If you’re a budding entrepreneur looking to launch an e-business, perhaps you’ve considered online dating. There are many reasons for going down this route. More and more singles are choosing the convenience of the digital environment when it comes to searching for a relationship. With easily customizable web templates available, putting a dating site together can be a straightforward undertaking. Assuming you’ve got to the stage of deciding which topic to cater for, and have designed your pages, have you considered the most important thing of all – how you’re going to attract customers? This is where SEO – search engine optimization – becomes crucial. SEO is the lifeblood of Internet communication, so here are some practices that will boost your visibility.
Choose your keywords wisely
What are keywords? This is the bait you can place throughout your web pages to attract the attention of search queries. Let’s take the example of someone seeking gay hookups online. They’ll be using many variations of this theme to help them rack down someone suitable for romance. There are all sorts of sites you can refer to that will provide you with suggestions. Words and phrases like ‘gay,’ ‘singles,’ ‘LGBT romance,’ ‘queer relationships,’ and so on, will be commonly listed. Prepare a list of these keywords, then ensure these are featured across your content, but prioritized in page titles, or the earliest paragraphs of the articles. These must appear to be included logically, flowing within the surrounding text. Search engines will notice if words appear to have been shoehorned into place.
Focus on strong title tags
In short, the title tag is the text that appears in blue whenever a description of a website appears in search engine results. This is the hyperlink that will draw customers to your dating site. There is a fine art to creating title tags that pack a punch! Here, you have to think like the editor of a tabloid newspaper who is familiar with using ‘clickbait,’ or headings and sub-headings that will spark interest. You need to be able to construct title tags that contain enough information to be succinct and ‘to the point,’ within 60 characters.
Analyze web traffic
The good news is that nothing is cast in stone. Once your dating service is live, it becomes an ongoing project. You can amend the content and therefore the keywords at any time. You might find that prospective customers are searching for particular words far more than others you have used as keywords. Certain pages on your website will prove to be more popular. So, how do you determine which ones, keywords or pages? This is where you employ the services of a third party, such as Google analytics. You can apply for the code to slot into your website, and search engines can then use this to give feedback on how your site is being accessed. This information can be fine-tuned to aspects like where your customers are coming from, and what times of day are most popular for visits. You can take all these details on board and use them to make appropriate adjustments.
Write dazzling content
Your dating site could be fabulously designed, with eye-catching fonts, and slick page layouts. But nobody is going to hang around for long if the articles aren’t captivating. Your content must be well-written, and where appropriate, broken down into neat headings, sub-headings, and easily-digestible paragraphs. Don’t bombard the viewer with images – these are important, but they must also fit logically with the text around them. And where photos are concerned, always incorporate descriptive alt tags for visually-impaired visitors.