1. What is Webflow, and what makes it one of the most popular website builders?
As mentioned above, Webflow is a solution for creating self-hosted websites. What makes it so popular is the ability to create clean, semantic code without having to write the code. The platform automatically converts your designs into clean, SEO-friendly code.
2. Is Webflow the right platform for your business?
If you are an absolute beginner and want to have total control over the design of your website, then Webflow may be the ideal platform for your business. In fact, large companies such as Lattice, Getaround, HelloSign, Dell And Upwork Are currently using Webflow for their websites.
3. Is Webflow good for SEO?
Yes, Webflow undoubtedly comes with a few winning SEO-friendly features. But, of course, it's also up to you to implement various SEO strategies to ensure you earn your place on the first page of Google search results.
In fact, when Lattice moved their website from a custom CMS to Webflow CMS, they were able to see a huge Growth of 280% in their organic traffic, which is massive! Likewise, Kisi Increased organic traffic by 300% after changing to Webflow. These case studies are clear indicators that Webflow for SEO is good.
4. Setting up Webflow SEO
Before learning how to maximize SEO on Webflow, it is essential to finish with a few SEO parameters. In this section, we'll look at these basic settings for setting up your SEO Webflow site.
Ensure the visibility of your site in search engines
SEO is a question of visibility for search engines. Your website should be visible to search engine algorithms so that they can access your content and rank your site differently.
The process by which search engine robots crawl your website and scan the pages on your site is called indexing. Before you start implementing SEO in Webflow, you need to make sure that search engine indexing is enabled for your Webflow site.
You can do this by going to the Webflow dashboard > All Projects. Select the project you want to edit and select Settings > SEO > Indexing.
Here, make sure that the Disable Webflow Indexing button is disabled. This means that search engines like Google and Bing can index and rank your website.
Make sure you have a valid SSL certificate installed
Security is one of the most important aspects of SEO. Google wants to provide the best possible user experience, and so without appropriate security measures, Google won't rank your site. One of these measures is the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate.
The SSL protocol guarantees the privacy of visitors to your website by encrypting the exchange of data between your site and users' browsers. Sites with a valid SSL certificate have HTTPS in their URL instead of an HTTP and a lock symbol next to the URL.
The SSL certificate is a crucial SEO ranking factor, so you need to ensure that your site has a valid SSL certificate. Webflow offers built-in SSL certificates for all of their websites, which means you don't need to worry about getting one.
To check for a valid SSL certificate, simply go to your website and check the URL. If it says HTTPS instead of HTTP, you're ready.
Verify your Webflow site with Google
Another advantage for Google to start indexing your website is Google's site verification. This check should be done through Google Search Console, a free Google tool.
Google Search Console offers useful information about your site, such as Google search impressions, clicks, click rates, search engine rankings, etc. The tool also provides information about possible indexing or crawl errors.
For your Webflow site to be verified by Google, start by connecting to Google Search Console Using a valid Google account Here, you add a property (your site) by entering your site's domain or URL.
Then, choose the HTML tag option under the verification methods and copy the verification code that is displayed. Open the Webflow dashboard in a new window and go to Project > Settings > SEO > Google Site Verification. Paste in the code that you copied earlier.
Then click Save Changes and then click the Publish option in the upper right corner of the screen.
Then go to the Google Search Console window and click Verify.
Add a sitemap to Google Search Console
Once you've verified your Webflow site with Google, the next step is to add the sitemap to Google. A site map is an XML file that serves as a map of your site. It consists of a list of the pages on your site, which makes it easier for Google to navigate your site.
The first step is to generate a site map. Webflow automatically generates a site map for your site. You can access it by going to Project > Settings > SEO > Site Map and toggling the option to Yes.
You can now access the site map by adding "sitemap.xml" to the end of your site URL, for example: yoursite.com/sitemap.xml.
You can also write your own custom sitemap.xml by setting the Auto-generate Sitemap option to No. Then add your custom sitemap in the space indicated.
The next step is to submit your sitemap.xml file to Google Search Console. To do this, go to the Google Search Console dashboard > Sitemap > Add a new sitemap.
Here, simply paste the URL from your sitemap and click Submit. Google will then process your sitemap in some time.
Set up Google Analytics and integrate it with Webflow
Google Analytics is another free Google tool that offers useful data and analytics on your website.
The tool offers information about the demographics of your site visitors, the most viewed pages, acquisition sources, and many other key details that can help you optimize your site and rank higher for keywords.
Integrating Google Analytics with your Webflow site will ensure that your site data is captured accurately by the tool. To do this, start by registering for Google Analytics (use the same Google account that was used for Google Search Console).
In your Google Analytics dashboard, go to Admin > Property > Tracking Info > Tracking Code. Here you can copy the code that is displayed.
Then, go to your Webflow dashboard > select Project > Project > Integrations > Google Analytics and paste the tracking code you copied in the space provided. After that, you can click Publish, and you're ready to go. Once done, Google Analytics will take some time to fill in your site's data and present information based on it.
Create an optimized site structure
Site structure is how web pages and other information are organized on your website. This is an important aspect of the SEO of any business website because it determines the user experience and usability of your site.
It is essential to start with an optimized site structure so that your visitors can easily navigate between different pages and find the information they are looking for.
Generally, you should start with the main pages of your site, such as the home page, contact page, information page, services page, etc. Under these pages, you may have other subpages. For example, from the “Services” page, you can add links to the different types of services you offer.
In the case of an e-commerce site, your site structure generally starts with the main pages, followed by the various category pages. Under these, you can have all of your product pages.
Depending on the structure of the site, you need to design the navigation of your website. You can add pages to your Webflow site based on the structure you designed. You can do this by going to the designer of your Webflow site and clicking on the Pages option. Here, you can add new folders or parent pages to your site.
It's critical to add the most important pages on your site to the top. For example, the home page, services, prices, contact, etc., should always be at the top of your site's hierarchy. In this way, search engines such as Google also perceive these pages as important.
Ensure the responsiveness of your Webflow site
One of the essential elements of having an SEO-friendly website is making sure it's mobile-friendly and responsive. Search engines like Google have been constantly pointing this out.
Google follows mobile-first indexing, which means that Google's crawlers will index the mobile version of your website to determine ranking, regardless of whether the search was done from a desktop, tablet, or mobile device.
In addition, it is important to have a mobile-friendly and responsive website to provide a good user experience.
By default, all the templates offered by Webflow are mobile-friendly and responsive. But you can verify this by using the various preview options offered by the Webflow designer.
Be sure to check the preview options for tablet, mobile landscape, and mobile portrait for all web pages before pressing the Publish button. This will ensure that the fonts, texts, images, images, links, buttons, and other elements are correct.
5. Webflow On Page SEO Strategies
Once you've finished setting up the basic SEO of your Webflow site, you can start implementing the on-page SEO strategies described in the Webflow tutorial below.
SEO with webflow can be divided into two main categories: on-page and off-page optimization techniques. On-page SEO refers to the various SEO techniques that can be implemented on the pages of your website. In comparison, off-page SEO refers to tactics that can be implemented outside of your site's pages.
In general, on-page SEO is more under your control because it involves making certain changes to the pages on your site. Off-page SEO is more complicated, more difficult, and generally not within your control. Nonetheless, both are essential for achieving good search engine rankings.
In this section, we're going to look at the various on-page SEO tactics that you can implement on your Webflow site.
Perform a keyword search
The first and most important step in implementing SEO is keyword research. When you start with the right keywords, half of your on-page SEO battle is won. But first of all, what are keywords? Keywords are words or phrases that people use when they search on Google.
For example, if I am looking for information on SEO techniques on page, I type “SEO on page for Webflow” on Google. So that's the keyword, and websites that have optimized their content/ website for that keyword will be ranked at the top of the Google search engine results page (SERP).
Related reading: Google Advanced Search Operators
There are several ways to search for keywords. Here we are going to list some of the easiest and most effective methods.
1. Google search results page:
Google can be one of the best ways to find target keywords for your website. Go to the Google search engine and type in the topics that best relates to your business.
For example, if you're an e-commerce store selling vegan beauty products, you might search for topics like “vegan beauty products Australia” or “cruelty free beauty products.”
Based on your search, Google will offer you automatic suggestions. These are the keywords that users are actually looking for on Google. You can play around with automatic suggestions to get a long list of target keywords.
For the same searches, you can also check out other sections such as the “People Also Ask” section and the “Related Searches” section. They are also useful places to find keywords that interest your target audience.
2. Keywords Research Tools:
You can also use keyword research tools to find the right keywords for your Webflow site. Most keyword research tools offer additional information about each keyword. For example, you can get information about keyword difficulty and search volume for keywords.
Keyword difficulty refers to a relative score that represents how hard it is to appear on the first page of Google for that keyword. If the score is low, it's relatively easy to get a high ranking for that keyword.
Search volume is the number of searches that the keyword receives each month. If the search volume for a keyword is relatively high and if you rank well for that word, you will generate more traffic to your website.
Keyword research tools also offer lots of additional data and metrics that you can use to dig deeper into your keyword research.
There are a variety of keyword research tools you can choose from, such as SEMrush, Ahrefs, KWFinder, Alsoaksed, etc.
Find informational keywords
Keywords can be classified into broad categories based on search intent. Search intent refers to the user's intent when they search for a keyword on Google. You can use tools like KeywordInsights.ai to automatically categorize keywords.
Are they trying to find information, compare products, or buy a product? It's good to optimize your Webflow site for keywords that correspond to different types of intent.
Keywords that are used to search for general information about a topic are known to have informational intent. It is a good idea to optimize the content of your Webflow blog for such informational keywords. These keywords don't lead directly to sales. However, they will bring users to your sales funnel.
Here are a few examples of informational keywords: “Which beauty brands are cruelty free?” , “How do you know if a product is cruelty free?” or “vegan skin care.”
Find keywords with commercial intent
Keywords that have a buying intent are known to be commercial in intent. Here are a few examples of commercial keywords: “buy cruelty free moisturizer for the face” or “the best vegan body mist.”
In general, it's best to optimize your main pages, such as the home page, the services page, the information page, etc., for commercial keywords.
If you're an e-commerce brand, you can optimize your product pages for these keywords. A high ranking for these keywords is more likely to lead to conversions and is therefore very beneficial.
Search for competitors
Competitive research should also be part of your keyword research strategy. Studying your competitors' most important pages, their ranking keywords, etc., will give you a direction to follow.
You can also target specific keywords that your competitors are already ranking for and try to outperform them.
Most keyword research tools offer the competitor search option, where you can type in your competitors' URLs and look for useful data about them.
Once you've finished your keyword research, the next step in on-page optimization is optimizing your website for those keywords. We'll talk about that in the following sections.
Optimize main pages for target keywords
The main pages of your Webflow site, such as the home page, the services page, the services page, the pricing page, the information page, etc. are the most important pages that form the structure of your site. Your on-page SEO should start with optimizing these pages.
To get started, you can create a list of keywords that best describe your business. This list should be based on keyword and competitor research carried out in the previous steps. Then, you can start adding these keywords to the main pages of your site.
For example, if you're a fitness trainer offering online services, you can edit web pages to include keywords like “online fitness trainer” and “free home workouts” in titles and subtitles, as well as other text. You can do this using the Webflow designer.
Be sure to include your target keywords in the titles, headers, and the top of your web pages, as the keywords included here are more effective.
It's also important to note that you shouldn't stuff your web pages with keywords to the point of making them difficult to read and making your text look artificial.
This will significantly affect your user experience and hurt your conversions. There is no point in attracting traffic to your page without any conversions.
Create high quality blog content
Blogging is one of the most important elements in increasing traffic to your website and getting a better organic ranking on Google. Because of the high competition we see in the market today, it is very unlikely that consumers will come directly to your site with the intention to buy and convert.
Most consumers who search on Google are looking for relevant and useful information about certain topics. However, they're looking to research products or services before making a buying decision.
With blog content, you can offer valuable information to your consumers and get them into your sales funnel.
Researching keywords and competitors will help you find the right topics and titles for your Webflow blog. Understand your audience, find the topics and information they're actively looking for, and create content about those topics.
Also, look at your competitors' blog content and look for the blog posts that get the most traffic and engagement (you can use keyword research tools for that).
Try to outperform your competitors by creating more useful, in-depth, and up-to-date content on the same topics.
Here are some tips that will help you optimize your blog content for SEO:
- Optimize your titles to get better click rates. This means that the titles of your blog posts should be such that they encourage and push users to click on your article from the SERPs.
- Create blog posts that cover a topic in depth and are longer. For example, creating one 2,000-word blog post will be more effective than creating four 500-word blog posts (in most cases). This is because Google wants to direct users to content that covers a topic in depth, so that they don't have to go through different pages to find all the information they need.
- Follow an appropriate hierarchical structure for your blog posts, starting with titles, followed by subtitles. Organize your content into bullet points and numbered lists. Google algorithms will thus be able to more easily navigate your content and understand its context.
- Be sure to include the main keyword and at least 4 or 5 related keywords in your blog posts. The best places to include keywords are the title, headings, subheadings, paragraphs, the first 200 words of the blog post, and the entire page.
- Avoid keyword stuffing or other “grey-hat/black-hat” SEO tactics that will affect the user experience and lead to Google penalties.
- Instead of just focusing on optimizing your content for search engines, try to offer content that has value for your target audience. You'll get a better ranking in Google as search engines like Google also want to provide the best possible experience for their users.
To create blog posts using the Webflow designer, you can use the blog post templates offered by the Webflow template you have chosen. However, you can simply add a new page and structure it in the format of a blog post.
Add titles, meta descriptions, and SEO-friendly URLs to all pages.
Headings, metatags, and URLs play a crucial role in on-page SEO. It's critical that you optimize these elements for all pages.
Webflow designer provides an easy way to change these elements for each of the pages you choose to publish on your site, whether they are main pages, blog posts, or e-commerce product pages.
When you do a Google search, you'll notice that the title, meta description, and URL structure are three main elements that appear in SERPs. You should optimize these elements to include the main targeted keywords.
To edit these elements using your Webflow designer, select a page and click Edit Page Settings. Under SEO Settings, you'll find provisions for changing the Title tag and the Meta Description.
In the general settings, you will find where to change the page URL.
These are the key Webflow SEO parameters for blog posts.
Optimize images to be SEO-friendly.
Images are another important part of optimizing your web page. The reason is that, first of all, images play a huge role in providing a better user experience. And second, images are the heaviest part of any page (they generally take up the most storage space on a page).
Here are some tips for optimizing images to be SEO-friendly:
- Be sure to be generous enough when adding images to your web pages, whether they are main pages or content pages. Images can break down text walls on any page, improve readability, draw attention to the right places, and interest users who browse your site.
- Add images that are relevant to the content on the web page. Those that are not relevant can hinder the user experience of a page.
- You can use either stock/royalty images or original images (screenshots, original photos, or graphics) on your site. You can use sites like Unsplash, AllTheFreeStock, etc. Pro tip: Using original images is more effective than using stock images because original images are more personal and engaging.
- Be sure to compress the images and reduce their size before uploading them to your Webflow designer. You can do this using free tools like TinyPNG or TinyJPG. These tools generally allow you to reduce image file sizes by 60 to 70% without affecting image quality.
- Add SEO-friendly alt tags to your images. Alt tags appear on user screens when your images aren't loaded for some reason. SEO-friendly alt tags are also useful to ensure the accessibility of your site. Try adding alt tags that best describe the image in question. You should also try to include one of your target keywords in the alt tags, as this also fits your Google rankings.
- Enabling lazy image loading will help you improve your site's page load speed. You can activate it using the image set in the Webflow Designer.
You can add images to your Webflow site pages by going to Add Items > Media > Image.
You can change alt text, lazyload settings, and more for images by double-clicking an image and going to Image Settings.
Ensure the readability of the pages of your Webflow site
How many times have you abandoned websites because the text was too small or because the huge walls of text hurt your eyes? This happens to most of us, especially when browsing on mobile devices.
To avoid this, it is essential that you improve the readability of your pages. To Do This, You Can
- Break through huge walls of text using media elements like images, videos, memes, infographics, and more.
- Try to limit the length of your paragraphs to 3 or 5 sentences.
- Add lots of white space wherever needed.
- Most readers are skimmers, so try to highlight important parts of your text by formatting them using bold, italics, etc.
- Use color palettes that are easier on the eyes and improve the readability of your text.
Optimize content for UX signals
User experience (UX) signals are an important ranking factor for Google. Google uses these signals to measure the user experience offered by the pages of your website.
Here are some of the important UX signals and tips on how to optimize your content based on these signals:
Waiting Time
Wait time is the amount of time a user spends on your page before moving on to other results in the SERPs. To improve wait time, try to create valuable, relevant, relevant, accurate, engaging, and comprehensive content so that users spend more time on your page.
Bounce rate
The bounce rate is an indicator of the percentage of visitors who abandon your page without taking any action, such as clicking on a link, filling out a form, etc.
You can reduce the bounce rate by giving users exactly what they are looking for. Good design, engaging content, and good page load speed also help to reduce the bounce rate.
Organic click rate (CTR)
The organic click rate is the number of users who click on the link on your page and arrive at your site after seeing it on the SERP.
To improve organic CTR, optimize SEO titles, meta descriptions, and URLs to entice and encourage visitors to click for more information.
Search intent
Search intent refers to the intent of the user when they search on Google. If you don't optimize your pages for search intent, your users will leave your site.
Search intent optimization starts with thorough keyword research and mapping. Make sure you're associating the right keywords with the right pages/content.
Optimize the speed of your Webflow site
Site and page speed is another important factor that significantly increases your search engine rankings. As noted earlier, search engines prioritize the user experience.
If your web pages load faster, Google will rank them better. If your pages load slowly, users will be impatient and will most likely abandon your page, leading to poor rankings.
Here are some tips for optimizing your Webflow site to improve page speed:
- Compress images before uploading them to your site, as images are usually the ones that contribute to slow page loading. Images typically take up 50 to 90% of the size of a page. Image compression will therefore have a considerable impact on the speed of your page. As we mentioned before, you can compress images using free tools like TinyPNG and TinyJPG. Webflow has also implemented the TinyPNG API, which allows you to automatically size and compress images when they are uploaded to the Webflow designer.
- Enabling lazy image loading also speeds up the loading of your site's pages and improves overall performance. When lazy loading is enabled, instead of loading all the images on the page at once, the browser loads the images as the user scrolls through the page. This speeds up the page load time.
- Use Google's free page speed test tool, called Pagespeed Insights, which helps you analyze the speed of the desktop and mobile versions of your website. The tool also offers useful information and suggestions that you can incorporate to make your site load faster. As a general rule, you should try to keep your page load speed under 3 seconds.
- When you opt for Webflow hosting, you automatically benefit from good page speed. Indeed, Webflow offers a hosting stack powered by AWS and distributed globally, with more than 100 data centers located around the world.
Tool to help optimize page speed - SEO Persistent Connection Check Tool
Set up internal links for SEO
An internal link is a link from one page to another page on your website. Used strategically, the internal link can be a powerful tool to improve the visibility of your website in search engines.
Every web page on the Internet has a page authority score that refers to that page's search engine authority. You can check the PA score of any web page using the MOZ bar Chrome plugin.
In general, the higher the PA of a page, the greater its authority and link capital. By using internal links, you can directly distribute this link capital to other lower PA pages on your site. This can be a powerful tool for improving the rankings of the various pages on your site.
Another benefit of using internal links is to offer a good UX. You can strategically add internal links in the right places to help your users discover new content, engage them more, and keep them on your site longer.
For example, at the end of each blog post, you can add links to other relevant blog posts on your site.
6. Webflow off-site SEO strategies
Now that we've covered the various on-page SEO strategies for your Webflow site, let's take a look at the various off-page SEO techniques.
Creating backlinks for your Webflow site: Outsourcing strategies
Backlinks are one of Google's top three ranking factors. So what is a backlink and why is it an essential part of your off-page SEO strategy?
Backlinks are nothing but external links from other sites/domains on the Internet to your site. In other words, if another website adds a link to your site, you've got a backlink!
Backlinks represent the authority, credibility, and trustworthiness of a website. It is therefore essential that you focus on creating good quality backlinks to your site.
Focus on getting high-quality backlinks
Before we dive into the various link building tactics, we first need to understand what affects the quality of a backlink.
- Domain Authority (DA): Each domain or website has an authority score that is linked to it. The higher the DA score, the more authoritative and trustworthy the content offered by the site is. In addition, a high DA score is also directly linked to a better ranking in the SERPs. Backlinks from high DA websites are considered to be high quality links.
- Page Authority (PA): PA is similar to DA, but id for each page. Just as in the case of DA, a return link from a page with a higher PA is considered to be of better quality.
- Relevance: The relevance of the domain and the link page is also important. The more relevant the website and the subject of the link page, the higher the quality of the backlink.
- Do-follow link: Hyperlinks can be described as no-follow and do-follow. Do-follow links are generally considered to be high quality links. This is explained by the fact that do-follow links allow the passage of link/equity juice from the link page to the page on your site.
- Link placement: If the link back to your site is placed higher on the link page, it will carry more weight than if it is placed lower on the page.
- Link anchor text: Anchor text refers to text that is added instead of the link. Keyword-rich anchor text carries more weight and is a high-quality link than anchor text that is irrelevant and does not contain your target keywords.
Email awareness to retrieve links from competitors
Sending emails is one of the most common ways to create backlinks to your site. You can start by researching your competitors and making a list of the websites that are currently connecting with your competitors.
To do this, you can use keyword research tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, Spyfu, and more.
Then, choose content that is similar to that of your competitor. If you can't find one, you can create content from scratch and make sure it's better than that of your competitors.
You can also update existing content on your website to make it better than that of your competitors.
Then, you can contact the websites that currently link to your competitors via email explaining how your content can add more value and better serve their target audience. If your content is really exceptional, you'll definitely get tons of backlinks that way.
Guest posting
Guest posting is another common way to create high-quality backlinks to your site. Simply look for publishing opportunities on quality websites that are relevant to your industry. You can take a look at your competitors and see where they are posting.
You can also do a simple Google search with the terms “guest post+<votre_industrie>” or “write for us +<votre_industrie>”.
Google will offer you a long list of sites where you can publish articles. Most sites allow you to add backlinks in the content and/or in the “author bio” section.
Publishing articles as a guest will allow you to get backlinks and will help you strengthen your authority and visibility in your sector.
Building Broken Links
Broken links are hyperlinks that lead to pages that no longer exist. These broken links usually lead to pages that display “Page not found” or “404 error.” Because these pages hurt the user experience, pages with such broken links hurt search engine rankings.
You can use these broken links to create backlinks for your site. All you need to do is go to the most popular and high value-added websites in your industry and look for broken links on their popular pages.
You can do this easily using free Chrome plugins like Check My Links And Link Miner.
When you find broken links on one of these sites, send them an email informing them of the links and offering them an alternative - a link to your site with similar content. There is a good chance that you will gain numerous backlinks from high value-added sites in this way.
Creating links to resource pages
Resource pages are pages that contain links to resources that are useful to users. It can be a list of useful tools, content, or any other resource. High-authority websites may have such resource pages with dozens of links to useful resources.
You can contact these websites and offer them another useful resource to add to their list - a link to a useful tool/resource on your website. If your resource is really useful and valuable for their target audience, you will definitely get lots of backlinks to your site.
Mentions of unrelated brands
Often, websites refer to your content, use your images, or refer to your brand without adding a link to your site. They're also great opportunities to generate backlinks.
All you need to do is set up Google alerts for your brand name or any other keyword specific to your site.
Google will alert you as soon as someone mentions your brand. If you can't find a link from them, you can contact them by email and ask for a return link.
Creating backlinks for your Webflow site: Inbound strategies
The various strategies mentioned in the previous section for generating backlinks were mostly outbound, that is, you were actively trying to connect with people to get backlinks. While outbound strategies can be effective, you need to put in hours of time and effort before you see results.
Therefore, apart from outsourcing strategies, you should also focus on internalization tactics to create backlinks to your site. In this section, we'll look at how you can use content marketing to create high-quality backlinks to your site.
Produce high quality and consistent content
Wikipedia is probably one of the most popular sites that get tons of good quality backlinks from websites. But why Wikipedia?
That's probably because the quality, authority, reliability, and expertise of the content that Wikipedia has to offer are nearly unbeatable.
Likewise, if you make the effort to create quality content, you will automatically get back links to your site. The key is to create original, high-quality, thought-provoking and authoritative content.
Consistency is also important. If you're constantly creating engaging and compelling content, you're bound to get more exposure.
Create infographics and video content
Media content in the form of infographics and videos can be a great way to generate backlinks while providing immense added value to your website visitors.
Video content and infographics are generally more difficult and take longer to produce and promote. As a result, these forms of media content tend to get more backlinks.
Write original research studies and statistics
When content creators, journalists, opinion leaders, etc., want to back up their claims with solid data, what do they do? They are looking for original research, studies, or statistics that prove that their theory is indeed accurate.
So it's obvious that when you make the effort to conduct original research and publish white papers and statistics based on it, you're guaranteed to get plenty of backlinks.
To get started, simply pick a relevant topic and start collecting data about it. It's a process, but the results are worth it.
Once you have all the data with you, do the calculations and get statistics that offer groundbreaking insights.
For example, this Ahrefs' study, based on the search for 100,000 keywords, is a good example. This page has approximately 134 backlinks from 102 link domains!
Use content groups
Content groups or topic groups are blog posts that consist of a main pillar page and several other group pages.
The pillar page consists of content on a general topic and includes internal links to several clusters. Clustered pages are pieces of content on sub-themes around the main content of the pillar.
Content clusters work very well for a number of reasons. First of all, they cover a subject in depth, more than a single blog post can do. As a result, Google is prioritizing these content breakthroughs and ranking them better.
Additionally, internal links implemented using content clusters also help you rank higher and distribute link equity. It also provides a good user experience and generates more backlinks due to the good quality of the content.
Hubspot's Facebook Marketing Guide is a great example of grouping themes together.
Promote your content on all social channels
Simply publishing your content on your site and hoping to generate inbound links isn't practical, unless you're already receiving a massive amount of traffic.
Promoting your content on social channels can help increase the visibility of your content items and linkable resources.
Therefore, get in the habit of promoting your blog posts, infographics, videos, white pages, case studies, etc., on various social media channels and in email marketing newsletters.
This will allow your content to acquire some visibility in the form of appreciations, shares and commitments. Additionally, you may receive a number of inbound links in this way.
7. Webflow advanced SEO strategies
Check the advanced publishing options on Webflow
You can access advanced publishing options for your Webflow site by going to the Webflow dashboard > Project Settings > Hosting > Advanced Publishing Options.
Here you can choose to enable the following options - Minify HTML, Minify CSS, and Minify JS. Enabling these options will allow your website to load more quickly. Also, make sure that the Enable SSL option is enabled.
Optimize for featured snippets
“Featured snippets” are snippets of useful information presented by Google at the top of the search results page. Google chooses to select featured snippets from a web page that contains relevant information.
Obtaining “featured snippets” allows you to improve your brand visibility, increase website traffic, and reach the top spot in Google SERPs.
Featured snippets can come in a variety of formats such as numbered lists, bullet lists, paragraphs, tables, etc.
Here are a few tips you can use to optimize your content for featured snippets:
- Start by figuring out what type of featured snippet will best match the keyword you're targeting. To do this, you can look at the format of the featured snippet that already exists or simply make an assumption based on the keyword.
- For paragraph type featured snippets, optimize your content for keywords based on questions. You can find such keywords using tools like AnswerThePublic. Try to add short answers of 40 to 60 words for these queries. Make sure your answers are relevant, accurate, and independent so that Google can include them directly in the snippets.
- Another important point to note is that most keywords with featured snippets are long-tail keywords. Therefore, optimizing your content for long-range keywords will help you get snippets of results.
- For table-type featured snippets, organize your content data in the form of a table. The same goes for ordered list and unordered list featured snippets.
Set up 301 redirects
If you're redesigning your website, migrating to a new domain, or reorganizing your website's URL structure, you may need to implement 301 redirects.
301 redirects allow you to redirect traffic from an old URL to a new URL. This helps you to redirect traffic from the old URL to the new URL and is therefore important for SEO.
You can set up 301 redirects by navigating to the Webflow dashboard > Project Settings > Hosting > 301 Redirects. There you will find the space needed to add the old and new URLs. You can also forward entire folders to a new URL path.
Add Open Graph Tags
Open Graph settings help you define what information will be displayed when your pages or posts are shared on various social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. Webflow allows you to set up custom Open Graph tags for each of your pages and posts.
To change Open Graph settings, select a page and go to Page Settings > Open Graph Settings. Here you can change the title, description, and URL of the Open Graph image. By default, these options will be the same as your SEO title and description.
Webflow Local SEO
If you are a local business owner with a physical store, then local SEO should be an important part of your SEO strategy.
Local SEO will help you attract local customers to your store organically. So when customers search for local businesses using “near me” queries, your business will appear on the first page of Google.
Here are some local SEO tips from Webflow that will help you rank on the first page of Google for local keywords:
- Optimize your web pages and content for location-related keywords. For example, you can optimize your pages for keywords followed by the name of your location.
- Google My Business is an essential part of local SEO. Sign up for Google My Business and optimize your profile. You can do this by filling in all possible data fields and adding accurate name, address, and telephone number (NAP) data.
- Try to get positive ratings and reviews on your Google My Business profile by reaching out to happy customers and asking for reviews.
- Local citations and directory listings have a huge impact on your local search engine rankings. Try to get quotes from popular sites like Yelp and also from niche directories.
- Keep your PNA consistent across the board — your website, Google My Business profile, directory listings, etc. This means that your NAP information should be accurate and exactly the same across all of these platforms.
- Local link building and local public relationships are other strategies that will help you rank higher for local searches on Google.
Tools to strengthen local SEO: Schema generator, Google review link generator And bookmarklet and placeID.
Webflow eCommerce SEO
If you're building an e-commerce website using Webflow, you need to implement some strategies that are specific to e-commerce SEO.
Here are some e-commerce SEO tips that will help you generate more traffic and increase product sales:
- Choosing the right keywords makes all the difference when it comes to e-commerce SEO. So start by finding the right keywords for your category pages and product pages. Use Amazon AutoSuggest, SEMrush, Google Keyword Planner, and similar tools to find the right keywords for your online store. It's also important to associate the right keywords with the right pages.
- Make sure you start with an appropriate hierarchical structure for your e-commerce site. Ideally, the home page should be at the top of the hierarchy, followed by the various category pages, and then the subcategory and product pages. Be sure to establish appropriate internal links between these different pages.
- Follow the usual on-page SEO tactics for all of your product pages. This includes optimizing SEO titles, meta descriptions, URLs, and more.
- Pack out the content marketing package for your Webflow e-commerce site. Create informative content in the form of blog posts, infographics, videos, and more to catch the attention of your target audience and add value to them instead of just being promotional.
- Follow the inbound and outbound link building strategies mentioned in the previous sections to improve the ranking of your e-commerce site.
8. Webflow Bonus - SEO Best Practices
Ensure the accessibility of your Webflow site
Website accessibility is the process of making your website accessible to everyone, despite barriers or disabilities they may have.
For example, seniors, people with physical disabilities, or people with mental disabilities should be able to access content on your website in the same way as anyone else.
Accessibility is an essential part of SEO. Indeed, accessibility directly affects the user experience. If some users have trouble accessing your website, your search engine rankings will likely be affected.
Additionally, by ensuring a fully accessible website, you can attract a lot more visitors to your site and improve your brand reputation.
Here are a few steps you can follow to ensure the accessibility of your Webflow site:
- Adhere to an appropriate hierarchical structure for each page on your site, as it helps assistive devices navigate your content and gives meaning to users.
- Use descriptive titles, subtitles, titles, image alteration tags, link anchor texts, etc. so that users with disabilities can understand the context of your content.
- Try to avoid CAPTCHAs, as they can be difficult for users with certain disabilities to use.
- Label your forms so that users understand the context of each form field.
- You can use automated website accessibility tools that will automatically fix accessibility issues on your site.
Align your SEO plan with your business goals
Blindly chasing organic search engine rankings is perhaps one of the biggest mistakes most new businesses make.
Like any other marketing channel, your website's SEO strategy should also start with a definite goal. This objective should be aligned with your business goals.
For example, if your current goal is to increase brand awareness, your whole approach to SEO will be different. From the keywords you choose, the backlinks you create and the content you create will be based on brand awareness.
In the same way, try to start planning the SEO of your Webflow site with a fixed goal in mind. This will not only lead your business in the right direction, but also achieve results much more quickly than otherwise.
Perform SEO tests on your site
SEO is not something that will give you results overnight, as in the case of paid advertising or PPC strategies. However, it is important to test and monitor your site's SEO results.
You can perform SEO tests on your Webflow site using tools such as SEO testing, On-Page SEO Checker by SEMrush, etc.
These tools will help you analyze your website's performance on organic search engines. These tools will also guide you in case of SEO problems and offer suggestions for resolving them.
You can also set up ranking tracking for your target keywords using these tools. That way, you can track the progress you're making for the keywords you're targeting.
Voice search optimization
As voice assistants like Alexa and Google Home take over most homes, the need for voice search SEO is rapidly increasing.
So, if you want to make further improvements to Webflow's SEO, you can also work on voice search optimization. Starting early will give you a head start.
Here are some voice search SEO strategies that you can implement on your Webflow site:
- Optimize your content for conversational, long-range keywords that use natural language.
- Optimize your content for “featured snippets,” as many voice search results are included in “featured snippets.”
- Target more keywords based on questions, as voice search queries are mostly in the form of questions.
- Include short, concise, and self-contained answers to voice search queries in your content.
- Create an FAQ page on your website and also add FAQs at the end of each page on your site. Using the FAQ schema will help you rank for question-based voice search queries.
Strengthen SEO through other marketing channels
Other marketing channels like PPC, paid social media advertising, social media marketing, and email marketing go hand in hand with SEO Webflow. Using other marketing channels will help you boost SEO results, so you should focus on them as well.
For example, social signals are considered to be an important ranking factor. When you boost your social media marketing efforts, you can get better social signals in the form of likes, comments, shares, brand mentions, and more.
These social signals will drive more traffic to your site and help you rank higher on Google.
Likewise, promoting your content on other marketing channels will help you gain visibility and thus you will be able to generate a large number of high-quality back links to your site and even get media coverage, which will allow you to obtain a better organic ranking in search engines.
Social media link tool - Facebook Messenger chat widget
Avoid “gray hat” and “black hat” SEO tactics
As you learn to implement SEO strategies, you will certainly encounter certain “grey-hat” and “white-hat” SEO techniques. It's important to avoid these questionable SEO techniques for a number of reasons:
- They only lead to short-term results.
- Google may penalize you or even ban your site for using such techniques.
- Even if you rank higher for a few days, you won't be able to reach the ultimate goal of a commercial website, which is to increase conversions and sales.
It is therefore preferable to avoid “grey-hat” and “black-hat” SEO strategies, such as link exchanges, “content spinning”, hidden texts, negative SEO, “content cloaking”, etc.
CHAPTER NINE
Webflow SEO: FAQs
Is Webflow better than WordPress?
On the one hand, Webflow allows you to design a fully customizable website from scratch, without even writing a single line of code. It gives you complete design freedom, has clean code, and lets you design websites using easy to use drag-and-drop functionality.
On the other hand, WordPress makes it possible to create personalized, high-performance and feature-rich websites from scratch. WordPress also offers thousands of plugins for you to choose from.
However, creating a WordPress website is not everyone's cup of tea, so you may need to hire experts to create one for you. And when it comes to comparing Webflow and WordPress in terms of SEO, both are powerful platforms that simplify SEO success.
Is Webflow better than Squarespace?
When it comes to comparing Webflow and Squarespace (and even Webflow and Wix, for that matter), there's no clear winner, because everything depends on your needs. If you are an agency or a professional designer, Webflow has a wide range of features and almost endless customization possibilities.
But it's more complex compared to Squarespace, which is suitable for small and medium-sized businesses of all types.
In terms of SEO, both platforms are suitable for SEO, but unlike Webflow, Squarespace doesn't allow you to manually change your project's SEO settings and website title. Overall, both platforms offer high-quality SEO tools and capabilities.
Is Webflow a good CMS?
Yes, Webflow comes with a powerful CMS that has lots of features and capabilities that anyone may need to create a business website. With a simple drag-and-drop interface, you can easily edit your websites without having to write a single line of code.
Is Webflow good for beginners?
Yes, Webflow is very beginner-friendly because anyone can create websites from scratch without any prior web development or design experience. You don't need to worry about writing code. Instead, you can use the platform's drag-and-drop interface to create custom websites that meet your needs.
You'll also find Webflow SEO tutorials and other useful lessons aboutWebflow university.
How much does Webflow cost?
Webflow's basic plan starts at $12/month and goes up to $36/month for the business plan.
What businesses use Webflow?
Businesses like Zestful, Dell, Zendesk, Zendesk, Upwork, Upwork, HelloSign, HelloSign, Petal, Bolt Travel, Bonsai, Homerun, Lattice, and Turtle built their entire site using Webflow. These are good examples of successful SEO for sites built using Webflow.
How long does it take to learn Webflow?
Webflow is a beginner-friendly nocode platform that allows creating custom websites from scratch. The platform's simple drag-and-drop interface allows people with no prior experience in website development or design to easily create amazing, high-performing websites.
While the platform is fairly easy to use for beginners, it may take up to a week to get familiar with the platform before you are completely comfortable using it.
Do you have to code for Webflow?
No, you can create websites on Webflow without having to write a single line of code. Webflow allows you to translate your design into clean, semantic code ready to be published without worrying about writing any code.
How can I get Webflow for free?
Webflow allows you to build websites for free until you want to get a custom domain and get your site online. To sign up for the free Starter plan, you can go to the home page or pricing page and click on the Get Started button.
CHAPTER TEN
Conclusion
Webflow is an easy-to-use, beginner-friendly, and SEO-friendly website creation platform. Many brands have seen a massive increase in organic traffic and site load speed after adopting Webflow.
If you're looking to create an SEO-friendly website using Webflow, this ultimate guide will help you do just that. Be sure to implement all of the SEO strategies and techniques mentioned in this article to reach the top of Google's SERPs as soon as possible.
If you want to explore alternatives to Webflow, you can check out our comprehensive guide on the Squarespace SEO.
