Looking to save some money on your SEO? Luckily you can with some DIY SEO. Read on to learn the top tips for implementing DIY SEO to save money.

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Today, no business can afford to be without an effective SEO (search engine optimization) strategy.

However, for small and mid-sized businesses, the cost of hiring a professional agency or consultancy to help you with your SEO is unaffordable.

Even if you could afford to consult the experts, how can you ensure that you get the most out of your investment?

But there's good news. You don't have fork out on an overpriced consultancy to sharpen your SEO techniques. There are plenty of DIY SEO tips to get your company rising up the search engine results pages (SERPs) rankings in no time.

1. Know Your Online Audience

You might think you know your target customers. However, your offline customers are potentially quite different from your online audience.

After all, researchers are suggesting that consumers behave different online compared to offline. This point was famously made by The New York Times cartoon with the caption, "on the internet, nobody knows you're a dog."

But this also goes for your online market. After all, even if your company has been extremely successful selling furniture in stores, this doesn't necessarily mean you'll have the same success online. The online market is often different to the offline market.

By knowing your online audience, you stand the best chance of executing an effective DIY SEO strategy for your company.

2. Research Your Keywords

When you speak to other colleagues in your company or industry, you probably use different terms and phrases compared to when you speak to customers.

This is because customers can't be expected to know the business jargon or acronyms used in your business. It's important to keep this in mind when it comes to effectively using keywords.

The first step is to research the keywords used by your prospective customers. Essentially, these are the types of phrases and search terms customers use to search for products and services you provide.

You need to know two main types of keywords.

The first of these is head key-phrases. These are general and the most searched for terms by users. Such as, "homemade cakes."

Then, there are also the long key-phrases. These phrases can be up to a few words and are more specific, usually related to location. For instance, "the best homemade cupcakes in California."

If you're struggling with doing keyword research yourself, there are many tools that can help you with this.

Check out the keyword research tool called Google's Keyword Planner. However, you need to have an AdWords account to get access to this. There are also keyword research tools that require a fee, such as Wordtracker and SEMRush.

Once you've established the keywords for your DIY SEO strategy, display them somewhere in the office or on your desk, where they'll act as a constant reminder of your focus.

3. Optimize Your Website

With your keywords and phrases in mind, it's time to optimize your website. You have to think carefully about how to use these keywords and phrases on your site.

The first step in the process of optimizing your website is to arrange the different pages on your site in order of importance. After this, you can list the keywords and phrases in the same order. This will provide you with the foundations of keyword use on your website.

However, it's also a good tip to make use of the long and specific key-phrases on your blog and Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) pages.

4. Quality Designed Website

Now you know which keywords to use on which pages of your site, it's time to make sure your website is professionally designed.

Unless you have experience in web design, this is an area that can't always be DIY SEO. Make sure you hire a top professional web designer or company to have the best possible chance of producing an outstanding website.

However, after it's designed and built, you can go back to doing it yourself by conducting in-depth research and gathering continuous feedback from focus groups about your site to keep improving it.

It's important to make sure you have a website that's user-friendly and easy to navigate. Some of the greatest websites aren't just simple and functional. They're also websites that users love spending time on and want to share with friends and family.

Last but certainly not least, make sure your website is smartphone and tablet friendly. Since 2013, there are just as many smartphone users searching Google as users on desktops and laptops. The reality is that if your website isn't mobile-friendly, users won't visit it.

5. Start a Blog

Great content is a great driver of traffic to your website. As far as DIY SEO goes, you can't do much better than providing your users with blog posts that they simply can't miss out on.

If you don't already have a blog, then you need to start one now!

You don't need to blog every day. By blogging bi-weekly or weekly it's enough to build a regular and decent audience. But posting on a regular schedule always help.

You can blog about all sorts of things from industry news, to listacles in your niche, to "how to" tips and interviews with experts or personalities.

6. Other Great Content

Great content comes in many shapes and sizes. While one of the most prominent ways of providing content is through regular blog posts, it's not the only way.

Other content types include vlogging on YouTube or posting pictures on your website. Many users prefer to consume visual content because it's easy and fast. You have to consider what type of audience you have before deciding on the type of content.

Whatever it is, make sure your target audience is going to be interested. Nobody wants to be bombarded with content that doesn't engage them.

7. Develop Your Social Media Presence

Nowadays nobody can afford not to have a social media presence. Whether you're an entrepreneur or a multinational corporation, or somewhere in between, you can't afford to miss out on the opportunities of social media.

Social media allows you connect with your customer base in a cost-effective way. You can build your network as well as gain feedback on your website, products, and services.

Most importantly, it's a great DIY SEO tip for boosting your rankings on search engines. Not many people realize that your presence on social media affects how Google and others rank your site.

The social media sites that you concentrate your efforts on depend on your target audience. For instance, if you're focused on business-y stuff, then you should concentrate your social media efforts on LinkedIn. However, if you want to target young people, Instagram and Snapchat are likely the best places.

However, regardless of what industry you work in, every company needs access to Facebook since over 2 billion of the world's population is there. This is too large an audience to ignore.

8. Build Your Brand

DIY SEO is not only about these tactics, but also about building your brand and promoting what you do to your target audience.

The best brands don't just sell products and services, but rather, they tell a story. You need to do this too.

You also need to find effective ways of gaining media attention. You can achieve this through social media. For instance, check out what's trending in your niche and jump on it to give your take on events.

You can also build your brand through collaboration with others. Conventional media, such as magazines, newspapers, radio, and TV still play a role in raising awareness. There's also new media, such a YouTube and other social outlets that can help you promote what you do.

9. Learn How to Use Google Analytics

To develop an effective DIY SEO strategy, you need to get feedback.

If you don't already know how to use Google Analytics, you need to learn fast. You don't need anything like an in-depth understanding. Just get the basics down!

Through the information provided by Google Analytics concerning your audience, behavior, and conversions, you'll know what you're doing right and what's not working. This feedback is essential to ensuring that you continue to boost your SEO rankings and raise awareness of your brand.

Just as no financial services company would function effectively without regular financial input, you can't operate digital marketing without Google Analytics reports.

10. Follow SEO News

There's only so much you can learn from reading a blog about DIY SEO. You need to read an SEO guide to get a deeper understanding of the techniques involved in the industry.

SEO is always changing and developing. This is why you can't rest on your laurels. You have to keep reading, learning and keeping up with the latest techniques to boost your rankings.

One of the best ways to do this is by reading SEO blogs, attending training programs on SEO and regularly visiting websites. You need to also subscribe to our newsletter today.

Find out More About DIY SEO

With these top ten tips on DIY SEO techniques, you can build an effective SEO strategy for your website. Boosting your rankings in SERPs is essential in the modern era of competition for space on Google.

However, there's much more to learn about SEO. Check out our website for our SEO tools to turn your website into the top-ranked site in your industry.