Writing for search engines is a large part of Applied Worldwide’s ability to continue its mission of enhancing a vision of applied sociology. We can write about the importance of sociology all we want, but if folks aren’t finding what we write when they are searching for information online, then that writing is not reaching its full potential. Therefore, we are introducing new standards for the articles and blogs we publish on AppliedWorldwide.com.
The following checklist will help you meet our new standards for publication, which will also help put your writing in front of a larger audience.
1. Include a focus keyphrase
- Your focus keyphrase is the keyword search you expect people to enter in Google, or another search engine, that relates to the content of your article.
- Your focus keyphrase should be included in the title, the first paragraph/introduction, subheadings, and throughout your article.
- An example of a focus keyphrase is “healthcare industry” for our “Analysis of Sociology Jobs in the Healthcare Industry” article.
- You can find some useful tips on choosing a focus keyphrase in this article from Yoast.
2. Include a 60-character title
- While it might not always be possible to keep your title right at 60-characters, it is important to aim for that length.
- Remember, your focus keyphrase should appear in your title.
- If you can keep the focus keyphrase in the first half of the title, that is even better!
3. Avoid passive voice
- Refer to this Grammarly article on passive vs. active voice for more on how to avoid passive voice.
- While a few instances of passive voice are acceptable, an overwhelming majority of your writing should be in active voice.
4. Avoid high-density of long sentences
- “Long sentences” in this case refers to sentences with more than 20 words.
- Diversifying your sentence lengths throughout your writing is generally a good practice, but a majority of your sentences should be 20 words or less.
5. Include external links
- Where possible, include hyperlinks to external sources you are citing, referencing, or mentioning.
- You can refer to this guide on How to Create a Link within a Word Document to learn more about creating hyperlinks.
6. Include internal links
- Internal links in internet writing refer to links within the same website. In this case, internal links are links to other pages on AppliedWorldwide.com.
- You should search AppliedWorldwide.com for articles and blogs that relate to the piece you are submitting using the search tool in the header.
- Try to find 1-2 related pieces from AppliedWorldwide.com to hyperlink within your submission.
- You will create a hyperlink for the internal link in the same way you would for an external link.
Using this list to guide the structure of your writing can help immensely with making sure search engines like Google prioritize your writing in search results.
