You are a course creator and have built a course website that you want to excel in the e-learning market after a lot of effort and hard work. You might think that you have done your job and now it’s time to see your hard work pay off with earnings from your online course. However, in reality, this is very far from the truth.
When it comes to selling your online courses, coming up with an amazing marketing strategy should be your top priority. You should be focused on how to market your online courses to make them visible to the world. Unless you have a good number of students following you and are ready to enroll in your online course, this can be daunting.
When marketing your online course, you can choose from either getting traffic to your course website via paid methods or unpaid or organic methods. Paid advertising can get you quick results but if you want to have results in the long run sticking to organic techniques would be beneficial.
In this article, we will show you how you can harness the power of SEO for your LearnDash website. How you can make your online course website search-engine friendly and attract more students to your course.
Now…
What Is SEO and How Does it Affect Your LearnDash Website?
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and involves techniques to improve the organic traffic on your website from search engines like Google, Bing, and others.
The target is to get your website on a higher ranking on a search engine that in return gets you a steady flow of organic traffic.
Benefits of SEO
Higher Ranking in Search Engines
According toa study by Up Inc. the top 5 ranking websites get a share of 69.1% of all the clicks on Google’s first page for a specific search result.
This means for your LearnDash website to be able to perform better you need to aim for a higher ranking on Google’s Search Engine Result Page (SERP). You would want your website to at least rank in the top 10 results to be able to generate some traffic over time.
Getting Traffic to Your Website
By creating high-quality helpful content related to certain keywords your website will be able to rank higher in the search results generating visitors and organic traffic to your online course
Builds Trust Among Potential Buyers
As discussed, SEO helps you generate traffic to your LearnDash website and in return can generate leads for your online course.
This will increase the level of trust among your potential customers in your brand as an authentic e-learning platform.
Higher ROI
As compared to paid campaigns, SEO lets you have a sustainable way of generating leads. With ranking higher on the search engine you get a chance to have better converting customers resulting in a better result on investment.
As SEO is a long-term strategy so although it may take time to see some results those results will sustain with consistently higher rankings and give you a strong ROI for years to come.
Want to improve your website’s SEO game? Get in touch with us now.
Key Terminologies
Before getting into the details of what practices to follow for you to rank your course website, you must know some important words and their meanings to better understand the world of SEO.
Keywords
Keywords are the terms that people use to find something on the search engines like “best online courses”.
Internal Links
The clickable links you use to let the user navigate your website easily. It can be text or an image that the user will click to jump to another page of your website.
Meta Title
The title people see on Google when they search for a term on the search engine.
Meta Description
The description that is shown along the meta title. It further explains the content the user will view after visiting the website.
On-Page SEO
The term on-page SEO refers to the methods and techniques you use to optimize your website’s content for a higher search engine ranking.
Technical SEO
It refers to practices used to make your e-learning website technically better for the search engine. For example, this might include optimizing site load speed.
Google Search Console
Google Search Console or GSC is a free service by Google that helps you monitor your website performance in search results.
Link Building (Inbound Links)
It is a tactic in which other sites link to your website. From Google’s perspective, this serves as a vote of trust for your website and is crucial for the SEO of your learndash website.
SEO Best Practices
Map and Use Target KW in content (Course page or product page)
SEO for your LearnDash website heavily depends on the placement of your keywords. What keywords you use in your course content and where you place them will greatly affect your efforts to market your online course website.
For example, if you have an online guitar learning course website then you should put the keyword “online guitar courses” on the main course page and the keyword “guitar instructor” on the About page.
Important Tip:
Avoid using the same keyword as your main keyword on different pages of your LearnDash website as it might confuse the search engine and Google might degrade your website due to confusion.
When you write content for your e-learning course website, it should be engaging, easy to digest, and importantly it should be of a decent length. According to a study by SerpIQ, the top 10 results on Google account for a content length of more than 2000 words. This study is a clear indicator that Google prefers websites with rich content and ranks them higher in the search results.
Use Images with ALT Text
Using alt text with your image is a good way to tell the search engine what the viewer can see if the image fails to load.
You can also map your target keywords in alt text so that your website’s images can compete in the “Images” tab of Google for relevant terms.
Your alt text also helps visually impaired users to easily navigate your website through a dedicated tool.
Make Content Readable
Ever heard the term “Content is King”? Well indeed it is and it can make or break your online presence.
With well-written good quality content you not only attract a good steady flow of relevant traffic but you also get backlinks to your website resulting in higher search result rank and a vote of trust for your website.
The content on your e-learning website should be well-formatted and easy to understand so that it is easier for a visitor to purchase your course.
Monitor Competitors
When getting into SEO to sell online courses, your competitors must be regularly monitored. Try to catch what trends they are following, and what techniques they are using to get traffic and better perform in the online course market.
With the help of such helpful insights, you can prepare a plan to make your website stand out from the competition.
Optimize your Meta Title and Meta Description
Meta title and Meta description of your website is the title and description you see on the search engine result page.
It tells the viewer what information to expect from the website.
An ideal meta title should be 60 to 70 characters in length and meta description should be 150 to 160 characters. The targeted keywords should be used to better align with the searcher’s intent.
Optimize for Technical SEO
Optimizing for Technical SEO is crucial. With it, you can tell the search engine that your website functions properly and within the rules defined by the search engine giving a good experience to the visitor of the website.
It can involve techniques like:
Optimizing your website load speed
Your website is properly indexed in Google
Finding and fixing broken internal and outbound links
Making your website mobile-friendly
Using HTTPS on your website
Do Internal Linking
Internal links help you have a better site structure. It also helps the visitor to better navigate your website easily.
In terms of SEO, a website having good internal linking helps the search engine better discover and index your content.
When linking one page of your website to another, you use anchor text which is the text the visitor clicks to jump on the desired page.
The anchor text should be self-explanatory and help the viewer better understand the content of the page.
An example of a good internal link can be if you include a “meet your instructor” page link in your course main page. Where the students can click on the anchor text and get to see the information of the instructor for their specific course.
Monitor Traffic Regularly
Monitoring traffic regularly helps you keep track of your LearnDash website over time. You can check if there are any fluctuations, gain, or loss of traffic.
With this insight, you can alter your marketing tactics accordingly. To monitor traffic you have a ton of tools you can utilize.
You can use tools like Ubersuggest, SEMRush, Ahref, Moz, or Google Search Console to get an idea what is the flow of traffic during a specific duration, on which keywords you are ranking, and on which position in the search result page.
SEO Mistakes to Avoid
Keyword Stuffing
It is a good practice to include keywords in the content of your LearnDash website.However the overuse of your target keyword results in keyword stuffing.
Google highly discourages stuffing your keywords. You should naturally place your keywords in the content of your course website.
There is no minimum requirement for how many times your main keyword should be used but a count of between 3-6 times is recommended.
Targeting broad topics for courses
If your niche is competitive and will require some extra effort to be able to make your website visible to the world then it is advised to refrain from targeting broad keywords or topics for your content.
For example, you have better chances to rank for the topic “online guitar courses for beginners” rather than “guitar courses”
Getting Irrelevant and Spammy Backlinks
Backlinks are an important factor considered by Google for a better website ranking. They act as a vote of authority to your website and build trust among your potential customers.
It is necessary to avoid getting spammy backlinks as it might hurt your website’s authority. You should not purchase a link instead it should be earned through relevant information and quality content.
Low-quality Content
Content lacking depth and not being able to provide sufficient information comes in the category of low-quality content.
You want the visitor of your website to get complete information about the course and the content should align with their needs for them to become your customers.
Duplicate Content
Plagiarism should be avoided on your website at all costs as it confuses the search engine of which website to rank higher. As a result, it ranks both websites lower and lets other websites take their place.
It is encouraged to write good quality plagiarism-free content to be able to make your website stand out from the competition and rank higher in search engines.
Key Takeaways
SEO is the heart and soul of the marketing of your online course. Your efforts to build a fully functional perfectly built course website will go in vain if nobody knows about it. For this purpose SEO for your LearnDash website is crucial.
By using advised SEO methods and tactics you can rank your website better in a search engine resulting in a good steady flow of visitors and potential customers to your website.
You must also refrain from using such techniques that are considered bad practice by search engines.
Remember, SEO takes time to get your desired results but the effects of performing SEO to sell online courses are long lasting.
People Also Ask
What is keyword density and how much should you use your target keyword in content?
Keyword density means how much your target keyword is present in your website’s content. It is advised that the target keyword should be used between 3-6 times in your content.
Can we reuse our target keyword for different product or course pages?
Reusing your keywords for different pages results in cannibalization. It means both of your pages will fight to get a better rank for the same keyword and it will confuse the search engine about which page to rank higher.
Can the URL, meta title, and course title be different?
A website’s URL, meta title, and course title can be different but is a good practice that these all are in sync as it will help Google to better understand what the content is about.
Is selecting a theme in learndash crucial to SEO?
YES, you should select a theme that is by default SEO friendly and takes less effort to perform SEO to rank the course in search engine result pages.
Do you need relevant and reputable inbound links to be able to rank on search engines?
You can rank but it will be difficult. The inbound links should be a natural process by writing good content and making yourself available to the community you can get links to your website easily.
