How do I leverage my homepage for SEO?

The home page is often one of the most important pages for an SEO journey. Not always to rank yourself, but always to support the other pages you want to rank higher in Google with. In this article, I dive deeper into how I use my home page (of this website) for SEO. For each block relevant to SEO, I will explain what I did and why I made certain choices. This gives a good picture of my way of thinking.

For all images, the circles around certain links indicate which links have been assigned a nofollow attribute. This is vital within this article.

What’s important here: With the homepage, I want to rank higher in Google for the keyword SEO specialist.

Block 1 of the home page: The banner

Home page banner. I list the things related to SEO below the image.

• SEO specialist hiring as added. Thus, I grab several variations of the main topic; namely, “SEO specialist” and “SEO specialist hiring.” The consideration here was how I wanted to write SEO specialist (with or without hyphenation). When faced with such a consideration yourself: I actually always go for the version that is grammatically correct and assume that Google does not make a big distinction here.
• The underneath is worded so that it is both user-friendly and once again highlights the keyword.
• In principle, I could use the buttons underneath better. The big “problem” with these two buttons is that I chose pages that are important for website conversion. One link to the contact page and one link to the references. As can be seen, both links get a nofollow attribute (which is a shame because this is where you can normally place strong internal links to important pages for SEO).
• The link to the references shown with my image contains a nofollow attribute. I do this to avoid wasting linkjuice on an external link.
• The image’s name and alt attribute both contain the main keyword: SEO specialist.

Block 2: The first textual content

The first textual content (below the USPs) of the page. Below the image my reflections.

• The headers (a and a ) both contain the main keyword.
• The header “What is an SEO specialist?” is also a high-volume variation. Typically, I wouldn’t have otherwise immediately chosen to ask this question here (I don’t find it otherwise very relevant to my target audience – my target audience does know what an SEO specialist is).
• There are 2 main links to important pages; the website higher in Google and SEO optimization.
• The link to the method contains a nofollow attribute. I don’t want Google to waste too much time on this page.

Block 3: The call to action

Here are my thoughts on block 3: The call to action on the page.

• The call to action is created uniquely for this page and does not occur with the same textual content on other pages.
• The headers of this call to action contain the main keyword (SEO specialist).
• The link to the contact page contains a nofollow attribute. Important again to channel linkjuice only to the most important pages.
• The image in the call to action contains the correct name and alt attribute.
• Furthermore, the call to action has been optimized to expedite the right customer journey on the page.

Block 4: Link to an external source with high authority

• From this piece of text, I link to an external source with a lot of authority on hiring an SEO specialist.
• Important here again is that I have incorporated the keyword in both a and a (about 60% of headers I usually try to stick to).

Block 5: FAQ and author

• A link under the name Ralf van Veen to the about me page stating that I wrote this page. This is how I prove that the page was written by someone with a lot of experience within this market (E-E-A-T).
• An FAQ containing a lot of content. A FAQ that folds out is often a great way of incorporating a lot of content on the page without impacting the UX of the page too much.

Summary

My idea here is always (and hopefully you’ll see this reflected in my approach) to make both UX and SEO a high priority. So this often comes down to writing quality content, not using duplicate content, deploying the right images and simply offering them on the page the searcher is looking for.