Search engine optimization (SEO) and digital marketing cannot really be separated, so if this field interests you, the fundamentals are worth having. SEO specialists divide the work into three: on-page SEO, off-page SEO and technical SEO.

What the job asks of you:

  • the ability to write,
  • a firm grip on the rules of your language,
  • research instinct,
  • the ability to infer what comes next

This article sets out what on-page SEO is, why it matters and how to use SEO tools to optimize your pages, in detail. If you are new to SEO, or you want a firmer grasp of the on-page side, this guide is written for you.

Let us begin.

Use the menu to jump to whichever section you came for:

1. What is on-page SEO?

On-page SEO is a large part of the work of making a web page more visible in search: the sensible arrangements you make inside the site itself. As the name suggests, it covers changes to the content of a page and to its HTML that improve the page's chances of ranking.

Because it is page based, on-page SEO does not include off-page work such as earning backlinks or building domain authority.

2. Why does on-page SEO matter?

On-page SEO is what tells search engines how your site is built and what the pages on it actually say. 

One part of it, for instance, is using headings and subheadings that carry your main keyword. The heading signals to search engines that your post is a likely match for certain queries, while the subheadings show how much of the subject you cover.

Good on-page SEO gives search engines grounds to treat your site as high quality content worth ranking. Weak on-page SEO can do the opposite and drag your positions down.

Which is why producing content with SEO in mind matters so much.

3. How do you create SEO friendly content?

Producing SEO content can feel intimidating if the idea is new to you, but once the fundamentals are in place it becomes second nature. If you want to write an SEO friendly article, do these three things:

1. Do your keyword research

The first step, and there is no argument about it, is finding out which terms your audience types into a search engine. That is the whole of keyword research. 

What are people searching for?

Keyword research means using SEO tools to find out which words and phrases your audience looks for, how many people search them each month, and what other sites have already published on the subject you are about to write about.

There are several keyword research tools to choose from: Ahrefs Keyword Explorer (strong), Semrush, Ubersuggest, Moz Keyword Explorer and Keyword Surfer. They help you find the relevant keywords to aim at in your industry, and they are just as useful for checking the keywords already on your radar.

Say you want to write about “how to become a freelance writer”. Searching that keyword in a keyword explorer shows you how easy, or how hard, ranking for it will be. You also see an estimate of how many people search it each month, along with the specific questions people ask around the subject.

What comes out of keyword research tells you which keywords are worth pursuing and what you need to include to cover them properly.

2. Match the search intent

Even writers who know their keywords can fall into the trap of writing for search engines and forgetting the audience. Useful content starts with the searcher finding the thing they were looking for. Matching search intent means answering the reader's question, preferably early in the article .

This article, for example, is about on-page SEO. So the first subheading goes straight at it. It does not open with a long thesis on the history of SEO; the subject is on-page SEO. We answer the questions that sit next to it as well, and show you how to optimize your pages for search engines. That is what matching search intent looks like in practice.

Match the intent and optimize for search, and you end up with posts that rank higher and are genuinely useful to read. When readers stay longer on your pages and share your content on social media or with colleagues, that engagement signals to search engines that the content is high quality. Higher positions follow from there.

3. Site structure and post structure

Subheadings are not decoration. They tell search engines how far your article reaches, and done properly they can lift your positions . The same holds for the structure of your site: the categories you use and the way posts and pages are arranged.

Take that article titled “how to become a freelance writer”: if you never use a subheading carrying your keywords, the post is unlikely to rank. You can write something genuinely informative and still have almost nobody find it in the results, purely because the subheadings were not used properly.

Use the right heading hierarchy too. Our specialists agree that H1 belongs to the post title alone. The heading tags that follow are H2, H3 and so on. That gives you no direct SEO advantage, but it makes your content easier to read and to scan, which raises your chances of being visible in search. Assuming, of course, that you wrote something worth reading in the first place.

4. How do you optimize your SEO content?

Once the content is written, or planned, it is time to optimize it. Three things to do: 

Put your keyword in

There is no formula for how often your keyword should appear, but our specialists at Türk SEM agree on one thing: your article has to contain your keyword. When you write about a subject naturally, you will mention the theme or its related words several times anyway – without ever thinking about it.

As we said in the piece on SEO friendly articles, take care to work your keyword into the first paragraph. That paragraph has to catch attention, and the language has to stay readable and plain.

What you must avoid is the practice known as keyword stuffing. Mentioning keywords in ways that do not sound natural, and packing the article with them, is something Google works out. Search engines can penalize a site for it.

Another on-page practice that gets too little credit is internal linking. Internal links point to other pieces of content on your own site. You will notice, for example, that most of our posts link to “other articles”. That is internal linking.

Our link extractor lets you find the internal links on your own site. Internal links help you in three ways:

  • they keep readers on your site, moving from one piece to the next
  • they help search engines understand how the site is organized
  • they build authority for the newer pages and articles on it

The most effective internal links point at relevant content and carry descriptive anchor text. Readers are likelier to click them, and search engines can read them easily.

Use images and alt text

Images can be a powerful on-page element. They can rank in image search, and they can make an article easier to grasp than the words alone. They also break up walls of text and make a piece more pleasant to read. Some kinds of image, infographics in particular, are easier to share and can carry your content further.

To get the most out of images as part of your on-page SEO, add descriptive alt text, ideally carrying the keyword of the post. Alt text improves the accessibility of your site and lets people on a slow connection understand what the image was meant to show. 

The rest of image optimization comes down to this:

  • choosing an image that adds something to your text 
  • giving it a relevant file name (ideally with your keyword in it)
  • resizing and compressing images so they load faster, which improves your on-page SEO
  • including images in your XML sitemap
  • adding captions where they help the reader get something from the image

That is a long list of things to do if you want to produce SEO content, and as you may have noticed, several of them need tools. So let us look at the tools.

5. Useful on-page SEO tools

Doing this work properly takes a few basic tools, and on-page SEO is no exception.

Google Search Console

google search console

This Google tool helps you get your site into the results, watch your traffic, spot serious problems and see which keywords bring the most of it in. You can also submit the sitemaps that help your pages get picked up sooner.

Ahrefs Keyword Explorer

The Ahrefs suite we mentioned earlier is an all in one SEO tool: keyword research, competitive gap analysis, site audits and a good deal more. It will also watch your site for internal link problems and page errors, show you which content ranks at the top of your industry and let you analyze what your competitors publish.

Some SEO specialists prefer Semrush, which is another all in one tool.

Clearscope

clearscope

Clearscope is an AI assisted SEO tool for building content that matches search intent. It reads the top ranking content for your keyword and hands you a set of related phrases to guide what you write. 

Google PageSpeed Insights

One important on-page factor we have not mentioned yet is site speed. Slow sites frustrate people, push bounce rates up and signal to search engines that your site may not be a good resource. This Google tool measures your page speed and suggests what to improve. Speed sits under technical SEO, but problems in on-page content can slow a page down all the same. Run the test and see what is holding your page back.

6. On-page SEO: FAQ

What is the most important on-page factor?

There is no single most important factor. Most of these elements do not work without the others. You can write excellent content, but if your keyword is missing from the title and the meta description, you probably will not land where you wanted to. The fundamentals to learn for on-page SEO are these:

  • writing to match search intent
  • optimizing titles, meta descriptions and headings
  • adding relevant images with alt text

Start there and add the rest later.

How can I learn on-page SEO?

If you have read this article, you have the fundamentals. If you want to go deeper with someone guiding you, I would suggest the Türk SEM SEO course, which is taught in Turkish. On that course you do SEO on your own site while you learn it. I am not saying this because I teach the lessons myself; the work we do on it is genuinely useful.

What is an example of on-page SEO?

Examples of on-page SEO include headings and subheadings, internal links, images and alt text. Optimize all of them and your content stands a better chance of ranking and of drawing more traffic.

7. Conclusion and further reading

On-page SEO is essential to a website that ranks well. It can look meaningless at first, and with a little research it turns out to be the easiest part of SEO to apply. The key to excellent SEO content is this: give your readers the information they came for and wanted to learn. 

Use headings and subheadings to give the content a structure, add images to make it more inviting, and work your keyword naturally through the text to show search engines what the page is about.