SEO editing is the process of revising a piece of content so that it sends the right ranking signals to Google.
There are few shortcuts to ranking highly in Google these days. Those few remaining “black hat” techniques that still plague the SEO industry, such as farming backlinks from PBNs, are going away.
At least that is what some SEOs are claiming.
This can be a tough pill to swallow for established SEOs who have built a business on selling the promise of ranking on page 1 for any keyword in 30 days.
For those of us who want to create exceptional content while maintaining at least a small amount of ethics, this is welcome news. Not that ranking will fall into your lap.
Rather, ranking requires greater involvement in content strategy planning and quality human writing and editing where appropriate.
How do we know this is the future?
Google recently announced a new machine learning model called MUM, which better understands text and images (audio and video is coming in the future), and how this content relates to the specific intent of a search. This will help Google to reinforce its latest experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness (E-E-A-T) guidelines, which tell us how to research content, write content, and publish content.
With MUM and E-E-A-T in mind, we can effectively edit for SEO and help Google to find our domains and published content.
SEO: More a Feeling Than Science
When talking about SEO, we need to stop and have a quick talk about control.
We do not control what Google displays in search results. In fact, as Google moves to MUM, keywords matter less. SEOs have even shown evidence that pages can rank for keywords that are not found on a page. This is possible because Google is a semantic search engine, a topic that is discussed in this article.
While we might do everything the right way, sometimes Google just ignores us. No matter how much time you spend on keyword research or if you manually added the page in Search Console, Google may show you zero love.
With that out of the way, the next sections will help you understand editing for SEO and how to send the right signals to Google so you do show up where you want.
Does the Content Match the Keyword Intent?
When reviewing any content, carefully check that the writing matches the intent of the keyword.
If you have no idea what keyword intent means, take a moment to learn about how the customer journey can inform every stage of content marketing to drive conversions, shares, and other organic growth opportunities. Learning as much as you can about the topic is crucial.
But, if you are in a hurry, just know that SEO editors use keyword intent to understand the headspace of someone who is performing a search query. For example, “white vinegar cleaning” indicates an information search, where someone wants to know more about the positives and negatives of switching to a new cleaning solution. Alternatively, “white vinegar cleaning recipe” suggests intent to take the next step and start using white vinegar to clean.
The type of content we create for the search intent differs based on where we think someone falls in the customer journey. Misreading search intent could lead to writing content that does not satisfy the searcher, causing them to leave the page and go to a competitor.
Focus Keyword in the First Paragraph
Always start your article by addressing the focus keyword and intent. Then write the rest of the content in a style and tone that builds upon the focus keyword.
Just be mindful about the number of times you use the keyword, because Google tells us not to fixate on keyword usage.
To be more specific, John Mueller, who is Google’s Search Advocate, says “In general the number of times that you use a keyword on a page, I don’t think that really matters or makes sense. When you’re writing naturally usually that resolves itself automatically.”
Mueller then goes on to say that keywords do matter, but that you should not get hung up on keyword variations or plural and singular versions of a keyword. The only thing you need to worry about is whether your content is well written and you are being helpful.
Subheadings and Related Keywords
Use subheadings to summarize what the searcher will learn in each section. But avoid keyword stuffing or writing close variations of your primary keyword, unless appropriate.
For example, if your keyword is “white vinegar bathroom,” you may want to avoid writing subheadings with text such as “white vinegar bathroom cleaning recipe,” “white vinegar bathroom cleaner with essential oils,” and so on. Consider alternative variations, such as “making a natural bathroom cleaner” or “adding essential oils to a natural bathroom cleaner.”
Google is a semantic search engine that uses natural language processing to understand the intent of the search query and the contextual meaning of words. This means that Google is not necessarily looking for an exact keyword match or a specific keyword variation when displaying results.
You are better off using as many relevant, topic-adjacent keywords to help Google better understand the context of your content. Taking this approach can also help you rank for not only your focus keyword but also secondary keywords.
Also remember to follow a hierarchy with H2 tags denoting a primary section, and H3 or H4 tags further breaking up those sections. This approach to subheadings helps people who skim content to find what they are looking for, and it allows Google to understand the structure and relevance of your content better.
Internal Links to Contextually Relevant Pages
Internal links tell Google what pages you think are important, they pass on page authority, and they give searchers options to explore more of your content. In many cases, you do not want someone clicking the back button after finding you through Google. With internal links and CTAs, they are more likely to browse multiple pages, create an account, buy something, or sign up for a newsletter – strong signals that tell Google your page is rank-worthy.
If you don’t have pages to internally link to, it is time to buckle down and start creating.
To get started, identify domains with subject matter expertise in the topic niche you are targeting. Use your SEM tool of choice to catalog these, then churn out content such as articles, infographics, video, audio, ebooks, and whatever else you can come up with – this is what it takes to build authority within an industry or niche.
Meta Title, Meta Description, URL, and Image Alt Tags
The meta title and description should complement the headline of your article while encouraging the searcher to click through to your page.
Similarly, your image alt tags should accurately describe the image. Google uses image alt tags to help with visual search, and they are essential for text-to-speech software.
The URL for a page is less of a ranking factor than in the past, but it is still a best practice to have the URL be relevant to the keyword and intent.
Try to keep the URL short, as this makes it more shareable and less sketchy. You want to avoid bit.ly or other link-shortening tools if possible because users assume these will lead to scam pop-ups, viruses, or other junk.
Using Yoast or similar SEO optimization plugins on your CMS can help to create consistency across your metadata.
Writing the Headline
Use your primary keyword when writing the headline, but check that the headline describes the searcher’s intent and that it is not clickbait – gimmicks can be good for short-term clicks, but they may diminish your reputation with your preferred audience.
If the headline does not match the intent of the content then rewrite the headline.
If the content does not match the intent of the headline then rewrite the content.
The Struggles of SEO Editors
In SEO editing, you should expect the unexpected. The following issues are some of the most common.
Writing for Robots, Not Humans
When you pass along a keyword list to a writer, you might receive content that is written for the keywords and not for a human.
Google has reaffirmed with the Helpful Content Update that content should provide new perspectives or information and be written in a way that understands the searcher’s intent. Content should also look and sound natural. Write for people, not search engines.
One Article or Multiple Articles?
When writing at an expert level about a topic, writers will naturally produce content that touches on many related topics.
When this happens, a page that is well written may rank in the top spot for your focus keyword and also for other related keywords. While this sounds like an envious position, you sometimes find that the related keywords rank poorly, and you are missing out on traffic.
So what is the solution? How do you improve rankings for related keywords without harming your focus keyword?
You have two options:
- Cut any mention of the keyword that is ranking poorly, and move all related content to a new page. You will now have multiple pages with a clearer focus on the keywords you want to rank for.
- Keep the article the same but add more content around the related keywords with the goal of increasing those rankings. This will give you a single page stuffed with a lot of information.
Some will argue that creating a single page that expertly touches on all contextually relevant areas of a topic is preferable. Part of the reason is that the page may be seen as more authoritative.
However, others argue that too much information on one page is overwhelming and can drive people to competitors who offer less imposing content. Thus, fewer people stay on your page and Google ranks it lower.
Regardless of your choice here, avoid writing for the same focus keyword across multiple articles. This may get you flagged for duplicate content and could affect rankings. However, when writing about a similar topic across multiple articles, you should expect to repeat some keywords and information. This is considered acceptable provided you keep duplicate content to a minimum.
Grammatically Incorrect Long-Tail Keywords
Some search queries are asked repeatedly in a grammatically incorrect way. Just because these searches have volume does not mean you should write for them.
Yes, higher volume long-tail keywords are enticing, but you need to avoid using keywords that make you sound unprofessional.
You may ask, what is the harm?
The harm is that Google will flag over-optimized content, and nothing screams over-optimized more than repeatedly using grammatically incorrect keywords in a headline, subheading, body copy, and metadata.
A better option is to understand what was meant by the searcher, make the long-tail keyword grammatically correct, and then write for the corrected keyword. In the short term, you may find that you are not ranking, but I am not aware of many SEOs in the 2020s who succeed in the long term by using incorrect keywords.
No Internal or External Links
It is always best to provide links in the content brief that you want used in the content. But sometimes you may leave the choice of links to the writer. You can go either route depending on your workflow. Just be sure that the writer understands how to identify quality and trustworthy sources of information.
The only time you won’t need links is if you are publishing content that is the source of information, such as an interview, press release, or academic research.
Whatever the situation, just remember that links help Google to understand your content and can be necessary if you want your content to rank.
Why You Are Not Ranking
Creating the perfect piece of content is not a guarantee of ranking.
If you are not ranking, perform a site audit. This can help to identify any issues related to duplicate content, redirects, site speed, UX design, and other common issues that affect whether Google views your domain as high quality or low quality.
Once you have completed your audit, and if you found no issues, you may want to look at your content for issues, including:
- Content is unoriginal and lacks input from subject matter experts
- Content has not been live for long enough
- Content is not being routinely reviewed and updated
- A lack of supporting media such as original and high-quality images, infographics, video, or audio content
- A lack of promotion via social media, news, backlinks, or other sharing methods
- Low domain authority
- Too much keyword competition
Some of these can be overcome with revisions, but some are not easily corrected.
High keyword competition and low domain authority are two areas which you have the least control.
You can overcome your low domain authority by investing heavily in content creation, but you will still be competing with other domains that have been around longer and may have more resources to produce content at a greater frequency.
That does not mean you will never rank. Rather, you will have to get creative to more selectively choose low-hanging fruit that may have lower volume but less competition – not the best position, but it is a start.
Quarterly Content Audits
An SEO content editor tool, such as Clearscope, SEMrush, or Surfer SEO can provide insight into how your competitors are producing content.
To use any of these tools, select your primary keyword, then paste your text content into the editor. The text will be evaluated against websites that rank for that same keyword. With that information, the tool will offer suggestions for what keywords to add to the content.
But be warned that these tools will sometimes pull irrelevant information or keywords that may not be a natural fit for the intent of your content.
Part of the reason this happens is that there is sometimes not enough content to pull from for that specific keyword, so Google is delivering the most contextually relevant content, even if it misses the mark.
You can confirm if this is true by searching for the keyword yourself. If this is the case, you have an opportunity to create original and impactful content for that keyword.
This is a good time to reiterate that you should not over-optimize content. Stuffing words or phrases that a piece of software tells you to include, but is not necessarily relevant to the search, could create over-optimized content and hurt your ranking. While you do want your content to be well-rounded and cover as many keywords as possible, it should not be at the expense of creating low quality content.
Why Learn SEO Editing?
SEO editing blends analytics and creativity. But SEO editors are somewhat of a rare breed.
Many editors have never been asked to make SEO a normal part of their routine, and frankly, if you want to do the SEO part of editing well, you need to invest a lot of time in the process that may not be available with a typical editing job
If you do learn SEO editing, it is a skill that can pay off in the long-term because you are learning to curate content that can serve searchers today via news stories or opinion pieces and into the future when you identify keyword opportunities and weave those keywords naturally into the content, making it more discoverable while signaling to Google that you should be the domain of choice within a certain industry or niche.
