SEO guide: how search works and what to optimise first
Last reviewed and updated
This SEO guide walks through the whole discipline in the order it actually gets done — crawling and indexing first, then keywords, on-page markup, content quality, technical health, and finally authority and measurement.
Every section links to the free ToolForge tool that performs the check, so you can audit your own site as you read instead of taking notes for later.
1How search engines actually work
Search has three stages: crawling (a bot discovers your URLs), indexing (the content is understood and stored), and ranking (the best matching pages are ordered for a query). SEO work that skips a stage fails silently — perfect content on an uncrawlable page ranks nowhere.
Before optimising anything, confirm the page is reachable, indexable and returns a 200 status. Then, and only then, worry about wording and links.
Tools for this stage
Tools marked Live open a working workspace that runs entirely in your browser — start with Robots.txt Generator and XML Sitemap Generator.
Go deeper
- Submit a website to Bing Webmaster Tools — Get verified and indexed on the second-largest search engine.
2Choose keywords you can realistically win
Every page should target one primary query plus a handful of close variants. Volume alone is a trap: difficulty and intent decide whether traffic converts and whether you can rank at all this year.
Map keywords to pages in a spreadsheet before writing. Two pages chasing one phrase split their own signals — that is keyword cannibalisation, and it is the most common self-inflicted SEO wound.
Tools for this stage
Tools marked Live open a working workspace that runs entirely in your browser — start with Keyword Density Checker.
Go deeper
- Keyword research guide — Build a keyword map from seed terms, intent and difficulty.
- Check your current position — Track a keyword against your domain before you commit to it.
3Optimise the page itself
On-page work is entirely within your control: a unique title under 60 characters, a description that earns the click, one H1, a descriptive URL, meaningful subheadings, alt text on images, and social preview tags.
Write for the person, then check the markup with tools. If the title reads like a keyword list, rewrite it — click-through rate is itself a competitive advantage.
Tools for this stage
Tools marked Live open a working workspace that runs entirely in your browser — start with Meta Tag Generator and Open Graph Generator.
Go deeper
- On-page SEO guide — Titles, headings, internal links and markup, element by element.
- Score this page live — Run the audit on the URL you just edited and confirm the fix landed.
4Publish content that deserves to rank
Google rewards pages that satisfy the query completely and demonstrate first-hand experience. Depth matters, but padding does not: answer the question in the first screen, then support it with specifics, examples and data.
Refresh existing pages on a schedule. Content freshness is a real ranking input for queries where the answer changes, and updating a page that already ranks is usually cheaper than writing a new one.
Tools for this stage
Tools marked Live open a working workspace that runs entirely in your browser — start with Text Summarizer and Word Counter.
Go deeper
- How to use SEO tools effectively — Turn tool output into a short, prioritised fix list.
5Keep the site technically healthy
Valid HTTPS, one canonical version of every URL, no redirect chains, no broken internal links, compressed images and a fast mobile render. These are hygiene items, but they cap how well everything else can perform.
Re-run technical checks after every template or platform change, not just at launch — regressions arrive with deployments.
Tools for this stage
These checks need a data provider connected. For a live measurement right now, run the SEO dashboard audit against the same URL.
Go deeper
- Technical SEO guide — Crawlability, indexation, Core Web Vitals and HTTPS in depth.
- Image optimisation for page speed — The single biggest mobile speed win on most sites.
Related tools
The six checks most people run first when they pick up a new site — start here if you are unsure where the problem is.
Frequently asked questions
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