If you want to get more sales and generate more revenue from your store, you will need to learn some of the most important growth hacks available in SEO, no matter what type of website or store you operate.

But finding proven SEO tips is hard these days as some self-proclaimed gurus out there are creating non-proven, myth-focused SEO content. Following such recommendations will not only derail your SEO efforts but also hurt your site rankings.

So, what can you do to acquire perfect SEO growth hacking techniques that directly impact your site rankings?

That’s the focus of this article. However, before we get started, here are some important SEO facts that you should know.

SEO Growth Hacking Statistics

70% of marketing specialists can attest that SEO brings more sales compared to PPC initiatives. 49% of marketers agree that organic traffic brings the highest ROI among any other channels. SEO takes from three to six months for the results of your efforts to appear on established sites and almost nine months to one year on brand new websites. SEO is a continuous effort. Google constantly updates its algorithms and the trends of your niche may change, so keeping an eye on what’s happening and adapting/improving your strategy is a must. Back in 2010, Google estimated 350-400 changes, and in 2018 Google made 3,200 changes to its search system.​​

Now that we have some statistics to refer to in our article, it is time to learn about the best growth hacking techniques for your SEO efforts. It is hard to do SEO on your own, but possible. However, if you want to develop your SEO strategy smoothly and in the most effective way, quickly track your website performance, and know what your organic competitors do. The SEO research tool by SE Ranking could be of great help. The software gives you an opportunity to perform automatic website audits, competitor and keyword research, backlink analysis, and other SEO activities in one place, saving your time and resources.

Best SEO Growth Hacking Tips

Competitor & Gap

Analysis What if I told you that one of the most important things for ranking your website on search engines was competitor analysis?

First of all, define your main organic competitors and analyse the following:

• Top pages: Find out their core pages that bring the most traffic.
• Top Keywords: Find their top keywords and how hard or easy they are to rank for.
• Analyse traffic: Analyse traffic volume, geography, and its main sources.
• Backlink profile: Find out what types of links they build and what anchors they use, understand the dynamics, and define link donors that are suitable for your website.
• Content Strategy: What content is the most popular? Why is it helpful for users? How do they structure it?
• Website Design: The general look and feel. Are there any eye-catching features? Note what is convenient for users and what is not, and avoid the latter in your design.

To find your direct and indirect organic competitors use the SE Ranking Competitor Research tool as a starting point. Then, check all the points listed above for your main SERP rivals. With that information, try to outperform or at least repeat the approach of your competitors. Chances are likely you’ll start climbing search results, especially if you combine this approach with the following steps.

Find Low-Hanging Keywords

When it comes to SEO, relevancy is key and the keywords you target should directly match your audience’s interests. So first of all focus on relevant keywords. However, keyword competitiveness is also an important aspect to pay attention to.

If you have created a new website you may face difficulties trying to compete with a well-established brand, so the best way to rank your website is by targeting low-difficulty keywords at the beginning. Use the SE Ranking Keyword Research Tool to find relevant low-difficulty keywords. Such keywords will have a low Difficulty score.

Usually, long-tail keywords have lower competitiveness and higher relevancy. If you are targeting “soccer ball shoes” as a keyword, start looking for options that can narrow your research down further. To find long-tail low-difficulty keywords, you can go for localization i.e. “soccer ball shoes in the USA”. Or, you can add demographics i.e. “soccer ball shoes for women”, etc. There are many variations that can help you grow and hack SEO.

At the same time, while low-difficulty keywords tend to bring results faster, do not forget to gradually develop the content for more competitive queries as well, so that you can start gaining authority in the topic. The earlier you begin – the better.

While almost everyone likes to follow this strategy, it doesn’t always work unless you have the right plan in place.

That is why paying attention to keywords that directly match your audience’s interests and search intent is a must.

Create Content Clusters – Pillar & In-Depth

Your SEO efforts are only as good as the depth of your content. You can increase the depth by adding pillar or cluster content pieces to your website. Let’s say you are writing content on Cat vaccinations.

The content topics should be:

• All about Cat vaccinations
• What Vaccines will a Kitten Get
• What Vaccines Male Cats Get
• What Vaccines Female Cats Get
• Cost of Cat Vaccines
• Types of Cat Vaccines

In the above list of topics, we have one main topic. This topic will be called the pillar. Then we have five subtopics. These will be called clusters.

You can create as many clusters as needed to give a comprehensive answer to your target audience’s questions. Run competitor research with SE Ranking to understand what pillar and cluster content your main organic rivals have.

Internal Linking

Internal linking is a way for people to go from one page on your site to another. However, more importantly, it is another way for Google and other search engines to discover a page on your website.

When more pages link to other pages on your site, search bots automatically understand that the page is of importance to your users. So, it becomes another signal for ranking that page higher in the search results. The Backlinko case study of 912 million pages confirmed the correlation between organic rankings and internal linking. On the other hand, link overuse can backfire, so when adding a link make sure that it brings value to the user and supports their customer journey.

Check that all your links are opened correctly and that there are not any unnecessary 301s (and, especially, redirect chains) or link loops.

This is where the SE Ranking website audit tool comes in handy. It will find all internal links to each of your website’s pages and also the depth of each page. It’s automated, so you just need to add your website as a project there.

Guestographics & Guest Posting

The more quality backlinks your website has, the higher its chances of ranking on search engines.

The best way to get more links on your website is by approaching others to place a link to your resource. You can ask them for:

• Link insertions
• Infographic publishing
• Video embeds
• Guest posts
• Opinion pieces
• Press releases
• Coupon submission

Use SE Ranking’s Backlink Checker to spy on your competitors’ backlinks and find websites you can place your own on. Then, reach out to them to agree on the topic and conditions. Once everything is ready, prepare your graphic and video content to be published using editors such as Canva, Adobe Spark, Animaker, or something similar and support it with engaging text.

Most websites may charge a fee for letting you become a publisher on their website. However, you can also find those that will let you post content for free. It really comes down to how well you can negotiate and the types of markets you search for.

Ready To Growth Hack SEO?

We have mentioned some of the best proven SEO growth hacking tactics for business websites.

Now over to you. Make sure to analyse the SEO strategy of your competitors to see what works in your niche. Target the right keywords, create value in your content, and use internal linking properly. Reach out to bloggers and platforms to get backlinks. And whatever activity you are busy with, keep in mind that it is crucial to rely on data rather than just personal opinion. Having reliable SEO tools and platforms on hand will greatly help you in your marketing endeavours.

Following these steps is a nice starting point to maintain consistent growth, get better revenues, and find valuable business opportunities.