Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can seem daunting. It’s constantly talked about as the thing to do, and the thing that can make or break you. While it is certainly incredibly helpful, it’s nothing to stress over. As search engines like Google and Bing have switched to more paid advertising (search engine marketing), it has been harder to break into the top pages. However, that doesn’t mean it’s all for naught.

Search engine optimization best practices make your website more accessible to a wider audience, so even if you’re not exactly where you aspire to be in the search rankings, the people who visit your website are more likely to have a great experience, which will give them a favorable opinion of you which is helpful for page reads, sales, and recommendations.

SEO is a slow and steady approach, which can seem frustrating. Consistently incorporating these practices will boost your website rankings on search engines and make your website better for your readers over time. Here are some tips I’ve picked up in my 10 years of marketing to help you boost that SEO and get people to your site:

Overview:

• Blogging
• Keywords
• Linking
• Accessibility
• Plug-ins

Start Blogging for SEO

I know what you’re saying. “I don’t have time for a blog!” I know, I know. That “sibling’s best friend” WIP manuscript is burning a hole in your keyboard. I get it fellow indie romance author. Blogging doesn’t have to be hard or time consuming, though!

While it’s in our nature as authors to want to put our heart and soul into everything we write, blogs don’t have to be that deep. They *are* a great way to connect with readers on a deeper level, and can be great to talk in depth about your latest releases and processes. However, they can be as simple as Buzzfeed style list articles, otherwise known as “listicles.” You can’t totally phone it in, they have to make sense for your readers, and they need to include keywords, links, and pictures—these are the SEO items that are going to boost your search engine rankings, the blog is just a vehicle for them. Still, it’s not something you have to overthink.

Here are some ideas for you, both listicles and otherwise! (Odd numbers do better in search engines 😉)

• Top 5 recent releases in your subgenre
• 7 Pieces of Lore from Your Latest Book
• 3 Authors that Inspire You
• Tropes and Themes in Your Latest Release
• The Impact of Current Events on your Work

Aim to post a blog regularly (I aim for once a month). It’ll help keep your website fresh and give you an opportunity for content for your social media, newsletters, and more.

Find and Use SEO Keywords

Keywords are the lifeblood of all SEO efforts. Keywords are the terms you want your website to show up under when people are searching.

Researching keyword rankings is an effective tool to figure out where to focus your efforts. While there are plenty of high buck tools for large enterprises, there are plenty of free SEO keyword tools for indie romance authors on a budget. These tools will help you identity which keywords to focus on for blog posts, and to sprinkle across your site. Make sure they make sense for your content and the focus of your site, or all that work will lead to the wrong people finding your site.

While you should sprinkle keywords over your website, the aforementioned blogs are a great way to focus on specific keywords for each topic. For example, writing a blog post about books in your book’s regency romance subgenre will help you rank higher for search terms related to regency romance.

Keywords should appear in headings, blurbs, and image descriptions when possible, but avoid “keyword stuffing.” Keyword stuffing is putting your keyword in as many places on your blog posts and web pages in an unnatural way to artificially boost rankings. And while it seems like it’s a good idea, keyword stuffing leads to low-value content and can even land your website on Google’s naughty list because it looks like spam.

Inbound and Outbound Links in Your Content

Inbound links, also known as back links, are links that go to different parts of your website (see what I did there?). Outbound links are links that go to other reputable websites with related content. They may seem small, but they’re a powerful SEO tool and a valuable tool for readers.

These links connect readers to content that relates to the topic at hand. Search engines like them as they help their algorithms understand what your content is about. While it may seem pointless to link away from your site, they’re great for readers as they can help them see you as an authority to find other things that interest them. Inbound links will also connect them to more of your content and keep them on your site longer. (Hello “Open in a new tab” feature, I love you!).

There aren’t many wrong ways to do inbound and outbound linking for SEO, but making sure you properly mark sponsored or paid outbound links can keep you off of Google’s naughty list.

Those blogs I suggested earlier are great places to link to other parts of your website (inbound), your store pages (inbound or outbound), and other indie romance authors (outbound). You should sprinkle inbound and outbound links across your website, ideally on each page.

Make Sure Your Website is Accessible

Accessible content is important to everyone. It makes your website more valuable and usable to readers with disabilities, which should be the primary reason to make sure you’re doing it. However, search engines also like accessible content because it’s better for everyone.

Making sure your images have alt-text is one of the top accessibility tips on any website (and social media post). Alt-text is a brief description of what appears in an image. People who use screen readers (or who can’t load images) are able to still utilize the images you add into your post, giving them the same experience as other people. Adding images to your posts is a great way to add value for everyone (and search engines) and taking the extra five seconds to add alt-text helps both readers and search engines.

Adding things like transcripts to videos/podcasts, as well as descriptions of content in tables and graphs are also great!

One thing often missing is proper website headers. While it’s gotten better overtime thanks to tools built into websites, making sure you’re using proper headers structure (H1 > H2 > H3 > H4) on your sites helps people using screen readers better organize the information. It also helps search engines organize your information and figure out what’s valuable to show people.

Blog and page titles are automatically H1, so start your content on your page at H2 and work down from there for each subsection.

Example: Each section of this post uses an H2 heading!

Use SEO Plug-ins

SEO plug-ins are a feature either built into or easily installable on most websites. While these aren’t a direct SEO tool for your content, they help you make sure you’re not missing anything in your webpages and blogs. They can remind you to add those inbound/outbound links, keywords, media, and check your website blurb (how the page will show up in search engines and social media) for effectiveness.

While they’re just one thing in the toolbox, they can help you take out some of the guess work of what you need to add to optimize for search engines so you can get back to that neighbors to lovers romance you’ve been working so hard on!

Currently I use AIOSEO, and it helps me look at different things, like keyword density across each page and post. When combined with keyword research, these tools can streamline your SEO process.

If you’re not using a plug-in on your website, consider making a checklist so you can at least make sure you’re checking the boxes on keywords, links, accessibility, and headlines.

Final Notes on SEO for Indie Romance Authors

While SEO may seem daunting, and the pay off isn’t immediate, search engine optimization is an important thing for indie romance authors with their own websites to put effort into. It’s a lot of small steps that produce big results over time and can take you from the Mariana’s Trench of search engines to surfing proudly on top.

Good luck, book besties!