68% of people use search engines daily. Websites take advantage of this number to rank higher using Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It allows the website to rank better, and increase conversion rates and engagement.
Regardless of the niche, almost everybody has started integrating SEO into their marketing strategy. Here are some tips on how you can take advantage of it too.
Table of Contents
Tips to Do SEO for a School Website?
Optimize Your Pages
Optimizing your homepage and other website pages allows more visibility on SERPs.
In simple words, when you curate your website content keeping the SEO factors in mind, it helps your website rank better and higher in the search results.
The keywords you use have a significant impact on your search engine rankings. Use keywords that are relevant to your target audience.
Make sure the words you use on your website’s homepage encourage users to want to learn more about what you have to offer.
For example: Instead of using Academic Excellence, use words that “spark” excellence like Innovation or Creative.
Make Use Of Internal Links
What is Internal Linking?
Internal linking refers to links from one page of a domain linked to another page within the same domain.
To rank in search results, the search engine needs to find your web pages; internal linking helps.
Internal linking helps in,
- Building page authority
- Organizing and prioritizing your website’s information
- Ensuring user experience
- Connecting between web pages
- Ranking higher in SERP’s
A bonus tip: Update your old content with new internal links. Doing so will improve the ranking value of the page.
Research Keywords
Choosing the right keyword is vital both for SEO and search engine rankings. A single keyword can make or break your website.
Start with making a list of possible keywords your audience might use in the search engine.
To ensure that you are using the correct keywords for the content, use tools like Ahrefs, Moz, or Semrush to analyze the keyword difficulty and the other aspects.
After analyzing potential keywords, seamlessly insert the keywords into your content. Keep one thing in mind, DO NOT STUFF KEYWORDS.
In fact, according to Carly Bryanna of Haitna, it might help you for a while in your rankings but, it is not the best practice in the long run.
It will only degrade the value and quality of your website.
Increase Crawlability
A search engine crawler, also known as a robot or a spider, crawls your website’s content to find relevant information.
During this process, it mustn’t encounter any dead-end or broken links. If so happens, it affects the ranking of your website.
- Avoid 404 errors. Such errors are likely to occur when the URL is inappropriate.
- Do not plagiarize the content. Plagiarizing content across a single website can affect your website rankings.
- Optimize the structure of your content using proper headings and subheadings tags.
- Optimize Images using alt-tags. Name your images and resize them to avoid an increase in loading time.
Optimize URLs
A structured URL is paramount for a school website. It is a building block you must not ignore.
Any school website has a navigational hierarchy that guides the user around the website with correct directions. If your website has this, you must also have an optimized URL for your web pages.
Let’s say, for example, https://www.abcinternational.edu/ is your homepage URL.
Now, if the user opens the academics page, and chooses to go to the history page, then your URL should be something like this – https://www.abcinternational.edu/academics/history
What you are not supposed to do is this – https://www.abcinternational.edu/528Ef/xjr#hy8g
When Google is indexing, it looks for potential keywords. You are wasting a perfectly good opportunity if you are not optimizing your URLs.
Improve Your Local SEO
Local SEO is about increasing search visibility for local businesses. It optimizes your business/website for a specific area.
Optimize your website using local keywords or locations to rank better in the search engine results. One easy way to do that is to use Google My Business tool. It is connected to the search engine and the map, which allows you to appear in local searches.
For example, when someone searches for “schools near me”, it will show a list of nearby schools added in Google My Business.
Create Calls-To-Action (CTA)
A call-to-action button you can use to direct your visitors to different pages to do something specific.
When it comes to school websites, make sure you use CTAs relevant to what your readers have already read or what they are willing to do.
Take a look at this CTA button from Deisgnrush.
A CTA catches the attention of the reader while reading. Hence, make sure you use action words like access, join, learn, download or read.
Here are a few examples for you.
- Download the worksheets to make your child’s study time more interesting.
- Join the group to learn more about mindful parenting.
- Schedule your virtual tour!
Optimize for Mobile
To optimize your website for mobile, make sure your website has a responsive web design. A responsive web design means your website is compatible with any device.
According to a study, mobile devices drove 61% of visits to U.S. websites in 2020, up from 57% in 2019.
Desktops were responsible for 35.7% of all visits in 2020, and tablets drove the remaining 3.3% of visitors. Globally, 68.1% of all website visits in 2020 came from mobile devices, increasing 63.3% in 2019.
Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool is friendly. It helps you analyze if your website is mobile-friendly or not and will also let you know the elements of web pages that need a fix.
See how well we have optimized our website for all devices.
Improve Your Technical SEO
Technical SEO is an essential part of crawling and indexing. An on-point technical SEO helps the crawl spiders to crawl and index your website for better organic ranking.
There are a few factors to keep in mind to keep your school website organized and glitch-free.
Make sure you –
- Fix your dead or broken links – Such links take your visitors to a page that no longer exists. Instead, they will see a 404 error, page not found. Something like this can hurt your technical SEO.
- Measure your bounce rate – The bounce rate is the percentage of visitors who leave your website after viewing only one page. Make sure your website has a low bounce rate.
- Measure your dwell time – Dwell time denotes the length of time a person stays on a particular webpage before leaving for the previous web page. More the dwell time, the more the conversion rate.
- Measure Page Speed – Page speed relates to how fast your webpage loads. You can use the Google PageSpeed Insights tool to analyze the factor.
Optimize Your Headings and Subheadings
When you are doing search engine optimization for a school website, make sure you optimize the heading tags of your web pages.
The importance of heading tags (H1s, H2s, and H3s) for good UX is often neglected. When you use heading tags to break your web pages, it gets easier for humans and search engines to read and understand the information.
One must use a proper format for headings and subheadings.
- Heading 1 – Use this tag only for the main heading title.
- Headings 2 to 6 – Use these tags for anchor texts to make certain website sections easy to share.
- Body – It refers to the body content that falls under the heading.
SEO for School Websites – FAQs
Why is SEO important for School Websites?
SEO is more than just organic ranking. A good search rank makes your website trustworthy. Having an SEO-optimized website improves the user experience. It helps your website appear in relevant searches.
How to maintain your SEO rankings?
Keep updating your website with SEO-friendly content. Take a step ahead and start link building. Acquiring links for your school website will allow you to maintain or increase SERP’s rank.
Is SEO necessary?
SEO is not as easy as pie but, it does carry weight. It is important because it allows you to connect with relevant people, ultimately driving more traffic. And the more traffic, the more the conversion rate.
How to strategize SEO for School Websites?
Begin with keyword research and optimizing relevant elements. Simultaneously focus on user experience and responsive web design. Keep on updating and optimizing content and make a link-building strategy.
Why is it important to have a school website?
It is important to have a school website to allow easy communication with your prospects. It enables you to share valuable insights, academic offerings, and other relevant information from a single place.
Key Takeaways
- Optimize your web pages for organic traffic
- Create Internal Links to increase website authority
- Do keyword research to rank well in search engine results
- Increase crawlability for more visibility in SERPs
- Optimize URLs for proper navigation for both search engines and visitors
- Improve your local SEO to increase local visibility and traffic
- Create calls-to-action to increase the conversion rate
- Optimize for mobile-friendly design for increased dwell time and low bounce rate
- Improve your technical SEO for smooth UX
- Optimize heading and subheadings to grab the reader’s attention and organize your content