Summary: Generating leads is critical for education institutions a few months before admissions begin. With organic search being the leading driver of traffic to your website, using SEO to increase website traffic is the most effective way to generate high-quality leads. This article will tell you how.
Key Takeaways:-
- Always optimise your content for people, not search engines
- Keyword research is the foundation of all SEO strategies
- Targeting course-specific keywords and going hyperlocal will get you quality leads
- Optimise your website’s architecture and design to stay relevant in the competition
There are more than 40,000 colleges in India that prospective students choose from every year. With each of these educational institutions and many more international universities competing for attention, you must take a strategic approach to SEO and understand the fundamentals of how to improve traffic for education websites. This could seem overwhelming when you start, but with the right SEO services expertise, you could see results in no time.
Importance of SEO for educational institutions
Today, there are more businesses than ever using the same platforms to attract the same sets of people. This is also true for educational institutions trying to generate leads. SEO makes it easier to increase online visibility, attract prospective students to your website, generate leads and increase enrollment.
According to various reports, students and parents start looking for schools and colleges between six months and two years before they are due for admission. This is why it is important to ensure you understand the user’s search intent and create content that provides relevant value. For the highest chance of SEO success, you must implement several SEO best practices that will increase website traffic and generate high-quality leads.
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11 SEO best practices to boost organic website traffic:
1. Optimize your content for people, not search engines.
This is one of the biggest mistakes even large companies make while trying to create digital content. Since the search engine algorithm determines SERP rankings, educational institutions try to create content that appeases the search engine. However, this results in keyword stuffing, clickbait-y content and overall reduced content quality.
Search engine algorithms today use website traffic to determine your page rank. This includes the number of pages visited, bounce rate, dwell time and footfall per month – all factors that indicate how much users like spending time on your website. If more people bounce from your website after staying for a short while, it tells the search engine that they’re not deriving enough value from you. On the other hand, if a visitor stays on your site longer, clicks on sufficient CTAs or visits multiple pages through internal links, the search engine deems your website relevant and useful.
2. Focus on hyperlocal and local SEO.
Your institute’s geographical location is a significant factor that affects which students apply. Local SEO makes your college or university more virtually visible in specific geographical areas, increasing your chances of being discovered and contacted by prospective students.
By approaching local SEO strategically, your institution becomes more visible to students and parents within a specific radius, which results in higher inquiries and registrations. Make sure you don’t forget to update your Google Business Profile. This is Google’s way of listing your institution on the map and showing your contact information, website details and user reviews.
