing into practical tools for readers.
The right asset can clarify complex concepts, aid learning, or guide important decisions.
Creating these resources once required designers and developers.
AI makes it possible to create without these skills.
Create Visual Assets
Many readers don’t consume every word you write.
They scan. They skim. They look for visual anchors to guide them through your ideas.
A study by MIT found that the human brain can process images in as little as 13 milliseconds. That’s up to 600 times faster than text.
But creating professional graphics used to mean:
Learning design software
Understanding design principles
Spending hours on each visual
Hiring expensive designers
Not anymore.
AI can help you create compelling visuals in seconds.
For example, in our 4 P’s of Marketing article, our senior writer, Yongi Barnard, used a graphic to explain why personalization matters.
The visual tells a compelling story at a glance.
To recreate this, gather your data.
Then, give AI parameters:
Please help me design a graphic showing these three personalization statistics:
80% of consumers are more likely to purchase if brands offer personalized experiences
48.2% of marketers say personalization improves click-through rates the most
66% of customers expect companies to understand their personal needs
Use:
A clean, minimal design
Progress circles to represent percentages
Dark background with light text for contrast
Short, clear descriptions under each statistic
Space for source attribution
Then, you just need to refine the finishing touches (colors, spacing, etc.).
Pro tip: Don’t just think about data visualization. Use AI to create:
Process diagrams
Comparison charts
Timeline graphics
Concept illustrations
Feature breakdowns
Our senior editor, Chris Hanna, puts it well:
“The best writers think like producers now. They ask themselves: how can I make this concept visual? How can I show instead of tell?
AI makes that possible without becoming a design expert”.
Create Smart Checklists
Converting processes into checklists makes your content more actionable.
But creating an effective checklist isn’t as simple as writing bullet points. You need to:
Break down complex processes
Put steps in the optimal order
Include validation checks
Add resource links
Consider different user scenarios
This is where AI can help.
The key is to prompt AI after you’ve written your draft.
This way, the LLM will have full context for your content and can create more detailed, relevant checklists.
For example, our senior editor, Shannon Willoby, made a 12-month checklist to help with her article on starting a blog.
She prompted AI to create the checklist based on her article content. Pretty simple but effective.
Here’s a template to get started:
I’ve written an article about topic. Please create a comprehensive checklist that:
Breaks down each major step
Includes key decision points
Notes important resources needed
Flags common pitfalls to avoid
Suggests ways to validate progress
Build Interactive Tools
Interactive tools like calculators, analyzers, and decision trees turn your knowledge into useful solutions. Readers can use these tools right away.
There are many opportunities, regardless of your industry:
Say you write about productivity. You could create a workload capacity analyzer that helps readers balance their projects.
If you’re a wellness writer, you might develop a habit-stacking planner to help people create healthy routines.
Or, if you’re a gardening expert, you could create a seasonal planting calculator.
For my ecommerce growth strategies article, I used AI to build an interactive profitability calculator.
Instead of explaining formulas, readers can explore different scenarios to understand how variables like cost of goods sold (COGS), shipping, and marketing expenses impact their bottom line.
The best part?
You can bring these AI-designed tools to life using no-code platforms like Calculator Studio. Here’s how:
Identify calculation needs in your content
Ask AI to help structure the logic and formulas
Design the user interface (AI can mock this up)
Build it in your no-code tool of choice
For instance, when building the profitability calculator, I prompted AI with:
I need a calculator that helps ecommerce owners estimate profitability. It should:
Include key metrics like COGS, shipping, and marketing costs
Calculate gross and net margins
Show breakeven analysis
Start simple.
A basic calculator that solves one specific problem well is better than a complex tool that confuses users.
7. Use AI to Edit Your Draft
Editing is the difference between good content and exceptional content.
But getting quality edits can be expensive and slow. You either:
Pay editors by the hour
Lose billable time as a freelancer
Wait through lengthy review cycles
Miss issues when editing your own work
AI changes this dynamic.
You can get quick, unbiased feedback and try different versions before your editor reviews a draft.
Let me show you how to do this effectively.
Get Strategic Input First
It’s tempting to jump right into line editing—fixing grammar and polishing sentences.
But start with the big picture.
Here’s how Chris Hanna uses AI for strategic editing:
“I feed the draft, outline, and brief to Claude. Then I ask: What’s missing? Where could we strengthen the argument? Which sections need more evidence?”
AI can help by:
Comparing your piece against successful examples
Identifying patterns and gaps
Suggesting structural improvements
This approach saves revision time. Why polish paragraphs you might cut or rewrite anyway?
Create Quick Quality Checks
Once you have your structure solid, create systematic quality checks.
You want to verify your content hits key engagement metrics.
At Backlinko, we track three readability metrics:
Single-Sentence Paragraph Percentage: The ratio of paragraphs with just one sentence.
Visual Break Density: Number of visual elements per 1,000 words. Higher density means better scannability.
Grade Level: We target Grade 7 or below for accessibility.
AI can calculate these instantly and suggest specific fixes. Here’s how:
Share your metrics targets with AI
Paste in a section of your content
Ask for both analysis and specific fixes
Beyond metrics, use AI to check for:
Redundant ideas and phrases
Passive voice overuse
Transition effectiveness
Brand voice consistency
Technical accuracy
Test Critical Elements
Some parts of your content matter more than others.
Your headline determines whether people click.
Your introduction decides if they stay.
Your calls-to-action influence if they convert.
These elements deserve extra attention.
Using headlines as an example, I note 3-5 potential titles.
I Google the topic I’m writing about and screenshot the search results.
I upload the screenshot to Claude. Then, I ask how my title ideas compare to the top articles.
Claude will make suggestions based on our title guidance, best practices, and differentiators.
Yongi uses a similar process for introductions:
“I write three different openings and ask AI which one creates the strongest hook. Then we discuss why—looking at elements like curiosity, relevance, and emotional pull”.
You can also test:
Section transitions
Examples
Proof point placement
Technical explanations
Closing arguments
Balance AI and Human Editing
AI accelerates the editing process, but human judgment remains essential.
Here’s how to make this work:
Start with AI for broad analysis and quick fixes
Apply your judgment to AI’s suggestions
Test variations of important elements
Verify technical accuracy independently
Maintain your unique voice and perspective
Chris Shirlow supports this balance:
“AI helps us identify potential issues faster. But we still need human expertise to decide what changes actually serve our readers.”
Start Writing Smarter, Not Harder
Pick one project you need to write this week.
Apply just one of these practices—maybe getting AI’s help with audience research or outlining.
That’s all you need to do to start seeing results.
http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png00http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png2025-03-26 17:11:162025-03-26 17:11:16How to Use AI for Writing Exceptional Content (7 Best Practices)
The more advertisers who bid on a keyword, the higher the cost.
For example, check out how the average CPC varies by industry:
Industry
Average CPC
Legal
$5.00
Insurance
$19.45
Online education
$9.10
Marketing
$4.28
Home services
$6.23
Auto
$1.83
Healthcare
$7.09
Travel
$0.96
Hospitality
$5.30
Retail
$3.63
Real estate
$0.96
Finance
$3.50
Sports
$3.48
Fitness
$2.20
Semrush’s Keyword Overview and Keyword Magic Tool provide a “Competitive Density” score.
Rated on a scale of zero (easiest) to 1.00 (hardest), it tells you how competitive a keyword will be in your PPC campaign.
A high Competitive Density score (.80 and up) means tougher competition in search results.
But don’t ignore these keywords.
High competition often signals strong conversion potential.
Never base decisions on low CPC alone.
The math is simple: If a $5 keyword converts much better than a $1 keyword, it’s worth the cost.
Ad Network Selection
Where you choose to run your ads can impact your costs:
Google Search Network: Your ads appear on Google search results pages and properties like Google Maps and Shopping. Search Network typically delivers higher-intent traffic but at higher costs since users are actively searching for specific terms.
Google Display Network: Your ads show on Google sites like YouTube, Blogger, and Gmail, as well as partner websites. Display Network usually offers lower costs per click but may bring less immediate purchase intent since users aren’t actively searching.
Seasonality
Keyword costs fluctuate throughout the year.
For example, “Christmas gifts” will cost more in December.
“Tax preparation” will spike in March and April. And “Swimwear” peaks during summer months.
It helps to adjust your budget for these seasonal shifts.
Manual bidding: You set the maximum amount you’re willing to pay for each click. This gives you complete control but requires more hands-on management.
Automated bidding: Google’s AI adjusts your bids in real time to help you meet specific goals (like maximizing clicks or conversions). This can be more efficient but may initially result in higher costs while the system learns your patterns.
Pro tip: New to Google Ads? Start with manual bidding to maintain stricter cost control, then experiment with automation as you gather more performance data.
How to Find Keyword Cost
With the right tools, you can learn keyword costs before launching a pay-per-click (PPC) campaign.
So, you can prioritize terms that deliver maximum ROI for minimum spend.
Google Keyword Planner
Why not go right to the source to learn CPC costs?
Google Keyword Planner shows estimated bid ranges that give you an idea of the high and low you’ll pay.
Plus, these estimates come straight from Google’s own data — making them a reliable starting point for budget planning.
Here’s how to use Google Keyword Planner to research keyword prices:
After signing into your account, click “Tools” in the navigation.
Then, select “Keyword Planner” from the dropdown.
You’ll see two options.
If you already have specific keywords in mind, choose “Get search volume and forecasts.”
Starting from scratch? Select “Discover new keywords.”
For this example, let’s go with “Get search volume and forecasts.”
Enter your keywords manually or click “Upload a file.”
Then, click “Get started.”
Review the “Top of page bid (low range)” and “Top of page bid (high range)” columns.
These show the estimated historical CPC ranges for your keywords.
For example, “garden decor” has a low of $0.33 and a high of $1.49.
So, advertisers with a great Quality Score might pay $0.33 per click.
But those with average or below-average Quality Scores could pay up to $1.49.
Keep in mind that these ranges are influenced by:
Your geographic location
Your Search Network settings
Seasonal competition fluctuations
Industry trends
The actual cost you’ll pay can fall anywhere within this range — or occasionally outside it during periods of intense competition.
Now, let’s look at another method to find keyword pricing.
The tool will return a list of keyword suggestions.
View the “CPC” column to learn the estimated cost for each term.
On a limited budget?
Add a filter to find keywords within your price range:
Click the “CPC” filter
Enter your desired range
Click “Apply“
Now, you’ll only see keywords that fit your budget.
Pro tip: The Keyword Magic Tool is best for researching keywords. Already have a list? Use Keyword Overview instead. This allows you to enter up to 100 keywords at once to see the average CPC, search volume, difficulty, and more for each term.
7 Steps to Selecting High-Converting PPC Keywords
Knowing what keywords cost is just the starting point.
The real magic happens when you identify terms that fit your budget and drive sales.
Note: A free Semrush account gives you up to 10 credits in the Advertising Research tool per day. Or you can use this link to access a 14-day trial on a Semrush Pro subscription.
Enter a competitor’s domain into the tool.
Click “Search.”
Now, you’ll see an overview of your competitor’s paid search performance.
Including the total number of keywords and traffic from paid campaigns.
Even better?
You’ll also learn how much it costs them to rank for these terms in Google Ads.
Scroll to the “Paid Search Positions” report for a peek at their top-performing keywords.
Including CPC, search volume, and position data for each one.
Note which keywords have high traffic but reasonable costs.
Then, add the promising keywords to your list.
Next, click the “Competitors” tab to learn who your competitor’s top paid rivals are.
(Hint: They may be your rivals, too.)
Click on any competitor’s URL and follow the same steps as above to assess their highest-performing keywords.
Finally, click the “Ads Copies” tab.
This reveals your competitor’s actual ad copy—giving you an inside look at exactly what messaging is attracting clicks and conversions in your industry.
Study the language, offers, and unique selling points they use.
Then, create your own ads that address the same pain points but with stronger, more compelling copy.
Pro tip: Writer’s block killing your ad copy? Let AI handle the first draft. Tools like AdCreative.ai instantly generate ad copy variations in seconds—all you have to do is edit and refine.
2. Identify Long-Tail Keywords
Long-tail keywords are highly specific phrases that match exactly what your customer is searching for.
Think “women’s long sleeve vintage graphic tshirts” instead of just “shirts.”
The benefits are too good to ignore:
Lower competition (and lower costs)
Higher conversion rates
More qualified traffic
Let’s see this in action.
“Shirts” has the highest Competitive Density score possible (1.00) and a CPC of $2.38.
But “fall shirts for women” has a much lower CPC ($0.49).
And a Competitive Density (.80) that is reduced enough to help you on the SERPs.
But high enough to signal transactional interest.
Sure, this keyword gets significantly fewer searches.
But those searches come from people who know exactly what they want.
And those are the clicks that convert into customers.
Ready to find long-tail keywords?
Here’s how:
Head back to the Keyword Magic Tool and enter a term like “women’s shirts.”
Select the “KD %” filter on the menu. In the “Custom Range” field, enter “0” to “29.”
This will limit your results to keywords with “Very easy” or “Easy” difficulty—prime territory for conversion-friendly, long-tail terms.
Scroll through the results to find long-tail keywords for your ad campaign.
Like “women’s button down tshirt” and “usa women’s soccer shirt.”
3. Confirm Your Keywords Are Relevant to What You Sell
Don’t get so caught up in metrics that you forget the basics.
Every keyword in your campaign should directly connect to your products or services.
For example, if you sell premium handmade leather wallets, targeting “cheap wallets” might bring traffic but not conversions.
Your ideal customers are searching for quality, not bargains.
This is why you’ll want to pay special attention to keyword match types in Google Ads:
Broad match: Triggers your ad for related searches, variations, and synonyms (lowest relevance, highest reach)
Phrase match: Triggers your ad when the search includes your keyword phrase (medium relevance)
Exact match: Triggers your ad only for searches very close to your exact keyword (highest relevance, lowest reach)
Start with exact and phrase match to ensure relevance and prevent wasted spend.
As you gather data on what works for your industry and budget, you can carefully expand to broader terms.
Pro tip: Have a “Below Average” ad relevance score? Group your keywords into tight themes, like “engagement rings” and “wedding bands,” instead of cramming diverse terms into one ad group. This simple reorganization can dramatically improve your Quality Score.
4. Target Purchase Intent Keywords
Every keyword reveals something about what the searcher wants.
Some people are researching. Others are ready to buy.
Purchase intent keywords signal that someone is in buying mode — not just browsing or learning.
As PPC expert Andrew Peluso says:
The best tip I can give for selecting the ideal keywords is to only target keywords with high purchase intent, meaning only advertise against keywords where the user is in a buying mode. If you spend money targeting keywords where the user is just looking for information, then that’s likely not a great use of your budget.
When it comes to paid advertising, focus on:
Commercial intent: Users are comparing options before buying (“best CRM software”)
Transactional intent: Users are ready to make a purchase (“buy Salesforce subscription”)
5. Focus on Cost per Conversion, Not Just Cost per Click
Keywords with low CPCs might seem attractive, but they’re worthless if they don’t convert.
Set up proper tracking to identify which keywords actually deliver customers, not just traffic.
Andrew explains:
To keep keyword costs under control, make sure you have really accurate attribution in place so you know what your cost per conversion is. Without this data being accurate, your cost-per-click number in isolation is almost useless.
You need to have a goal in mind for your cost per conversion. Regardless of what your cost-per-click is, make sure you’re happy with how much the conversion costs you.
What does this mean for your campaigns?
Set up proper conversion tracking in Google Ads
Monitor which keywords drive sales, not just clicks
Be willing to pay more for keywords with higher conversion rates
Pro tip: To boost CTR without sacrificing conversions, test different value propositions in your ads. A “free shipping” message might get more clicks, but “handcrafted quality” might attract buyers who convert.
6. Build a Negative Keyword List to Reduce Ad Waste
Negative keywords prevent your ads from appearing for search terms that might seem relevant but attract the wrong audience.
Here’s how to implement this strategy:
Pull your Google Ads search terms report for the last 90 days
Look for terms that drive costs but few conversions — these are your negative keywords
Build a comprehensive negative keyword list. This way, your ads no longer show for underperforming keywords to prevent ad waste.
7. Test Different Keywords to See What Performs Best
Keyword selection isn’t a set-it-and-forget-it task.
It’s an ongoing experiment that gets better with time.
Follow these best practices for testing keywords in your ad campaigns:
Review performance weekly, looking beyond clicks to focus on conversions
Gradually shift budget from underperformers to high-converting terms
Add new keyword variations based on what’s already working
Look for seasonal patterns that affect performance
As you gather data, your campaigns will become more efficient, driving down costs while improving results.
How to Optimize Your Quality Score and Lower Keyword Costs
Even the best keyword strategy falls flat without a strong Quality Score.
Instead of just bidding higher, focus on these three critical components that Google rewards with lower costs and better positions.
Ad Relevance: Match User Intent
We touched on this above, but it’s worth repeating:
One of the best ways to gauge intent is by analyzing the Google SERP. What Google ranks organically gives strong clues. Are users looking for information, or are they in buying mode? Your ad should reflect that intent.
For example, if someone searches “best running shoes for flat feet,” they’re in research mode.
Your ad should highlight expert reviews or comparison features.
But for “buy nike running shoes,” they’re ready to purchase.
Your ad should emphasize pricing, fast shipping, or size availability.
Expected CTR: Create Compelling Ads
Expected CTR measures how likely users are to click your ad when it appears.
To improve expected CTR:
Include the keyword in your headline
Use action-oriented language (“Get,” “Try,” “Start”)
Your landing page must fulfill what your ad promised.
To create a high-scoring landing page:
Match headline language from your ad to your landing page headline
Place your primary keyword in the H1, first paragraph, and at least one subheading
Keep loading time under three seconds (compress images and minimize redirects)
Add testimonials or reviews to build credibility
Include a single CTA that matches your ad’s offer
For landing page experience, the key is continuity. The landing page should match both the ad and the intent behind the keyword. If users click your ad expecting one thing and land on a page that doesn’t deliver, your score will take a hit.
For instance, if your ad promotes “home garden design ideas,” your landing page should feature garden inspiration prominently—not a general plant catalog or seed shop.
The key takeaway? Everything must work together:
Everything needs to flow seamlessly—keyword intent, ad messaging, and landing page content. When these elements are aligned, your Quality Score improves.
Ready to Find Keywords That Get Clicks and Conversions?
Optimizing your ad keyword strategy can help you pay less for better results.
(And outperform the competition while you’re at it.)
Remember these principles:
Quality is key: Improve your Quality Score to reduce costs
Get specific: Long-tail keywords often deliver better ROI than broad terms
Follow the data: Let performance metrics guide your strategy
Test continuously: What works today might not work tomorrow
Finding high-performing keywords starts with having the right tools.
Check out our comprehensive guide to the best keyword research tools. Including features and pricing comparisons to help you choose.
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A new profile of Elizabeth Reid, the head of Google Search, confirms that Google is moving away from its longstanding model of sending its users to websites. As one former unnamed senior executive put it: “Giving traffic to publisher sites is kind of a necessary evil.”
As for the iconic Google Search bar? It will slowly lose prominence in the Google Search experience, due to the continuing growth of voice and visual search, Reid said.
Necessary evil. Google has been increasingly focused on keeping users inside Google properties, reducing the need to click through to external sites. A former Google senior executive told Bloomberg that supporting publishers was incidental to Google’s larger aims:
“Giving traffic to publisher sites is kind of a necessary evil. The main thing they’re trying to do is get people to consume Google services.”
“So there’s a natural tendency to want to have people stay on Google pages, but it does diminish the sort of deal between the publishers and Google itself.”
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said in December Google spends a lot of time “thinking about the traffic we send to the ecosystem.” But, of late, he has stopped short of promising that Google will send more of it to websites – and there’s probably good reason for that.
Instead, Pichai now mentions how AI Overviews are increasing search usage. (Even though, I thought the whole point of AI Overviews was to reduce the number of searches – remember the idea of “let Google do the searching for you” to get “quick answers”?)
Google Search hovering. The Google Search bar won’t go away, according to Reid. However, it will become less prominent over time as Google prepares for the rise of voice and visual searches. Here’s the full section from the Bloomberg article (Google Is Searching for an Answer to ChatGPT):
“Reid predicts that the traditional Google search bar will become less prominent over time. Voice queries will continue to rise, she says, and Google is planning for expanded use of visual search, too. Rajan Patel, a vice president for search experience, demonstrated how parents can use Google’s visual search tools to help their kids with homework, or to surreptitiously take a photo of a stylish stranger’s sneakers in a coffee shop to buy the same pair (something Patel did recently). The search bar isn’t going away anytime soon, Reid says, but the company is moving toward a future in which Google is always hovering in the background. ‘The world will just expand,’ she says. ‘It’s as if you can ask Google as easily as you could ask a friend, only the friend is all-knowing, right?’”
Other Reid quotes of note. For what is being considered a “profile” of Reid, the article didn’t contain many direct quotes. Here are the few interesting quotes from the piece:
“We learned what people really wanted two months faster” (on launching early features in her Google Maps days).
“[Search is a] constant evolution [rather than a complete overhaul].”
“Things start slowly and then quickly. Suddenly the combination of the tech and the product and the use and the understanding and the polish and everything comes together, and then everyone needs it.”
“It’s really exciting to work on search at a time when you think the tech can genuinely change what people can search for.”
And one indirect quote, where Bloomberg summarizes her thoughts on AI:
“Google’s generative AI products still carry disclaimers that the technology is experimental. Testing tools in public helps them get better, Reid says. She’s convinced that, as with other changes to search, AI will get people to use Google even more than they did before.”
Why we care. Many websites started to lose traffic when Google launched AI Overviews last May and as AI Overviews expanded. Google was a fairly reliable source of organic search traffic for over two decades – but the rules are changing. No, SEO isn’t dead. But old SEO strategies and tactics will need to evolve and playbooks will need to be rewritten.
The internet is full of recycled lists claiming to reveal the “most profitable blog niche ideas.”
But most lack any actual data to back up their recommendations.
That’s why we decided to do something different.
We analyzed 100 blog niches using a comprehensive methodology to identify the top 25 opportunities based on cold, hard numbers.
This included:
Search volume data
Keyword difficulty scores
Average cost per click (CPC)
Search intent
Short- and long-term growth trends
For each winning niche, we created a detailed scorecard that ranks its performance across three critical dimensions:
Growth, monetization, and ranking potential.
These metrics are presented on a five-point scale to help you quickly assess each niche’s strengths and challenges.
Whether you’re launching your first blog or your fifth, these insights will help you make smarter decisions about where to invest your time and energy.
Each niche received a total score based on these weighted metrics, allowing us to identify the top 25 blog niche ideas.
Now that you see how we evaluated these niches, let’s find the right one for YOU with our Three Ps framework.
How to Choose and Validate Your Blog Niche
Want to know the secret to long-term blogging success?
It all comes down to the three Ps: Passion, Potential, and Profitability.
The most successful blogs hit this trifecta.
They’re built around topics you genuinely care about, have substantial audience interest, and offer clear paths to revenue.
Here’s how to find your perfect match.
Step 1: Consider Your Passions
Passion for your blog niche isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s a competitive advantage.
Why does this first “P” matter so much?
When you genuinely care about your topic, you’ll:
Stick with it when growth is slow (and trust me, every blogger faces plateaus)
Develop deeper insights that casual researchers miss
Create high-quality content that naturally displays E-E-A-T (expertise, experience, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness) signals that Google rewards
Create authentic content that resonates with fellow enthusiasts
Think about what topics you find yourself researching for fun, discussing with friends, or already have experience with.
These are your passion indicators.
Pro tip: You’ll be creating hundreds—if not thousands—of articles on this topic. Make sure it’s something that won’t feel like a chore six months from now.
Step 2: Research the Niche’s Long-Term Potential
Found a topic you love? Great.
Now let’s evaluate the second “P”—Potential—to make sure this niche has staying power.
First, verify there’s an actual audience for your niche.
Here’s how:
Visit online communities where your potential readers hang out:
Facebook Groups: Check member count and weekly post volume
Quora: Analyze question frequency and follower counts
Reddit: Look for subreddits with at least 10,000 members
For example, when I searched “gardening” on Reddit, I found this active subreddit with 7.8 million members.
Pay attention to:
Common questions people ask
Problems they’re trying to solve
Language they use to describe their challenges
Products or solutions they’re already using
Now, let’s look at whether your niche is growing or declining.
For example, “garden design” gets 6.6K searches per month in the United States.
While not as high as some, niching down from the broad category of “gardening” has clear benefits.
This includes much lower difficulty (65% vs. 90%).
Next, look at the “CPC” report.
(The higher the CPC, the more advertisers are willing to pay for clicks, signaling stronger monetization opportunities.)
“Garden design” has a CPC of $1.78, which shows monetization potential.
Pro tip: What’s a “good” CPC? After analyzing CPC data across 100 blog niches, I found the average was $2.09. While this benchmark is useful, don’t chase high CPCs alone—weigh them against competition levels and search volume to find your ideal niche.
With the three Ps as your guide, you can confidently identify a blog niche that’s personally fulfilling and financially rewarding.
Now, let’s explore the top 25 blog niche ideas for 2025.
1. Artificial Intelligence (AI)
In a surprise to no one, “AI” is the #1 blog niche for 2025.
Despite the relatively modest $1.24 CPC, the off-the-charts search volume (1M) makes this an incredibly lucrative opportunity.
But you’ll need to bring your A-game.
This means expert content that demonstrates a deep understanding of the topic.
This is true whether you focus on breaking artificial intelligence news and trends before others do.
Or providing in-depth tutorials and tool reviews to help the everyday person understand and use AI.
Or you could niche down further.
Like the successful AI blog Machine Learning Mastery.
This blog teaches developers “how to get better results, faster” with practical AI tutorials.
Machine Learning Mastery is a great example of how to monetize in this space.
They use display advertising and sell multiple machine learning ebooks and tutorials.
Monetization paths: AI tool affiliate partnerships, display ads, online courses, consulting services, paid newsletters with industry insights
Success requirements: Tech fluency, talent for simplifying complex topics, constant learning mindset, firsthand experience with emerging tools
With 426% growth over the past decade and a substantial 165,000 monthly searches, this space offers clear potential to turn your blog into a reliable revenue stream.
But the competition is no joke.
Even the subniches like SEO and content marketing have 100% keyword difficulty.
To stand out in this highly competitive space, you’ll need to create content competitors can’t easily replicate.
Think case studies, original research, firsthand insights, and expert interviews.
For example, Search Engine Journal (SEJ) has found success in the SEO and search marketing subniches with data-backed content written by industry experts.
While there are many ways to monetize a digital marketing blog, SEJ’s strategy includes syndicated content opportunities and banner ads.
Success requirements: Verifiable security credentials, ability to explain technical concepts clearly, commitment to staying current with evolving threats
4. Meal Prep
Meal prep has seen remarkable growth (457%) over the past decade.
And it has no signs of slowing down.
It’s also slightly more accessible than some top niches, with 75% keyword difficulty.
(Plus, check out that healthy $5.24 CPC).
But what makes this niche particularly attractive is its evergreen appeal.
People will always need convenient, healthy eating solutions that save time and money.
Success here hinges on authenticity.
Thoroughly test your recipes, document each step visually, and provide specific troubleshooting tips from your own kitchen experiences.
Combine high-quality photography with practical, real-world advice that readers can’t find in generic recipe collections.
Note: “Food” is one of the most profitable blog niches, averaging $9,169 per month in revenue, according to a RankIQ study.
For example, Sweet Peas and Saffron, a popular meal prep blog, features step-by-step directions and storage and reheating instructions for each recipe.
They also monetize their blog in a few tasty ways:
Success requirements: Relevant credentials or personal transformation story, ability to cite research accurately, consistent content that builds trust
6. Home Remodeling
Love to DIY home projects?
The home remodeling blog niche offers enticing numbers:
60% keyword difficulty (lower than many of our top niches)
$5.22 CPC
Consistent growth: 41% YoY; 65% 5Y; 39% 10Y
To shine in this niche, demonstrate real expertise, whether you focus on home decor or kitchen redesigns.
Readers want detailed cost breakdowns, material recommendations, and step-by-step instructions that result in successful outcomes.
High-quality before/after photos and video tutorials will separate your blog from competitors.
Young House Love is a prime example of home remodeling niche mastery.
They document real renovation projects with detailed cost breakdowns and process photos that show every step.
They’ve also monetized through multiple book deals.
And have their own lighting line at a major retailer, showing the diverse money-making potential of this niche.
Monetization paths: Tool/material affiliates, online courses/tutorials, digital downloads, sponsored content
Success requirements: Construction/remodeling experience, step-by-step tutorial ability, video production capabilities
Pro tip: Diversify your blog monetization strategy. Multiple income streams not only help you earn more overall, but they also provide crucial protection if one revenue source slows down.
7. Debt Management
Talk about the sleeper hit of blog niches.
Debt management has an eye-popping $15.50 CPC—the highest on our list.
Despite a relatively modest search volume (2,900 monthly searches), this niche presents a golden opportunity for monetization.
Plus, the 63% keyword difficulty makes it more accessible than many top niches.
But here’s the catch:
As a Your Money, Your Life (YMYL) topic, Google holds financial content to much higher standards.
You’ll need to demonstrate legitimate expertise to rank.
Success requires establishing E-E-A-T signals through author credentials (financial certifications help), expert contributions, and comprehensive, accurate advice backed by authoritative sources.
Trust is everything here.
Focus on transparency, avoid get-rich-quick promises, and show readers a clear path to financial improvement.
Personal stories (with receipts) will be a differentiator in this niche.
Note: Finance blogs are popular and profitable. According to RankIQ, bloggers in this niche earn an impressive average of $9,100 per month, making it one of the most lucrative blogging categories.
While there are plenty of smaller blogs in this niche (with low traffic) many of the major players are blogs run by financial institutions.
Like this one:
But with a solid SEO strategy and high-quality content, you’ll have a good shot at breaking through on the SERPs.
Productivity has a surprisingly high CPC of $9.80—the third highest on our list.
Even better?
This blog niche has shown consistent growth across multiple timeframes:
17% YoY
58% over five years
44% over the last decade
Clearly, our collective obsession with doing more in less time isn’t fading.
But at 93% keyword difficulty, you’ll face stiff competition from established productivity giants.
Success here demands more than rehashing the same time management tips everyone’s already heard.
Develop and test original productivity systems, create custom tools your audience can’t find elsewhere, and share firsthand stories of how you maintain productivity.
The Zen Habits blog is a stellar example of this.
Its creator focuses on habit formation from their firsthand experiences.
Like writing a novel, tripling their income, running marathons, and much more.
While the blog’s design is minimal and doesn’t feature display ads, Zen Habits has multiple monetization paths.
This includes books and a paid membership with workshops and video courses.
Success requirements: Personal wellness experience, consistency in practice, ability to balance science with accessibility
16. Career Development
Career development has emerged as a standout niche, with 107% growth over the past five years.
The strong growth and relatively approachable competition (61% keyword difficulty) make it an attractive option, whether you’re a new or seasoned blogger.
Specificity and actionable advice are the keys to success in this niche.
Focus on particular industries, career stages, or workplace challenges where you have firsthand experience.
Document real career transitions, share authentic workplace stories, and create practical resources.
Like resume templates and interview scripts.
For example, The Muse, a well-known career blog, shares advice on everything from skill development to team building.
They also feature company profiles and job listings.
When it comes to monetization, The Muse offers a variety of revenue streams designed to help readers land their dream jobs.
This includes personalized resume reviews and career coaching services.
Monetization paths: Resume services, career coaching, professional course affiliates, job board partnerships
Success requirements: Professional experience, networking abilities, understanding of hiring processes
17. Green Technology
Green technology offers a rare combination: moderate competition (58% keyword difficulty) and solid monetization potential ($5.01 CPC).
But the relatively low search volume (1,900 monthly searches) means success hinges on attracting highly targeted, high-intent website traffic.
To make the most of this niche, focus on content that aligns with user intent.
Readers want the science behind green technology and actionable ways to reduce their carbon footprint in their own homes.
This is why product reviews will be big in this niche.
Stay ahead of emerging trends and policy changes to position your blog as a forward-thinking resource.
For example, CleanTechnica covers energy efficiency, geothermal energy, Tesla products, and more.
They also provide in-depth electric vehicle reviews.
To monetize, CleanTechnica leverages multiple revenue streams, including display ads and an ecommerce store.
So, they can generate income while continuing to champion sustainable tech.
Monetization paths: Eco-friendly product affiliates, sustainable technology reviews, green living courses, consultation services
Success requirements: Environmental knowledge, technical understanding, ability to make complex innovations accessible
Pro tip: Interested in joining an ad network to monetize your blog? Pay special attention to niches with high monthly search volume. You’ll need 50,000 monthly sessions just to qualify for Mediavine, the ad platform used by 40% of bloggers earning $2K+/month (RankIQ).
18. B2C Sales
Business-to-consumer (B2C) sales shows promising growth (+300% over the last 10 years).
But it also has surprisingly low competition at just 32%.
This provides an accessible entry point for bloggers with B2C sales experience.
While the search volume is low (720 monthly searches), the ease of ranking makes this an attractive option.
Share specific sales scripts, customer journey maps, and proven conversion optimization techniques backed by real-world experience.
Consider specializing in particular sales channels (ecommerce, retail, subscription services) or customer segments where you have hands-on experience.
With such minimal competition, you have a genuine opportunity to establish authority relatively quickly compared to more crowded niches.
Now, let’s look at a successful blog in this niche.
Sales Gravy helps sales professionals sharpen their skills, close more deals, and navigate sales slumps with confidence.
To monetize, Sales Gravy offers virtual sales workshops and online courses.
This lets them turn their expertise into valuable training resources for their audience.
Success requirements: Technical knowledge, testing methodology, clear communication of complex features
20. Health
The health niche pulls in a whopping 368,000 monthly searches.
Not to mention that juicy $4.67 CPC.
But don’t start drafting “10 tips for better health” articles just yet.
As a YMYL topic, health content faces Google’s toughest quality filters.
Without medical credentials or expert partnerships, you’ll struggle to gain traction.
Your best bet?
Niche down to specific health conditions where you have firsthand experience or certified knowledge.
And back everything with scientific research and insights from medical professionals.
This is what Healthline, a popular blog in the health niche, does.
Their articles are written by health writers and reviewed by medical professionals, which helps establish trust and credibility.
To monetize, Healthline uses multiple revenue streams that align with its audience’s interests.
This includes advertising, sponsored content, and affiliate links.
Monetization paths: Health product affiliates, wellness programs, supplement partnerships, telehealth referrals, digital downloads/plans
Success requirements: Medical/health credentials, research skills, ability to translate complex information responsibly
21. Books
What this evergreen category lacks in CPC ($0.68), it makes up for in passionate audience engagement.
(Check out that 368,000 monthly search volume).
But you’ll need a distinctive angle that sets you apart from established literary blogs to break into this competitive space.
Consider niching down to underrepresented genres, specialized reading guides for particular audiences, or unique book curation approaches.
Authentic book reviews and recommendations are crucial here. Insightful commentary and humor also work well.
For example, Book Riot stands out in this niche with diverse book coverage, literary-themed product reviews, and multiple themed newsletters.
They’ve also taken a creative approach to monetization with their own book subscription box.
Curated by Book Riot editors, each box delivers hand-selected books tailored to the customer’s preferences.
Monetization paths: Book affiliate programs, product recommendations, subscription book clubs, author partnerships, premium reading guides
Success requirements: Genre expertise, analytical reading skills, consistent content production
22. Cryptocurrency
Thinking about riding the crypto wave?
This niche has skyrocketed with a mind-blowing 700% growth over the past decade.
With 135,000 monthly searches, there’s no shortage of people hungry for crypto content.
Here’s the catch
You’re facing 100% keyword difficulty.
Google won’t let just anyone rank here—this is serious YMYL territory.
Focus on educational content that helps readers understand blockchain fundamentals or risk management strategies.
Share your personal experiences (both wins and losses) to build authenticity.
Success requires genuine expertise through technical accuracy, responsible advice, and transparent disclosure of your own involvement with digital assets.
The CoinDesk blog is a powerhouse in crypto news.
Backed by financial journalists and technical experts, they cover the latest trends, regulations, and market moves.
CoinDesk monetizes its blog with a solid mix of methods:
http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png00http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png2025-03-25 16:04:352025-03-25 16:04:3525 Best Blog Niche Ideas (Data Study)
Do you have a website or are you thinking about creating one? And do you want to attract more people to your business? If the answer is yes, then there’s no doubt about it: SEO should be part of your marketing efforts. It’s a great way to build your brand and get people on your site. But what does it actually entail? In this post, we’ll give you an understanding of what SEO is and how you can get started!
What is SEO?
The acronym SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. Let’s first get a definition from one of our principal SEO experts at Yoast, Alex Moss:
SEO is both the art and science of improving a website, and pages within, to be as visible as possible for when people search for a relevant topic within any search platform. SEO covers many areas from technical aspects including optimizing a site’s performance and structure, to enhancing brand authority by providing great content and matching it with that person’s search intent.
Alex Moss – Principal SEO at Yoast
So how does Google work? With search engines like Google, the process consists of crawling, indexing, and ranking. The crawler is an online bot that scours the web to collect all the pages out there and save them in a gigantic database called the index. This index is constantly updated with new pages or updated versions of existing ones. When someone searches online, the search engine calls on the index and uses complex algorithms to determine which pages are relevant to show. This determines the ranking of results shown to the online searcher.
For example, when I search for the term ‘sustainable phone case’, these results are shown by Google. Based on my search term and the intent behind it, Google deems these results the best ones found in its index.
Screenshot of Google’s results for ‘sustainable phone case’
Organic vs paid search
SEO is focused on attracting more organic traffic to your website, traffic that comes to your site via unpaid search results. But as you can see in the image above, the search results also show ads and sponsored results. Often at the top of the page. To make a clear distinction, there are a few acronyms in use that are valuable to know:
SEM: Search engine marketing entails all marketing efforts to show up in the search results, both through ads and organic results.
SEO: SEO is the practice of improving a website to show up when people search for a relevant topic within any search platform.
SEA: Search engine advertising is the practice of paying for ads that show up in the search results of relevant keywords.
PPC: Pay-per-click. The advertising model used in SEA, where the advertiser pays a fee each time one of their ads is clicked.
These paid results can allow you to show up as the top result for a search term, but it will cost you money every time a user clicks through to your website. When comparing SEO vs PPC, they both have their benefits and drawbacks. But more often than not, they complement each other well.
Why SEO is important for site owners
Huge volume of searches
The reason that so many (big) companies heavily invest in SEO is the high impact that it can have when done right. To give you an idea, Google, the most-used search engine got around 8.3 billion searches per day in 2024. A number that has only gone up (and significantly) since 1998. So if you have a website, you want to make sure to show up in Google and other search platforms.
SEO is intent-driven
Online search is very intent-driven. Unlike other marketing channels, such as social media, where people happen to scroll upon your brand and content. This means you’re interrupting a user’s experience to capture their attention, which makes it more difficult to get them interested. Showing up in their search results aligns with an existing demand—your customers are actively seeking information, products, or solutions. This makes SEO a powerful inbound marketing strategy, where users come to you rather than the other way around. Because searchers already have intent, they are more likely to convert, making SEO an essential tool for attracting high-quality leads.
Competitive advantage
Creating a website and leaving it at that isn’t going to cut it. With new websites popping up left and right, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to get noticed and maintain customer loyalty. SEO can provide you with higher online visibility, a stronger brand, more authority in your field, more contact moments with your audience and higher quality traffic to your website (and/or offline location). All of this, leading to higher brand loyalty and more revenue.
Types of SEO
Although the basic principles remain the same, there are a few different types of SEO worth mentioning. They may not all apply to your situation, but it is beneficial to dive into the ones that do:
Ecommerce SEO: SEO specifically focused on gaining more visibility and organic traffic for online stores. With the goal of acquiring more sales.
Local SEO: Local SEO is the practice of optimizing your website for a specific local area. This is to ensure you are easily found (both online and offline) by a local audience.
Video SEO: The process of optimizing videos and video pages to make them appear in the search results for relevant keyphrases. Whether that is Google’s search results or search results on other platforms like YouTube and social media.
News SEO: Mainly relevant for news publishers, news SEO focuses on getting content to show up as the top result in Google News and other news-specific areas of the search results.
The 3 pillars of SEO
SEO is all about optimizing your website to increase your online visibility. But what do we mean by that? What exactly should you be optimizing? Well, there’s a lot you can do and it can be divided up into three main areas.
The 3 pillars of SEO: Technical SEO, on-page SEO, and off-page SEO.
Technical SEO
First of all, it’s important to focus on the technical part of SEO. Technical SEO is all about improving a website’s technical aspects to improve user experience and make search engines understand your pages. Aspects that fall under technical SEO are:
Loading time of your pages
Making the right parts of your site crawlable for search engines
The amount of dead links on your site
Security
Use of structured data
Search engines value these aspects because they want to present their users with websites that provide a proper user experience. A page that takes forever to load, doesn’t exist anymore, or isn’t secure, provides a terrible user experience and will not make users happy. Also, aspects such as crawlability and structured data help search engines understand what your pages are about. This helps search engines understand your relevance and allows them to rank your pages higher.
On-page SEO
Although technical SEO is also part of on-page SEO, this can be seen as ‘under-the-hood’ optimization to improve your pages. The other efforts that can be categorized as on-page SEO are targeted at optimizing the content on a page. Think of:
The quality of your content
Use of the proper keywords
Showing E-E-A-T in your content
Site structure
Internal linking
Well-thought-out URLs, titles, and alt tags
On-page SEO mainly revolves around content SEO and using the elements around that content to improve your findability for relevant terms.
Off-page SEO
In contrast to on-page SEO, off-page SEO entails everything you do for SEO outside of page optimization. Such as external link building, social media and local SEO (off-site). This is focused on growing your reach and building your brand to attract more traffic. An important part is link building, getting other relevant websites to link to your content. This can really help boost your visibility and improve your reputation as an authority – see links as like votes of confidence from other websites
But there’s a lot more you can do. For example, speaking at events, doing interviews, and blogging for other websites. These activities give you the opportunity to showcase your expertise and reach new people. When you own a local shop, these might not be as relevant. In that case, it’s important that you focus on the experience that people have with your shop. Make sure that customers leave happy and that this experience is positive, offline and online. This also extends to social media. Although your activity there does not directly impact rankings, it pays off to be in contact with your audience there as well. And provide a similar (positive) experience through these platforms as well.
One final aspect that you shouldn’t forget about is your business listings. Make sure these are accurate on your Google Business Profile and other websites that are relevant to your business.
SEO Ranking factors
To determine what results to show, and in what order, search engines use ranking factors. Ranking factors, or ranking signals, are characteristics of a page that search engines look at to determine how relevant that page is for a specific search query. Although the exact list of ranking factors and their importance is a bit of a mystery and changes from time to time, we do have a pretty good idea of the most important ones:
The quality, relevance and usability of your content
External and internal links
The technical aspects of your site (f.e. security)
User experience on your site (site speed, easy navigation, mobile parity)
The overall online presence of your brand
In addition to these top-ranking factors, there are plenty of others (both known and unknown). But to get a head start with SEO, it makes sense to focus on these aspects first.
SEO now vs early days: a brief history
SEO in the 90’s
Although websites have been around for a little while longer, people started optimizing their sites for search engines in the mid-1990s. As you can imagine, SEO was a lot simpler back then. The algorithms that search engines used were way less advanced and relied on ranking factors like keyword density to determine the relevance of a page. The ‘trick’ back then was making sure the keyword was being used enough times throughout your page and in your meta tags.
Search engines evolving
Naturally, the companies behind search engines quickly realized the issue with this approach. Displaying the results that use the keyword most isn’t always the best experience for their users. So they had to find a way to better handle how potential results were being ranked. Search engines like Google started working on ways to get smarter and rely less on ‘tricks’ and static ranking factors. This resulted in a number of algorithm updates, each resulting in a smarter Google that was more capable of understanding the relevance of a page.
With a team working non-stop on improving Google’s search engine, the focus moved from factors like keyword density to user experience and high-quality content. These algorithm updates are still very much a part of the SEO field, with Google releasing a new one (or multiple) every year. You can expect this to be a continuous process where search engines adapt to current search behaviour and adjust their algorithms to keep showing users the best results for their search query.
SEO in 2025
So, where does that leave us in 2025? As mentioned, search engines continue working on their algorithms to improve their users’ experience. The focus points of SEO in 2025 are still high-quality content and technical factors like site speed, security and mobile parity. But there are more aspects that Google and other search engines deem important.
Search engines are working hard to get a better understanding of a user’s search intent, to show that user the results that fit their need best. Related to that, they continue to improve how information is presented in the search results, which can differ quite a bit per search intent.
A possible zero-click search, where the definition of site structure is shown in an AI overview.
One result of that is zero-click searches, where search engines show the complete answer to a search query in the search results. This can lead to fewer clicks to your website, but it still pays off to be the website that provides that answer. In fact, this is a good example of the direction in which SEO is going. Shift your focus from ‘just clicks’ and maintaining a specific spot in the search results to building a strong brand and being visible on different platforms.
In 2025, SEO will focus less on raw keywords and more so around search intent across diverse platforms like social media and LLMs. As well as this, it’ll be important to produce more video content as discovery platforms integrate these more into their SERPs.
Alex Moss – Principal SEO at Yoast
The other aspect we can’t ignore is AI. More people are using AI tools for their online searches and search engines are also investing in providing AI-driven search experiences. An example of that is Google AI overviews, where Google uses AI to pull together and combine information on a search query from different resources. This is then shown in one overview, with the hope that this directly answers the specific question asked.
Setting SEO Goals
SEO experts used to closely monitor ranking positions, clicks, website traffic and stats like bounce rates. Naturally, all of this data is still relevant, but there has been a shift in what goals to focus on. Search behavior has changed, and search engines are showing your content in many different ways. So it’s not just a number game anymore. You need to focus on the overall perception of your brand and being present in the right places.
Set SEO goals related to engagement, brand awareness, user experience on your website, user satisfaction, and how all of this can be related to sales or other actions you want your audience to perform. This can be trickier than just looking at your daily rankings but will give you a better idea of the success of your SEO strategy and how you’re perceived.
How to learn SEO and get started
Although it consists of a lot of different aspects, it is possible to tackle (a lot of) SEO yourself. Let’s look at how you can do that and what resources can help you get started.
Start with the basics
Before you get to content creation, it’s important to get your technical SEO in order. If you know your way around redirects, optimizing page speed, crawlability, security and structured data, make those your first priority. If not, let your site builder help you out or hire someone with a background in technical SEO. When that’s done, you can start looking at site structure and the content on your pages.
By doing keyword research, you will be able to create content that aligns with your business and gets people to your website. It will also give you loads of input on topics to write about. This will enable you to set up an SEO strategy and plan to continue working on this throughout the year. Because SEO is never done. That’s why it’s important to create a realistic plan and keep yourself (or your team) to it. This might feel like a lot of effort, but remember that SEO not only brings more traffic to your site, it also helps build your brand and increase user loyalty in the long run.
How we can help you
At Yoast, we want to make SEO accessible for everyone. And we want to help you do it yourself. That’s why we offer a free and Premium version of our WordPress plugin, allowing you to get started with SEO without too much trouble. Our free plugin comes with features like the SEO and readability analyses, which give you feedback on your content right away. It also handles parts of the technical SEO for you. Our Premium plugin gives you access to some more features like AI-powered features, a redirect tool, and the possibility to add multiple keywords per page. Making SEO even easier to work on.
We also offer a variety of SEO courses in our Yoast SEO academy, where you can find 5 free courses to get started. For example, the SEO for beginners course, the WordPress for beginners course and a course on structured data. If you’re a Yoast SEO Premium user, you get access to all 16 courses on there. Which will really help you dive into the different aspects of SEO and how to tackle them.
Finally, we have an SEO blog with numerous blog posts on SEO basics, more advanced SEO, new developments and related topics. All of this to make sure that you have all the tools you need to successfully work on SEO yourself!
http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png00http://dubadosolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/dubado-logo-1.png2025-03-25 14:15:182025-03-25 14:15:18What is SEO (Search Engine Optimization)?
