Adding a new webpage to your website is a great fresh content strategy that attracts search engine crawlers. This signals to both search engines and human visitors that your website is valuable and not static. However, just adding a page without any optimization is not very helpful. Here are five things to do when adding a new webpage to your website.
Inform your SEO Agency or SEO Specialist
This is very simple, but sometimes forgotten. Include the SEO expert in the process of creating the new webpage. Besides providing best practices, the specialist can begin working on keyword research for copywriting, keyword tracking, competition research, etc.
Analytics Code
Remember to include the analytics code the rest of your website has for tracking purposes. If an action on this page is valuable to you, track the activity by setting a conversion goal.
Sitemaps
Update your traditional sitemap and XML Sitemap (if it’s not dynamic). The updated XML sitemap should be submitted to Google and Bing Webmaster Tools. This is a great method that encourages search engines to revisit your website, find the new webpage and index it. If a page is not indexed it means that search engines are not aware it exists and therefore won’t be considered for search engine results.
Target Relevant Keywords
Don’t select just any keyword, target relevant keywords with a good search volume. Include these in the title tag, Meta description tag, image alt tag, header tag, and copy of the page. (Note: Adding target keywords must be done in a very natural fashion. Including the exact phrase in all of these on-page SEO elements can raise red flags.)
Link Building
Finally, create awareness about your new webpage through:
- Social media posts/tweets
- Press releases, articles, or blog posts
- Newsletters
- Linking from other pages in your website.
The link should have an anchor text which includes your targeted keywords. Avoid the “click here” or “learn more” clickable text that has no SEO value.
