What is internal SEO? (+ full training of internal SEO principles and techniques)

This article is the most complete internal SEO guide and training in 2023, with the help of which you will learn:

How to optimize your content
How to use schema and URL to improve SEO
How to write an effective title and meta description
What effect does link building have on internal SEO?
How to send a positive and correct signal to Google

In addition, we’ll go over the general tips and techniques you should follow to get ready to optimize your site like a pro.

If you’re ready, let’s start by defining on-page SEO.

What does internal SEO mean?

Many summarize internal SEO in content creation based on SEO principles, which is wrong; Because the content is a table and a chair! Electrical wiring, color, decor, etc. are also important.

Internal SEO (On-page SEO) means all the activities we do to optimize page components (whatever the user sees) to rank in search engines (source: Hubspot)

Page elements include content, images, links and even white space, which ultimately leads to a correct and easy understanding of the page by Google and the user.

What is the difference between external SEO and technical SEO and internal SEO?

External SEO means everything that is done outside the site to achieve top rankings. Among the most important of these measures, we can mention getting backlinks in different ways, such as publishing advertisement reports and even public relations.

Why should we pay attention to internal SEO?

Is on-page SEO still important in 1402? Yes, let’s look at Google’s own statement on what the search engine does:

How search engines work

So the first signal that shows that the information is related to what the user searched for is the keyword; It means that there should be a similar word on that page (both title and text). If we have to conclude, we must say that Google still crawls your site to find keywords.

But it’s not like before to fill the page with keywords and expect to be in front of others! Now you need to optimize the pages of the site for different purposes:

Creating the best experience for the user
Increase loading speed
Increase click rate
Match between the user’s search intent and the content

It is more important than using keywords, it is important to provide useful and valid content. On the other hand, the user should get his answer very quickly and read the content easily. This is where other issues such as good user design, white space, original images, etc. come into play.

The user may not understand what activities you have done behind the scenes (technical) and outside the site (external SEO); But internal SEO directly affects his experience and what he feels.

So internal optimization is important because it helps Google and the user understand your pages and site.

Well, you’re ready to go pro! The next section contains everything you need to do.

Internal SEO techniques you should know

To make learning the techniques easier, we have divided this section into several sections. Before we start, read the following:

Some of the techniques you read below may have been seen in technical SEO articles; Nothing strange! Because they are common in some cases and cannot be separated.

1. Principles and points related to content and key phrase

The most important part of internal SEO is the production of high-quality content that responds well to the user’s needs; But how is it possible to create such content? Let’s see!

Identifying important keywords to optimize content

You will need special tools for this; There are many options, the most important of which are the following:

Keyord Planner
KWfinder
KeywordTool
Moz
SEMrush
Ubersuggest
Ahrefs

In keyword research, first of all, it is important to find words that are useful to you; That is, the keywords that your potential customers will search for. For example, “Method of cooking cutlets” is not useful for a magazine active in the automotive field!

After that, things like the volume of search, the level of competition and the user’s purpose of search are important. For example, long-tail keywords may not have a high search volume, but they have a high conversion rate.

Of course, you are not going to spend time only on these words! You should prepare a list of all related words – both generic and low-volume.

These words are the basis of your work in internal SEO; So it is better to take this step seriously.

Optimizing the title and meta description with related keywords

After finding the right keywords, you need to use them on your pages! For example, if you have an article about how to cook Korma Sabzi, you should add the phrase “How to prepare Korma Sabzi” to it.

The title and meta description are the 2 main parts of the page where you must use the keyword. The SEO title is what tells Google and the user what your page is about.

Usually, the closer you put the keyword to the beginning of the title, the more chances you have. Of course, you are not supposed to put it at the beginning of the title; That is, if you don’t leave, it doesn’t mean that you won’t be ranked. Sometimes, it doesn’t make sense at all and the title becomes meaningless.

In addition to keyword, you can use words like “best”, “free” and… to get better results from the title. On the other hand, you can even look at what users are searching for and modify the title accordingly. For example, “keyword research for SEO” instead of “keyword research”.

Note: excessive use of powerful words; Because the bait may be seen and no one clicks on it.

Do not leave your meta description empty! Write a clear description of the article along with the keyword. Feel free to do this explanation with different keywords. Be sure to include 2 elements in your explanation:

Description of the article
The most important benefits

Of course, Google may choose an explanation from the content based on the phrase the user is searching for; But you must write your explanation.

Tip: Are you auditing your content? Be sure to write a description with the keyword for those who do not have a meta description.

Adding keywords to content naturally

Google should not feel that you are abusing keywords!

You must use the selected keyword consistently and naturally in the text. Maybe Google doesn’t clearly agree that keyword repetition is important; But how to find out that the article is really about it when the main keyword is used only once in the content?

But do not overdo it! You are not going to use the keyword once every few lines or once every 200 words; Naturally, use keywords in the right place and with the right distribution. On the other hand, too much repetition of keyord will cause an unfortunate event called “keyord stuffing” to happen and you will get hit.

Identify and remove keyword cannibalization and prevent competition with yourself!

One of the biggest mistakes newbies make is creating multiple pages for one keyword! This unforgivable mistake in SEO is called keyword cannibalization.

Suppose we had another page for this internal SEO keyword! Well, the click rate, backlinks, conversion rate and even the content were divided between 2 pages; In addition, the credit that was supposed to come from Google would be less!

What’s worse is that Google doesn’t know which page to display at all and ignores it! Whereas if we go with this one page, all of these will be for this page and we will have more chances to get the top ranks.

To solve the problem, prepare a table of contents and write the URL of each in front of it along with keywords. Now see which 2 pages you have used the same keyword.

Site restructuring
Changing the content based on the needs of users and the search results of the console
Find new keywords
Using 301 redirect

Write content that is useful and valuable

If the site is going to rise in Google, you must produce unique, first class and authentic content. Your content should be different from others and avoid copying! (Don’t back and forth the words, it makes no difference.)

Is the issue tied to you? Provide more complete content than competitors. In this content, it is better to see what your competitors are not doing that you should be doing.

For example, all competitors had introduced 20 good products for online sales. We went beyond these words. First, we selected 31 products. Second, we checked the popularity of products with Google Trends.

Explaining how to produce useful content is beyond the scope of this article. We want you to write the article “What is content production and how to create winning content?” read the

But in general, here are a few things to keep in mind:

Use keywords only where needed
Be sure to prepare content according to the user’s needs
Do not exaggerate
Provide up-to-date, practical and actionable information
The content should be for the Iranian user and make sure that your solution is useful for him
Use helpful images (like infographics).
Write more complete content than competitors

Write content that answers the user’s search intent

If a user searches for the term “buy AirPods”, most likely their intention is to buy the product. In such a case, you should prepare the product page by writing a suitable product description that contains the keyword.

But if the term “Airpod buying guide” is searched, the user wants to read a detailed and educational article that will help him in making a better decision.

If the content you produce is not relevant to the user’s intent, you won’t show up in the top results at all; What if you want to attract the attention of users!

Take inbound SEO to the next level with E-E-A-T!

E-E-A-T is the template we use to rate a site; We use it to evaluate each search term and each result.

Hyung Jin Kim

Simply put, E-E-A-T says that trust is achieved by combining experience, expertise and authoritativeness.

Let’s read some examples that get less points from Google’s point of view:

Marketing principles written by an anonymous 15-year-old student
Sore throat treatment guide written by a mechanic student
The page of a site that has a bad reputation
Tax declaration form on the medical site!
Shopping page with very little information that is not transparent

In the next section, let us be a little more precise about the meaning of this concept.

Demonstrate experience or subject matter expertise

For Google, those contents that are prepared by an expert or an experienced person are much more valuable.

For example, in the medical field, if the content is written by a doctor based on his experiences, or at least reviewed by a doctor, it has a better chance of getting top rankings.

To ease Google’s mind about this, you can do the following:

Show that you have complete nobility; Provide solutions to problems based on experience
Use credible sources and link to them
Take advantage of professional quotes
Create a page for each author and link to their LinkedIn profile; At the end of each article, mention the name of the author
Make sure that the information provided in the form of content is correct in all respects

The content of someone who experienced something is different from someone who just translated. For example, let’s say you see an article about “Top 10 Restaurants in Toronto”. In which case it is more useful and attractive for you:

The author has visited 10 restaurants and shared his first-hand experience
collected information from the Internet (even that restaurant may not exist anymore!)

Observing these tips will ease the mind of the reader about the validity of the content and Google will rank it more confidently.

Use keywords in the content text correctly

Above, we talked about the importance of natural content distribution in the text; It is better to use the main keyword once at the beginning of the text (preferably the first paragraph). The right approach is to pick a set of relevant keywords and build content around them.

For example, to write an article about cooking ghee stew, the main keyword may be “recipe for ghee stew”; But the following statements are about the same topic:

How to prepare ghee stew
How to cook ghee stew
Learning how to prepare ghee stew
Majlisi ghee stew recipe
A guide to preparing ghee majlisi stew
How to prepare minced meat with mutton
How to prepare ghee for 4 people

We know these as secondary and secondary keywords. Google uses them to understand the relationship of the page with the user’s search term (query); That is, it understands what the topic of the page is about and what kind of pain it is causing the user. Using them will make your content not filled with the main keyword!

Add appropriate videos and images to your content

Using different content formats on one page is both valuable for Google and creates a good experience for the user. If you can prepare a video related to the topic of the page, it will be easier to rank and people will stay longer.

Images such as infographics and even screenshots of the training steps – for example, the training of creating a matched campaign on hinet – make the user learn difficult concepts more easily.

According to experience, it is better to have a variety of examples in educational articles. Add images to make the audience understand the examples better. Alternatively, record a video of all the steps; Just do the steps yourself once.
This shows that your tutorial is really doable and written from experience.

Writing clickable titles and meta descriptions

It is important to write the title and meta description in such a way that the visitor is encouraged to click on your link. You can use the question in the title; Also, the stimulation of emotions and the use of numbers also work wonders; Like “The best internal SEO techniques in 2024”.

If you have a video on the page, be sure to mention it in the title; For example, “Video training of location registration in Google Map with phone and computer”. In addition, expressions such as step-by-step training, video training, the most complete list, etc. are also effective.

Regarding the meta description, be sure to write it in such a way that the user knows what to expect in the article. Keep it as short as possible; Don’t forget to use keywords!

3. Specifying the structure of the site

Site structure determines how well the pages are organized and related to each other. This point is one of the principles of internal SEO that is also important for technical SEO.

Avoid creating pages with no purpose and without a plan. Each page must be created around specific keywords in order to attract Google’s attention.

Also, categorize and put each content in its own category; In this way, you will not have 2 pages for one keyword!

On the other hand, when you determine the structure of the site in advance, you can determine the importance of the pages; That is, you prioritize them for internal linking.

This image also shows an inappropriate site structure:

3. Techniques related to page structure and technical tips

Without introduction, let’s go to the points of this section.

Use H1 to H6 tags properly

Use H1 to indicate the main page title and only once. If the site is built on WordPress, H1 will be created automatically. The page title (H1) can be different from the SEO title; This is a good opportunity to use secondary and secondary keywords in the title. In this way, a title related to the user’s search term is displayed.

Now it’s time to break your content into smaller chunks. The clearer the structure of the page, the easier it is to read. In addition to the order, many people just read the subheadings to find their answers and understand what each section is about.

Use H2 to H6 respectively. The number of subtitles does not matter; But make sure to use it properly; It means from 2 to 6!

Note that even on landing pages, use these tags to smooth the visitor’s reading path by dividing the content into smaller parts.

Arrange the structure of the page correctly

It is better to arrange the structure according to what the audience needs and not to drag the topic.

For example, if the user searches for the price of the dollar, he does not like to read long sections about what the dollar is, its history, why it is the most common currency in the world, etc.; He simply needs the dollar price at that moment.

Show the price first and to enrich the page, continue to address the important issues with the help of different subheadings.

So provide the most important information first. This mindset of keeping the user hungry to finish the article will not work at all.

Please pay attention to the URL

First of all, the shorter the URL, the better. To the extent that Google officials previously announced that if they are in doubt between 2 pages with the same value, to give a higher rank, they will choose the one with a shorter URL.

In addition, using keywords in the URL helps to optimize the situation. Maybe you want to use English URL like us; In this case, it is recommended to have a short phrase and a synonym of the keyword in English.

But a bad example? Think the URL of this blog post was like this:

hinet .co/blog/asdawASGSDwq
hinet .co/?p=123

Follow the order and classification based on the site structure in the URL. For example, the address of our service page should not be:

hinet.co/blog/retargeting

This page, which is specific to retargeting ads, should either be a subsection of “Services” or come directly after the domain name.

Core Web Vitals review

As we said, good user experience is important directly and indirectly in internal SEO; Core Web Vitals are also important things that Google considers to measure this issue:

Does the original content load quickly?
Is the structure of the page neat and fixed?
How long does the user’s first interaction with the page last?

Increase site speed to improve CWV score; Also, removing redundant scripts and tidying up the code helps in this regard. Put these together with image optimization and watch the score rise.

You can read the article “What to do to improve the site’s SEO”. We have discussed this topic in detail there.

It’s time to power down the site!

Develop a specific strategy for link building

The user and the Google robot should move around the site easily! This issue is tied to the way of linking. Let’s check it all out:

Prioritize pages

Google looks at links with credibility. Therefore, it is better to link to important pages from other pages. On the other hand, proper internal linking ensures proper communication between related pages (source: rockcontent).

So, which page is more important to you? For example, blog is the first entry from Google and it is better to link from blog to important pages such as category page or product page.

On the other hand, the home page of the blog is not very important; Unless you have designed a special page that you want to get leads from.

Look at the prioritization of pages that should be considered for store site SEO:

Home page of the site
Product category page
Product page
Blog articles
Other pages like about us

Your links can have different purposes such as introducing the brand, reading related articles, directing to register on the site, encouraging to buy, introducing the product.

Use descriptive anchor text

One of the common mistakes is using words like here, click, read more, etc. as anchor text and also using long phrases!

Anchortext should be descriptive so that the user understands the topic of the landing page; That is, it should mean on its own. In addition, it is better to use secondary and secondary keywords in some links.

For example, if the keyword is “improving the ranking in Google”, you can use the anchor text “methods to increase the site in Google”.

Use words such as “buy” and “price” in the anchor text for shopping.

Link to other resources and sites

In addition to internal links, you should link to other external sites to demonstrate the credibility of the content.

For example, to show the author’s expertise and experience, link to his LinkedIn profile. Another way is to link to sources in the text like we did.

If you have been paid for links, they must be sponsored links or at least nofollow. On the other hand, you can use UGC or Nofollow links for the links in the comments section.

Note: never link to the main page of the site as a source! Link to the article, report or where your source was.

We have reached one of the interesting topics of internal SEO, which is user experience!

5. Paying attention to the user experience and sending a positive signal!

How to send a positive signal to Google that a good user experience awaits the user? Let’s see!

Lighten the top of the page

The first part that the user sees without scrolling. Keep this section as light as possible and do not go for heavy and very large images.

In blog posts, we recommend displaying the featured image, intro, and table of contents at the very beginning.

Maybe it is better not to display the index image on mobile. For example, you can put a box with a different color and put an introduction or a summary of the text. Then display the list.

Create white space

Creating white space or empty space is one of the topics of design; But for the internal SEO of the site, you should create white space as much as possible on different pages.

By creating white space, the user’s eyes will not get tired. On the other hand, not everyone reads the entire page, and creating white space around important topics—for example, headlines that are read most often—will grab their attention.

Now how to create white space? First, talk to your designer to specify some things in general between the spaces, the size of the texts, the place of the list, Above the fold, etc.

After that, observe the following in the content itself:

Create white space between lines with space

Do not justify!
Use images to segment each subheading
Don’t forget the lists
Leave a quote

Take comments seriously!

Give special value to the comments below the articles. Answer them as soon as possible and try to have a conversation with the audience. Comment is the content that the user produces for you and increases user interaction; It gives them something to stick with after the post is over.

In addition to being responsive, sometimes you find that your article is outdated or doesn’t meet the user’s needs. Update your content based on those comments; Like what we did for the “Keyword Research Tutorial” article.

Even the comments play a role in completing the ideas and points you have brought in the article. You can put a more complete article in front of the user; Before the competitors take this opportunity from you!

The last tips of mastering internal SEO!4.

Let’s see what points we should follow to walk shoulder to shoulder with the professionals.

Internal SEO techniques for images

To optimize images, follow these tips:

Use original images
Do not use decorative images; Photos should create value for the user (such as screenshots of training steps, examples of advertisements or infographics).
Write the name of the image file in English and descriptively; Separate the words with a hyphen
Reduce the size of images
Don’t forget the ALT tag for the image; Naturally, use keywords for images, especially index images and product images
Use 3 common formats PNG, Jpeg and Webp
Have specific instructions for the size of the images
Use the appropriate image in schemas such as Product

Based on experience, instead of using images that everyone uses, prepare your own unique images and use them on the pages.

For example, instead of searching for “images of work environment” and putting the first Google image, put a picture of your work environment.

Using relevant schemas to increase click-through rates

Ranking is valuable, because increasing traffic is important! An increase in traffic cannot be achieved except by increasing the click rate. Using a schema along with a good title and meta description will help you increase this rate.

For example, the Review schema is a form of social validation that shows how many people have liked your content or product.

Trying to reach zero position!

In some queries, Google shows the answer on the same page of the results so that the user gets his answer very quickly; This feature is called Featured Snippet or zero position.

Being in this position is in your interest; Because you own a large part of the results page. If your answer is complete, you have a great chance to click.

How to get to this position? First, see what keywords you were able to get on the first page of Google. After you’ve made your list, go see what’s featured in this niche. Use the same structure and add a new section to your article (source: Backlinko).

For example, if a definition is provided in this position, you also add a brief and useful definition to the page; Like what we did!

Continuous optimization

In general, SEO is a permanent and long-term process! It’s not like you fix everything once and then enjoy the increase in traffic. Competitors can easily take your place with changes! So it is better to constantly monitor the performance of the site and its pages.

For example, the user’s search intent may change, or by checking the search console, you may realize that you misdiagnosed the intent from the beginning. You may even see that the page is not ranked.

Maybe you see your site coming up well in the results; But no one clicks on it. You go to the title and meta description and change it.

Of course, your site may come up for phrases that shouldn’t; For example, Hinet’s “Sports 3 Advertisements” page for the phrase “Sports 3” is also seen on the first page. This is no longer something that can be controlled!

But if, for example, our article “Beauty Clinic Ads” comes up in the results of “Beauty Clinic Launch”, we need to go to the content and check the density of “Beauty Clinic Launch”. Let’s see where it goes wrong.

This is just a small part of performance analysis! All the things we have said so far, you must constantly monitor and prevent problems; Problems such as slow site speed, broken links, keyword cannibalization, duplicate content, and others.

In order to use the search console to your advantage, we suggest you read the article “What is Google Search Console and how to use it?” (Complete Guide for Newbies!)

In addition to the search console, use Google Analytics to make sure you have prepared a good page to host the audience and guide them towards your goal.

Take all 3 sides of SEO seriously!

In this article, we not only told you what internal SEO is and why you should take it seriously, but we also gave you a complete list of everything you need to do.

It is not possible to achieve results without internal optimization and only by relying on external and technical SEO. These 3 columns hand in hand will bring you to your goal of attracting maximum quality traffic.

We would be happy to know your opinion about the article. If we missed something, be sure to write to us.

For more information and to perform your services in the search results, go to our Google Ads services page