SEO Guidelines

Purpose

Identify our SEO practices.

Scope

Relatively outdated content.

All our sites which are publicly available must observe the most basic SEO practices listed here.

The TTFB (load time) should be under a second on a fast connection.
There should be a unique title tag for each page, rendered on the server.
There should be a unique descriptive meta description tag for each page, rendered on the server.

Should be 60 chars or so.
Include keywords (such as “real estate prices” or “housing market”)
Include the current Year and/or Month.
Include a quantity in the title.
Include a convenience or quality word from “quick, simple, today, X minutes, now, free, automatic, ultimate, complete, definitive, study, step-by-step”.
Include an emotional word “Amazing. Remarkable. Magic. Extraordinary.”
Use parentheses in your title “( in 2018 )” “( Ultimate Guide )”.

Should be 200 chars or so.
Include foreshadowing, specific numbers, call to action, reasons the user would visit your page.
Include key differentiator (what sets you apart).
Use a curiousity gap.

Google has about 200 “ranking factors”. Top ones include:

number of similar words “on-page” in titles, url, headings, and body text, to the search term.
how many links on the internet point back to your site/page
how many people click your page in Google (CTR) by writing a good meta description, and how long they stay on your page (dwell time/engagement)

#3 is new in 2018, and more emphasized. the other #1 and #2 are old from original pagerank algorithm

Having things render only in React/Vue/Riot tags (not on server side render) is still a disadvantage.

It’s also important to review WMT, ahrefs and Google App engine for clues on what works.