Create SEO SOP (Stan. Op. Proc.) To Drive Better Traffic for Your Business
So, when it comes to your marketing, your SEO specifically, having some SEO SOP (standard operating procedures) in place is going to help you succeed in getting the basics in concrete. This will allow you to really start accelerating your results and rocking those Google results.
Here we’ll go through: what is an SOP? Why is it important for your SEO? And how to create one?
First things first….
What Is An SEO SOP?
SOP stands for standard operating procedure and is a document that outlines how a certain task is done step by step.
These can include numbered steps, images, screen captures and even video walkthroughs. The videos are the most hopeful, especially for those that learn on a “see-do” method, meaning they learn by seeing.
Standard operating procedures (SOP) help to make your work faster, easier, and more scalable. For example, administrative/programmatic SOPs will consist of five elements: Title page, Table of Contents, Purpose, Procedures, Quality Assurance/Quality Control, and References. You can view a SOP example here.
The SEO SOP’s that you create can be extremely useful and used for:
- Keyword Research and Analysis:
- conducting keyword research to identify valuable keywords and phrases relevant to the business.
- analyzing keyword competitiveness and search volume.
- On-Page Optimization:
- optimizing title tags, meta descriptions, header tags, and image alt attributes.
- creating SEO-friendly URLs.
- optimizing content with targeted keywords.
- Technical SEO:
- optimizing website structure and navigation.
- improving website speed and performance.
- fixing broken links and resolving crawl errors.
- Content Creation and Optimization:
- content creation, including guidelines for length, quality, and relevance.
- optimizing content for featured snippets and voice search.
- internal linking strategies.
- Link Building:
- conducting link prospecting and outreach.
- guest posting, content promotion, and building backlinks.
- monitoring and disavowing harmful backlinks.
- Local SEO:
- optimizing Google My Business (GMB) profiles.
- managing online reviews and reputation.
- creating and maintaining local citations.
- Mobile Optimization:
- ensuring mobile responsiveness and usability.
- optimizing mobile page speed and user experience.
- SEO Audits and Reporting:
- conducting regular SEO audits.
- generating SEO performance reports.
- tracking key performance indicators (KPIs).
- E-commerce SEO:
- optimizing product pages, category pages, and product descriptions.
- managing product reviews and ratings.
- Technical Troubleshooting:
- diagnosing and addressing technical SEO issues, such as duplicate content or canonicalization problems.
- Schema Markup and Rich Snippets:
- implementing schema markup to enhance search engine listings.
- optimizing content for rich snippets and featured snippets.
- International SEO:
- optimizing websites for international audiences and multiple languages.
- hreflang implementation and geo-targeting.
- Algorithm Updates and Recovery:
- staying informed about search engine algorithm updates.
- recovering from search engine penalties or drops in rankings.
- Social Media Integration:
- optimizing social media profiles for search.
- leveraging social signals for SEO.
- Content Promotion and Distribution:
- promoting content through various channels, including social media, email, and outreach.
- Competitor Analysis:
- monitoring and analyzing competitor SEO strategies and rankings.
- identifying opportunities and gaps in the competitive landscape.
The Top 5 SEO SOPs Every Business Should Have:
There are a lot of different processes that a business can use and benefit from internal SOPs. However, the five most critical SEO tasks that should have SOPs included according to AHREFS are:
- Content creation and on-page SEO
- Internal linking procedures
- Image optimization
- Email outreach for link building
- Tracking your rankings and making updates
Let’s look at a CONTENT SOP that we have in place so you can see how we create the SEO SOP for documentation and sharing.
We love how Tango.us has outlined in a super easy format on how to create a stellar SOP by providing templates and guides in their “2023 Guide to Standard Operating Procedures”
Steps to Create SOP for Content:
- Create a new document to write the post in Shared Drive in the appropriate folder <current year> Posts
- Create and/or Fill in/update the Trello Card with the Title concept
- Write the content outline first in the document
- Write the draft
- Edit the draft (Edit1)
- Create images with proper naming
- Upload to site ready for Edit2
- Add titles, meta descriptions, focus keywords, tags, categories, and alternative text (with focus keyword) to images
These eight steps are specific to our systems and styles. We use Google Drive and TRELLO to keep track of everything, but feel free to use this as an example and adjust to fit your own programs.
Want to build BETTER processes?
A mere SOP isn’t enough if you want to scale. In other words, you can’t scale your business unless your systems and processes are automated, predictable, and efficient.
We can show you how to convert your SOPs into automated and predictable processes so you can give awesome service to your customers.