SEO checklist: it still works for Yandex

Search engine optimization is a complex activity and what it needs first is a to-do list to keep at hand. This article may serve such a checklist when doing SEO jobs for your website. We base on our SEO experience, with Yandex prior as we mostly promote websites in the Russian search. So, if you already have a Russian website and need to push it for more popularity in the Russian SERP, we’ll start with…

1. Keyword research first

First off, we  build a list of search queries for your content. This means identifying the (key) words and their collocations that will be the target ones for your website, i. e. those very search queries that folks on the internet would be most probably use to find the service or product like the one you want to promote (further on we call these collocations ‘keywords‘). To draw it properly we analyse various queries popular Yandex Wordstart and use some online content analysing services in Russian to see which keywords are already in their places on your website or which should be strengthened by additional text or rewording.

2. How relevant are the webpages you plan for keyword optimization?

After we make up a list of general  keywords for the whole website (about 20-30), we  check which pages of your website may be considered relevant for each query in the search engine. We make up a table where the first column contains the quieries (keywords correspondingly), and the other is for the pages that show  relevancy in each search engine we are interested in. To find out which page is the most relevant to the query, we use advanced  features allowing to search on your website: the pages that show first in the search results are the most relevant and shoulf be optimized first.

3. How good is the optimized webpage for users?

Now it is time to see whether users find the pages of your site useful. These could be quite relevant to the searches but this doesn’t necessarily mean they are ever visited, or, if they are of poor quality, the unsatisfied visitor might leave the website after seeing such page. This increases this so-called “bounce rate” signalling to the search enginge, that your website is not good enough for higher positions. If we find the page poor, we improve it: writing a better copy might help. At this stage it would suffice to create a page which would be more appealing for users that would come across your page through one of the queries – it’s a shame to lose valuable visitors to low conversion when you try so hard to get them from SERP.

After we decide which pages need to be optimized or completely changed, we proceed with the next serious step: SEO copywriting which is the core of the optimization process,  no matter Google or Yandex, and it might take more time and money than the rest of the jobs. We won’t go in detail here in this article – just remind you that reasonable keyword placement and striving for higher conversion are the top ideas.

3. Оn-page optimisation: technical matters

The site’s overall success in search results, in our opinion, depends a lot on this techy stuff. Here is our “do-zen” – a check list for technical on-page optimization (some do’s are still important for Yandex):

1. correct robots.txt file is uploaded;
2. proper sitemap.xml files are set, and every important page is listed;
3. the sitemap.xml link is present in the robots.txt file;
4. any webpage on your site can be reached within three clicks top;
5. all text content is easily indexed, frames are used moderately, no silly black/grey SEO tricks are in use;
6. there’s no linking within javascript codes, if so, you need to repeat the links in html as well;
7. all (ok, most) content images have <alt> and <title> tag text filled in;
8. description meta-tags are filled properly (they say it’s getting irrelevant – but still, we do it for Yandex, though sometimes it is an absolutely “snippet-blind” machine, we insist on it);
9. the title tag contains the keywords the page is optimized for, it looks natural, clickable and attractive in SERP;
10. target keywords are present but variably used in title, description, H1 – H6 headings, and headings are properly worded for users, not only for robots;
11. some keywords are highlighted with <strong>, <em>  tags;
12. good internal linking between the pages of the website is provided: neither overdone nor underdone.

4. Off-page optimisation: backlink building

Offpage optimization is often mostly about backlink building, and if you take up this method seriously, the effect will be worth the effort. We are, say, more of a “pure SEO” kind specs and find keyword optimization more rewarding, however a proper backlink with good ancor text still works for Yandex (though they say the opposite). It might influence positions indirectly through users’ behaviour: the more visitors access your website, the higher are its traffic rates, so Yandex ranks your website higher then,

It is a common opinion that off page optimization is mostly about byuing links. We don’t either like it or do it, but there are clients who truly believe this might help with Yandex. Ok, it might. When doing this, we take time to have a close look at the websites we are planning to purchase a link from. We are always careful so that not to buy a link from a “bad” site which has nothing to do with the topic of your project, or deal with a website banned by Yandex or a drop-out. It’s a waste of money with no or even sad result. Besides, be careful with the backlinks growth: if your website is new to Yandex it is not recommended to overdo backlink building: not more than 100 links per month and only from most trustworthy sites. Otherwise Yandex considers your backlinks unnatural and your campaign might turn a waste of money and time. Anyway, we almost never recommend paid backlinking as a strategy for digital marketing.

Insted we would offer social sharing – this will get your website indexed quicker, We can set up for you a social media account or a public group to publish your new content. The most popular social network among Russians is VKontakte – as of December 2022, it was used by 61% of all Russian Internet users (49% of the total population of the Russian Federation).. There’s a special service from Yandex that allows to set a whole bunch of Russian (and other) social sharing buttons on your website. Besides, we will use our own personal Russian social accounts and blogs for backlink building.

by Vi and Olli