2021 SEO Audit for Your Squarespace Website
Life moves pretty fast and Google’s quest to provide ever better search results moves even faster. With Google reworking its algorithms every day, there are always new opportunities to improve SEO for your Squarespace website.
So whether you’re languishing on page 10 or wanting to improve on an already-strong performance in 2021, use this checklist to audit your Squarespace website’s SEO. Some of it you can do straight away, other aspects can be worked into your goals for this year, then reviewed again at the beginning of 2022.
Don’t forget to track the results and let me know how you get on.
Is Squarespace Good for SEO?
Yes. Squarespace performs well for many aspects of SEO, particularly mobile optimisation. It is known to be an audience-friendly system, which lends a certain amount of weight to its SEO ranking when compared to Wordpress. Squarespace has some technical limitations that slow down page loading times, but not all SEO 'issues' have equal impact. As long as you design a clear, informative customer-focussed website that provides better information to potential customers than your competitor's websites, its technical limitations should not prevent you from ranking highly on Google.
First of all, have you solved your identity crisis?
Don’t skip this step; it’s vital to your SEO success.
DIY SEO is almost entirely reliant on you having a main keyword phrase to describe your business then always using this phrase to describe you and your business, be that on your website, your business cards, or in conversation with customers.
Defining your phrase is really easy or really hard, depending on what you do and where.
If you provide a traditional real-world service in a place, your keyword phrase should write itself, for example:
Plumber in Castleford
Hypnotherapy in Oxford
Building restoration in Manhattan
Defining your keyword phrase is more of a challenge if you provide an unusual service, provide it remotely, send products to customers all over the world, or travel far and wide to provide your service. That’s because you’re competing with many other national and global businesses. You may have to choose the most important out of a number of niches and go for that. Or you might have to use your USP or the problem you solve as your keyword phrase, instead of the thing you do.
If your keyword phrase/niche isn’t clear to you, contact me for help.
Armed with your keyword phrase, run through the following sections to check and fix everything you can.
Are the basics in order?
Fix the following on your Squarespace site and you’ll bounce up the listings, especially if there’s lots to fix and your site has already been online for a number of years.
1. Add your keyword phrase to your website name and search engine description
In your website editor’s main menu, click Marketing / SEO to open up the place to add a keyword optimised site name and description.
You’ve got two choices here:
Go for the safe option and use your keyword phrase plus your website name, for example “UK Squarespace Designer | Catwood Websites”
Or, take a chance on a more clickbaity approach, using an enticingly long sentence that people want to finish reading, along the lines of those Facebook ads that say “Harry beyond furious to find out Meghan’s secr…”. Mine is below:
Squarespace site SEO page where you add a site name and description
OK so my clickbait is a work in progress. The keyword phrase/business name approach is the best way to zone in on one keyword phrase, boosting you up the results. The clickbait/long sentence approach is designed to get people to click on your business when they find you.
Which approach works better for you is a matter for your own experimentation.
2. Complete the SEO information for every page
Since 2019, Squarespace has provided a way to add names and descriptions to every page, specifically for SEO purposes, so if you haven’t reviewed your page descriptions for a while, this will be a new opportunity for your website’s SEO.
To find the place to add SEO descriptions (it’s the same whatever template you use), go to the Pages menu and click the cog next to the name of a page. Then fill in the name and description making sure you add your keyword phrase and plenty of variations on it:
Squarespace pages menu showing cog next to page name
Squarespace page SEO tab where you add a title and description
Remember here that every page description is a chance to sell the benefits of looking at that page, so make sure the page includes interesting, useful information, and add a “call to action” to encourage people to check it out.
3. Add your keyword phrase to your page headings and page content
SEO experts agree it’s beneficial to put your keyword phrase in the H1 tagged heading and in the first 100 words on the page. In practice this can look a little forced in headings, so only use your phrase if it makes sense and looks natural.
The important thing to note here is that every page on your site should have an H1 tagged heading (and only one!), followed by a keyword-rich summary of the page’s contents.
4. Put your keywords into image captions and filenames where possible
To add alt text to a normal image block, use the ‘image filename’ slot under the image, then copy the sentence to the caption under the image.
To add alt text to an image in a gallery, click to edit the image and then choose the SEO tab. Add all the detail you can to describe what’s in the image to someone who can’t see it.
Read Squarespace’s alt text advice here.
5. Reduce image size where you can
Squarespace says it compresses and optimises images when you upload them, but I find it’s even better to compress them before uploading them. You can do this quickly and easily with an online tool like https://compressjpeg.com/.
If your images are going to be banners, keep them at least 2000px wide. If they’re going to features within text like the images on this page, 500px wide is safe enough.
6. Verify your business with Google My Business
This step has the potential to reap many rewards if you take your time and add as much information about your business as you can. Head over to Google My Business (GMB) and start to fill in your business information.
One of the first tasks is to verify ownership of your business. You do this in a quaintly old-school way, with a postcard sent to your business address. The postcard has a code which you type into your GMB account and hey presto! You’ll soon feature on the “Maps Block” in Google search results. This is the list of businesses with a map you sometimes see in Google search results.
Fill in every GMB section you can with as much information as possible. When I went through the process I even created a free Google website because I wasn’t sure if I’d be penalised for not doing so. If you do that, make sure Google points people to your actual website and not your Google website.
After registering with GMB, head over to Bing Places and copy your business listing from Google to Bing. Download the apps for both and switch on messaging so potential customers can message you directly from search results via the app.
This seems like the right place to mention that your primary business phone number, address and business name should always be written the same way and I mean exactly the same. Choose whether you use Road or Rd or Street or St, then stick to it. Forever (or until you move when you have to start the process all over again).
7. Register with online directories
If you’ve heard of backlinks you’ll know how important it is to get other sites to link to your website. Online registries are one simple way to do this. Here’s a great list of UK business registries you should join. Search online for local business directories in your area; you might find your local newspaper or council runs a free business registry.
Remember that your business address and phone number must be written in an identical format everywhere they appear. Make sure your address is in the back end of your Squarespace website, on your contact page if appropriate, and written in exactly the same way wherever you register your business online.
That’s it for the quick SEO wins everyone with a Squarespace website should take the time to implement. Now it’s time to get serious.
Time to search for more SEO opportunities…
Once the basics are in order you can use free tools at your disposal to get inspiration for new content, search for keyword opportunities, and check and fix the way other websites describe your business.
1. Add more content!
Words are essential to your website, even if you’re a highly visual business. Google wants to know not only that you are who you say you are (which is a good reason to use the same keyword phrase whenever you describe yourself), but also that you’ve got the expertise to back it up.
As far as Google is concerned, great websites are full of useful information that’s always completely up to date. It wants to see a portfolio that gradually expands and a blog with new and updated posts. It wants to see visual content like infographics and video too.
This means a plumbers website should include a description of the kind of jobs you do, the qualifications you have, and even a little story about what you like most about being an electrician. Create pages called “About”, “Services”, and “Testimonials”, then fill them with words and include your keyword phrase wherever you can. Add new testimonials as they come up and video explainers for how to do those little jobs people don’t really need to pay you for.
2. Get serious about blogging
A blog is the obvious way to get words onto your website, and one source of inspiration for blog posts is Google itself. Search for the service you provide then look for the “Searches related to…” box of suggestions on the results page. Use the questions other people ask to inspire your posts.
Another source of inspiration is your clients and the questions they ask you. If the same question comes up over and over again, answer it in a blog post.
Now, if anyone ever tells you a blog post should be short, tell them from me they’re about 10 years too late with their advice. Over the last decade, blog posts have found their niche as long, detailed explanations of specific concepts.
A great blog post should be a long, meaty essay; detailed, referenced if possible, and packed with actionable advice. You don’t have to write hundreds of them - a neat suite of ten or so up-to-date posts could work for you - as long as each post is a one-stop-shop of information on its subject.
Talking of which, here’s my one-stop-shop blog post on how to write the perfect blog post.
Finally, although Google loves words, it also loves you to break them up with pictures, so use images and pull in videos from your YouTube or Vimeo account.
3. Check how you are referenced online
I’ve already mentioned that Google expects your business name, address and phone number (known as NAPs) to be written in exactly the same format everywhere they appear online, but how do you check?
Google My Business (GMB) and Bing Places both make it easy to find out who is linking to you. In GMB, click on Links near the bottom of the main menu. In Bing Places, click Inbound Links, under Reports and Data. Check each listing for accuracy.
If your NAPs are out of date on a website and there’s no easy way to update them yourself, try writing a nicely worded email to the owner of the website to ask them to make the change.
4. Find keyword opportunities in search analytics
If you’re not registered in Google Search Console already, go to Analytics in the main Squarespace menu and click Google Search Keywords, then click the black CONNECT button and follow the instructions.
Once Google Search Console is up and running (which can take a couple of days) you’ll be able to see which keyword phrases you’re performing well for and which keyword phrases are most likely to get you clicked on.
If you’re new to SEO you might find your most common keyword phrases relate only to you or the name of your business. But sift through the results and you’ll find phrases you hadn’t considered. Take those phrases and go back through the previous section, adding them to your website where it sounds natural to do so.
Tweak, wait a few weeks to see how the changes affect your traffic, tweak again.
4. Get more reviews
If you don’t ask you might not get, so prepare a template email to send to previous clients with a few tips (perhaps even recommend Google My Business if you work for other businesses) and include a kind request to submit a review for your business. GMB provides a template for this.
Don’t suddenly send a bunch at once - it will look a little suspect if you suddenly receive a job lot of positive reviews. Make a list of clients who liked your work and send out one email a week. Perhaps even schedule them for sending if your email software will let you.
The same applies for any other site you could be rated on, including Tripadvisor, Feefo, TrustPilot or any others. Make it easy for people to review you and they will.
Finally, reply to every review!
Now get strategic
1. Get talked about
This one requires zero technical nouse, just a drive to market yourself and your business and make it a success.
Even more than links to your website, Google wants to see citations, mentions in passing, speaker listings on conference websites, supplier listings on client websites, that sort of thing. These ‘mentions’ prove to Google that you’re a real, capable business that has customers and should be used by others.
Again, there are no shortcuts to this one. No sneaky cheats. You just need to market your business relentlessly and make it a success. Once you start to make it, make sure you’re getting the mentions you deserve and reach out to other websites with a suggestion to mention you.
2. Try event sponsorship and other PR opportunities
Sponsoring events is another good way to get mentioned online while marketing your business. You might find opportunities on Twitter, or via local business networking groups. Register with local community groups on Twitter to find out what’s coming up then offer what you can to the event. This works best if you’re offering expertise and items relevant to your business. A local tree surgeon could offer firewood to a Forest School, or a web designer could offer to create or revamp a local good cause website.
Local papers are crying out for stories so a freebie or a business launch can get you some real traction in your local community. Follow local newspapers on Twitter for story opportunities.
3. Consider voice search opportunities
Voice search is when you ask Alexa a question and she gives you a useful, relevant answer. You’ll see these questions and answers in Google search results too.
If your site is already performing quite well in search results you can further boost your rank (and help your readers) by adding questions and answers to your site. If Google deems your answers to be good, they could appear in search results and be read out by Alexa. Try using an obvious question/answer format to make it easier for Google to spot potentially useful content.
4. Rework old blog posts and content
My website used to get most of its traffic for a post about Squarespace SEO. Then, one day, the post slipped down to page 2 of Google search results and my traffic fell off a cliff. I’ve tried updating the post but nothing works.
Still, I know a lot about SEO so I’ve repurposed and updated much of the content in the original post with new information and a slightly different angle. The lesson is, nothing ever stays the same. It may seem like a pain to rewrite a whole bunch of content, but you already have most of what you need.
I recommend reviewing your entire blog collection once a year, pruning off the articles that get no traffic, and reworking the ones that should be doing better. It’s an essential way to prove your expertise, authority and trustworthiness to Google and get the traffic your site deserves.
Anything else?
I’d love to hear what works for SEO and your Squarespace website. Have I missed anything obvious? Were you expecting more sorcery? Let me know in the comments.
The perfect blog post is the single best place to find information that helps the reader answer the question they typed in to Google. It should be detailed and long, contain relevant research and data, and include examples that allow the reader to draw their own conclusions.