How To Learn SEO (With Tips & Tricks)

You want to learn SEO (search engine optimization), but where do you start?

If you are interested in learning about search engines and how websites can rise to the top of search results, you have come to the right place. There’s a lot to learn, but we’ve got you a step-by-step guide to start your digital marketing career in SEO.

What is SEO?

In full form, SEO means search engine optimization.

SEO is a method used to boost your website’s ranking in search results on platforms like Google. When you type a question into Google, the sites that appear at the top have probably applied effective SEO strategies. The aim is to make it easier for people to discover your site when they search for topics or products related to what you provide.

Image Credits: Google

This method helps to increase both the quality and quantity of traffic to your website. Plus, this improves the visibility of your website for relevant searches.

Step-By-Step Guide To Learn SEO in 2025

Some SEO professionals don’t start with the intention to make it their full-time career. However, with a clear intention to learn SEO, you can become an SEO expert early on – and this can accelerate your growth and take your SEO career to the next level.

STEP 1: Understand SEO basics

To understand where we’re headed, let’s first take a quick look back. SEO focuses on targeting keywords, appearing at the top of the search results, driving traffic, and converting traffic into leads.

Here are some SEO terms you need to know – these are the basics you need to learn SEO.

• On-page SEO enhances your website’s search rankings. This includes optimizing keyword placement in content, refining title tags and meta descriptions, and enhancing site structure.
• Off-page SEO focuses on actions to boost your search engine rankings outside your website, such as building backlinks, social media mentions, and brand citations.
• Technical SEO improves the technical elements of your website.
• Link Building helps to create high-quality backlinks from other reputable websites to improve your site’s authority, trust, and search visibility.
• Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) are the pages your customer sees after entering a search query in Google or other search engines. Here, you have both paid ads and organic results.
• White-hat SEO is tactics that follow search engine guidelines, such as producing quality content, proper keyword usage, and earning links naturally.
• Black-hat SEO is the unethical tactics that try to manipulate search engine algorithms for quick rankings, such as keyword stuffing and inserting low-quality backlinks.
• Keywords are the words or phrases people type into search engines to find information.
• Keyword research is the process of identifying the right search terms that your target audience uses, helping you plan and optimize your content.
• Organic results are search results that are unpaid content in SERPs.
• Organic traffic is traffic that come through organic search results rather than paid ads.
• Ranking factors is the criteria search engines use to determine where your page appears in search results (e.g: site speed, backlinks, content quality).
• Search intent is the reason behind a customer’s search query (4 types - informational, navigational, transactional, or commercial).
• Crawlability is how search engine bots discover and index your website pages.
• Indexing is the process of search engines storing and organizing content found during crawling so it can appear in search results.
• Page authority is a score that predicts how well a specific page will rank in SERPs through backlinks and content relevance.
• Domain authority is a metric predicting how well your entire website will rank.

STEP 2: Take an online digital marketing course and get certified

By earning a certification, you equip yourself with the proper SEO knowledge to confidently practice SEO on your own, but also boost your professional credibility when networking on platforms like LinkedIn.

If you’re considering enrolling in an online digital marketing course, choose one that truly helps you develop the skills needed to advance your digital marketing career. Look for programs that go in-depth on the areas where you need improvement. If a course only scratches the surface and doesn’t cover your specific learning goals, it might not be the right platform for you.

Click here: 8 Tips to Choose a Digital Marketing Course in Tamil

STEP 3: Understand what search engines value

To learn SEO, first understand search engines because you work only for search queries. While each search engine has its algorithms and processes, they all share one mission – to deliver the most relevant and useful results for every customer search query.

Several factors determine what makes a result the “best”:

• Relevance: This ensures the content on a page closely aligns with the searcher’s intent, relevant keywords, and topics.
• Quality:  This evaluates content through Google’s E-E-A-T framework (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) to prioritize people-first and trustworthy information.
• Usability: Deliver a smooth page experience – mobile-friendliness, intuitive navigation, fast load times, and accessibility.

The better you understand these ideas, the better you can grasp how ranking factors and SEO tactics work.

STEP 4: Know how artificial intelligence (AI) works

AI is transforming the way search engines operate, how content is discovered, and how users interact with search results. Today, algorithms rely heavily on AI to interpret queries, understand context, and deliver highly personalized results. Today, 7 in 10 searchers only read the first few lines of a Google AI overview (AIO).

So, stay informed about AI trends. As AI tools like Google’s search generative experience (SGE) and ChatGPT influence search behavior, you must adapt their strategies to ensure content remains visible and relevant.

STEP 5: Be familiar with SEO data

Once you start working with SEO tools, you’ll quickly realize they generate a lot of data. Without this data, you’d have no clear way to measure performance, identify gaps, or know exactly where to improve.

Some of the most important SEO metrics to track include:

• Positioning: Where your page ranks on the SERPs and how close it is to the top spot.
• Impressions: The number of times your page appeared in search results.
• Clicks: How many times users clicked your page from the SERPs.
• Click-through rate (CTR): The percentage of impressions that resulted in a click.Organic sessions: The total number of visits to your page from organic search.
• Conversion rate: The percentage of customers who took a desired action (e.g, filling out a form, downloading an ebook, or making a purchase).

STEP 6: Gain practical experience

Through your online course, you can get a clear view of SEO and do projects. But to learn SEO clearly, gain practical experience by doing internships or volunteering to help non-profit organizations with their websites. This gives you real-world experience and helps you build your portfolio.

This hands-on experience is very valuable. Because you can work with real clients who want your help and have better knowledge of SEO tools like Google Analytics, SEMrush, Ahrefs, Ubersuggest, and so on.

STEP 7: Regularly test your SEO knowledge

Keeping up with the latest news, research, and algorithm updates is essential, but to learn SEO, reading alone won’t make you an expert. You need to apply what you learn, test industry assumptions, and experiment with your ideas to see what truly works.

Every experiment, whether it succeeds or fails, sharpens my understanding. They teach you what doesn’t work, build confidence in your decision-making, and help you understand the difference between correlation and causation.

To learn SEO, do all these little things to make a huge change in your SEO career. With this, you can become an SEO expert even if you have no prior experience.

Learn SEO To Start Your Career Today With Us

So, if you’re thinking to learn SEO, don’t wait, take the first steps today to become an SEO expert tomorrow. And if you’re looking for the perfect place to learn, consider enrolling in NB Marketing Solutions’ online digital marketing course. It’s designed to teach you everything you need to know about SEO and set you up for success in the digital marketing world.

So, why not join and become a master in this digital world?

The opportunities are endless, so take your first step today to start your career with us!