This section is for search engine optimization. The content team is now running a monthly content audit on Routledge, as part of that, a content health check is undergone, and all content needs to score above 80% to be in line with best practice SEO. These fundamental elements of your content need to be done correctly. Otherwise, Google will index your work negatively.
Keywords to Target Please list here the primary keyword you're targeting and any secondary keywords you wish to target. For further guidance visit Conductor!
What is the Title Tag? A title tag is an HTML element that specifies the title of a web page. A page's title tag is displayed as part of the search snippet in a search engine results page (SERP). It appears as the clickable headline for the search result and is vital for user experience, SEO, and social sharing.
Best Practice: Format - Target a primary keyword, then a secondary, and look for long-tail variations of them. Then create your tag.Most desktop and mobile browsers are able to display the first 50–60 characters of a title tag so keep characters within this.
What is the Suggested URL?When you add your title to the CMS, it will autogenerate a URL. First, however, you should follow these essential tips if you need to create the URL structure from scratch:
Create a logical URL structure with page hierarchies.
In addition to structuring your URLs with logical organization, use SEO-friendly URLs. URLs that are simple, easy to read, and include keywords that describe the content on a web page are SEO-friendly.
Keep it short and simple.
Use hyphens to separate words.
Eliminate stop words - Stop words (the, and, or, of, a, an, to, for, etc.) do not need to be in your URL. Remove these words from your URL to make it shorter and more readable.
Use lower-case letters
Speak to Mark Furlong or somebody in the Content Team if you need to do a redirect. - Redirects ensure there are no broken links for people and bots. Anytime you edit or change a URL, add a 301 redirect so that if someone clicks the old URL, they will automatically be taken to the new URL and won't see a broken 404 error page.
Remove dates from blog posts - Removing postdates from the blog post URL keeps content relevant to searchers because people always want the most up-to-date content. URLs without dates can improve click-thru rates from search engines and help content rank for years.
Avoid using numbers and special characters.
What is Image Alt Text?
Add alt text to any images used on your webpage, or social media post. This should be a concise description of your image. Less than 125 characters is ideal.
IMPORTANT
Avoid using phrases like "image of" in alt text for screen readers. Just describe the image's content or purpose directly. Screen readers already announce images, so omit "image of" or "picture of" in alt text to avoid clutter. Instead, provide a concise description that accurately conveys the image's purpose and context, aiding users in understanding the content.
What is the Meta Description?The meta description is a snippet of about 155 characters shown in the SERP underneath the Title Tag. – Search engines show it in search results mostly when the searched-for phrase is within the description. So, optimizing it is crucial for on-page SEO.
Best Practices: Google generally truncates snippets to ~155-160 characters. It's best to keep meta descriptions long enough that they're sufficiently descriptive, so we recommend descriptions between 50 and 160 characters
Include compelling copy that is actionable and includes relevant keywords.
Avoid duplicating meta descriptions.
Avoid double quotation marks in descriptions. When double quotation marks ("...") are used within meta description HTML markup, Google recognizes them as signals to truncate the description from that point and will automatically cut off the rest of the text from the SERP snippet. To prevent this from happening, your best bet is to remove all non-alphanumeric characters from meta descriptions. If quotation marks are important in your meta description, you can use the HTML entity rather than double quotes to prevent truncation.
Please type your H1 below. The H1 tag is an HTML heading that's most commonly used to mark up a web page title. Most websites use CSS to make the H1 stand out on the page compared to lesser headings like H2, H3, etc. H1 tags help search engines understand the page, improve user experience, and improve accessibility.
Best Practices:In most cases, you should only have one H1 included in your content, which should be the title.
The h1 should match the title tag as closely as possible.
Keep H1s short.
Include your target keyword.
Include an H1 on each page you create.
What other headers do you need? If you’ll only be using H2s then please select H2. However, if you think you’ll require smaller headings such as an H3, then please include that in your selection. Use H2-H6 subheadings where it makes sense and remember not to skip heading levels.
List your H2sPlease list out your headings for example:
‘Back to school’
‘Back to school essentials'
‘Back to school lunch ideas'
Have you put in a design brief yet?Please type in the job code for your design brief so we can match this to the job when creating your page/content. If you’ve yet to submit one, please do so ASAP, as the design team will require at least two weeks to process your order. Once you’ve done so, please email us the job code.
You're almost there! Please upload any existing image files or copy related to this content.Please use this as an opportunity to upload any documents containing copy, body images, or further content guidance that you wish to be followed/used for the project.
Any additional comments?Please use this space to inform us about anything else you feel is relevant to the project.
