Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) means making your content discoverable and appealing to people searching for what you’re writing about. If you’re writing content that no one can find, you’re wasting your time.

Why SEO still matters

SEO remains critical for two reasons:

1. Humans searching: People use search engines to find solutions. If your content doesn’t appear when they search, they’ll find your competitors instead.
2. LLMs researching: Large Language Models like ChatGPT and Claude search the web for current information. When someone asks an LLM about your topic, it will cite whoever ranks well in search results, not necessarily who has the best product.

Poor SEO means invisibility for both audiences.

The SEO process

1. Define your target audience and their intent

Before optimizing anything, answer: Who is searching? What do they want to accomplish?

A developer searching “WordPress translation plugin” has different intent than someone searching “how to translate WordPress site.” The first wants to evaluate options. The second needs information and guidance. Your content must match the specific intent behind the search.

2. Research how your audience searches

Discover the exact words and phrases your target audience uses. Don’t guess. Research.

Use Google’s autocomplete: Type your topic and see what Google suggests. These suggestions come from real searches.

Check “People also ask” and “Related searches” at the bottom of search results. These reveal what else people search for on this topic.

Look through forums, like Reddit, to see the terminology that people use when searching for what you’re offering.

Look at what competitors rank for using tools like Ahrefs or Moz (covered below). If three top-ranking pages all target “translate WooCommerce products,” that phrase matters to your audience.

Beware about using keyword-research tools without context. The fact that a keyword is popular doesn’t mean that this is your correct goal. It’s only your goal if this is the language that people use when they’re searching for what you’re offering.

3. Optimize your content for intent and keywords

Write for humans first, search engines second.

Your title and opening text must match search intent. People scan search results to identify what to click on. When searching, the only thing that they’ll see from your content from competitors’ content is the search results. These include the title and “search preview”. Help your audience by including the keyword they are searching for in the title. Your title needs to say “here is what you’re looking for”. Usually, Google will use your page’s title “as is” in search results. If Google’s algorithm considers your opening text as a great summary for your content, it will use it “as is”. You should aim for your opening text to be what Google shows in search results. For this, write an opening text that briefly summarizes your content and also set it as the page’s “SEO description” text. If Google needs to compose the search preview from the content of your page (disregarding your opening paragraph), you should rethink the opening paragraph.

Use keywords naturally throughout. Don’t repeat the same phrase mechanically. Both search engines and LLM understand natural language. Stuffing your content with keywords will make your content unappealing for people and hurt your search performance.

4. Build relevant incoming links

Google still uses incoming links as a voting mechanism. The more incoming links from reputable and relevant content, the better. Votes (links) from sites that sell links never worked and still don’t work. Incoming links from irrelevant sites, using irrelevant keywords is a strong signal for Google that someone is trying to game its algorithm. It also doesn’t work.

We’ll cover link building methodology in detail in a later chapter. For now, understand that links remain a critical ranking factor.

Tools for checking SEO performance

Google Search Console: Your definitive source

Google Search Console (GSC) provides complete, accurate data about how your site appears in Google search results.

GSC shows:
- Which queries trigger your content in search results
- How many people see your content (impressions)
- How many click through (clicks)
- Your average position for each query
- Which pages on your site get the most search traffic

Use GSC as your primary SEO measurement tool. It’s free, accurate, and comes directly from Google.

Limitation: GSC only shows data for your own site. You cannot see your competitors’ performance.

Google Analytics (GA) / Matomo: Understanding visitor behavior

GA and Matomo track what happens after people click through from search results. They show on-page metrics covered in the previous chapter: bounce rate, time on page, conversion to your desired action.

Use these tools to understand whether search traffic engages with your content or leaves immediately. High search traffic with a high bounce rate means your content doesn’t match what searchers expected.

Limitation: These tools show behavior but not search position or keyword data. Combine them with GSC for complete understanding.

Third-party tools (Ahrefs, Moz, SEMrush): Competitive intelligence

Third-party SEO tools estimate your competitors’ performance. They crawl the web to approximate:
- Which keywords competitors rank for
- How much search traffic competitors receive
- Which sites link to competitor content
- Historical ranking changes

These tools help identify content gaps. If a competitor ranks for “WordPress multilingual ecommerce” and you don’t have content targeting that phrase, you’ve found an opportunity.

Critical limitation: Third-party tools provide estimates, not exact data. Their traffic estimates can be wrong by 50% or more. Use them to identify patterns and opportunities, not as precise measurements.

Google itself: Manual search analysis

Run searches yourself. Type in the keywords you’re targeting and see where your content appears. More importantly, see who appears above you.

Examine the top-ranking content:
- What intent does it satisfy?
- How is it structured?
- What makes it more relevant than your content?
- What does it include that you’re missing?

Manual searching reveals information no tool provides. You see exactly what searchers see. You understand why competitors outrank you. It shows you what content people actually want to see (Google’s algorithm discovers this). See how your competitors appear in the search results and what they write about. Many people have voted by clicking on these competitors’ sites and staying on their content (not bouncing). This is your best intelligence tool for what your target audience is actually looking for.

Do this regularly. Search results change. Competitors publish new content. Your position fluctuates.

Remember that Google personalizes the search results. When doing SEO research, always use a browser in incognito mode (so that you don’t see results tailored for you) and use a VPN to check what people in your target audience see.

What poor SEO results mean and what to do

Problem: Your content doesn’t appear in search results at all

Diagnosis: Search engines haven’t discovered your content, or they consider it irrelevant to any query.

Solution:
- Make sure that your content has some links, at least from other pages on site(s) that your company maintains. Search engines discover content by following links. Keep these links very relevant to your audience.
- Give it a bit of time. A few days is fine to start seeing organic traffic. A few weeks almost certainly means that you have a problem.

Problem: Your content appears in search results, but people are not clicking into it

Diagnosis: Act quickly (within days). Google is giving your content a chance (usually happens with new content) and measuring how relevant it is for visitors. Right now, it’s not relevant and Google will soon stop showing it.

Solution:
- Repeat your research for how people search for what you’re offering. You might be targeting the wrong keywords.
- Rewrite your title and opening paragraph to more compellingly address what searchers want.

Problem: Search traffic has high bounce rate

Diagnosis: Act quickly (within days). Visitors are voting with their feet (mouse) against your content. Google measures bounce rate and will soon understand that your content is not what people expected (click bait, intentional or not). Google’s algorithm will soon stop offering your content in search results.

Solution:
- Make sure that the content is really about what your opening promises.
- Make sure that your content gets to the point quickly.

Problem: Your content ranks on page 3 or 4 (positions 20-40)

Diagnosis: Search engines understand your content but don’t consider it among the most relevant results.

Solution:
- Make sure that your “on page” performance is great.
- Strengthen your title and opening to more directly address search intent.
- Build more incoming links from relevant sites.
- Make sure that you’re aiming for a realistic goal. The first page of search results includes just 10 spots. Not all the sites on the Internet can appear in these 10 first spots.

Don’t wait for SEO data

Remember the previous chapter on on-page performance. SEO results lag by weeks or months. It takes time for search engines to discover updated content, re-evaluate its quality, and adjust rankings.

On-page metrics appear within days. High bounce rate, short time on page, low conversion—these signals warn you about problems immediately.

Fix on-page performance first. When readers engage with your content, search engines notice. They track how long people stay, whether they click through to other pages, whether they return to search results looking for something better.

Strong on-page performance leads to improved search rankings. Weak on-page performance guarantees poor SEO results, no matter how well you optimize keywords.

Monitor both. Act on on-page metrics quickly. Use SEO metrics to verify that your improvements translate to better search visibility over time.