How Semantic SEO Expands Reach for B2B Companies

Marketing has higher stakes for B2B companies than B2C ones because leads are much harder to find and convert. Improving online reach is a central part of all effective B2B SEO strategies. Semantic SEO makes your content easier to discover in a search using context.

Here is how a B2B SEO agency opens new possibilities for a B2B business with semantic SEO:

• Defining Semantic SEO and Semantic Search.
• How Semantic SEO Supports B2B Businesses.
• Optimizing Your Website for Semantic Search.

There is a lot to discuss, so get ready to take notes.

Let’s go!

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What Is Semantic SEO?

Semantic SEO is the marketer’s response to recent changes in search engine algorithms, which decrease the power of individual keywords in favor of semantic search. In a nutshell, the goal is to serve users content based on their intent, not necessarily word choice.

Semantic SEO allows your content to have enough context to appear higher in search results despite not matching the intended search term. Search engines build a concept of the search term’s meaning based on how it appears in content and what other concepts relate to it.

Think of semantic search as a word web. In order to reach more people, your content has to have as many links between it and the target keyword as possible. The words that link them are the semantic keywords. The connecting lines build much needed context between these concepts.

That means a target keyword, on its own, is no longer enough to carry your content to the top of search engine results pages (SERPs). Competitors can bypass your website using semantic keywords to strengthen its value for searchers. As you can tell, context is key in modern SEO.

How Does Semantic SEO Expand B2B Reach?

When producing results for searchers, a search engine looks at certain key factors to know how high or low to place them on the page. Among the factors that B2B SEO agency experts count is how relevant the post is to the query. Website metrics are another important factor.

In addition, Google has quality control measures for the content it shows. It checks the experience, expertise, authority, and trustworthiness (E-E-A-T) of results to ensure they fit the searcher’s needs. E-E-A-T highlights the value of authenticity in content creation and SEO.

The main goal of the best semantic SEO practices is to increase topical authority and relevance to users, both of which are critical factors in online reach. Not only do semantic keywords show your topical expertise, but they also act as seamless links between every related content page.

Employing topic clusters gives you more chances to address user queries in just the right way to appear in results while creating strong internal links. The latter is particularly important for their contribution to excellent user experience (UX) by bringing related information within reach.

Boosting Your Online Reach with Semantic SEO

Optimizing your company’s website for semantic search is complex and taxing because every part affects the others. Working with a B2B SEO agency is best, but it is possible to do it yourself as well. Below are the ten steps that you need to assemble reliable B2B semantic SEO: 

     1. Create High-Quality Detailed Content

Semantic SEO answers many common issues marketers face such as using natural language, long-tail keywords, and structured data. It also naturally applies E-E-A-T to boost discovery in search results. To be successful, it takes more than just keywords to use.

Responding to semantic search requires structure and planning. The goal is to integrate long-tail keywords seamlessly into the content. Imagine how negatively it affects context if you insert random semantic keywords throughout your content just to say you added them.

At best, it makes your articles hard to read. At worst, it renders your content completely useless. Semantic SEO is supposed to make your content more comprehensive through the addition of relevant keywords and optimize them for UX, not turn your articles into over-optimized disorder.

     2. Align Your Keywords with User Intent

To use semantic SEO to your advantage, it is vital to know what your target market searches for and how. It becomes much harder to incorporate semantic keywords into content when you do not know what search terms they use. Building context heavily relies on current customer insight.

A software-as-a-service (SaaS) business that wants to create a content marketing campaign for its marketing automation software (target keyword) should include phrases that reflect it, for instance, “lead nurturing software,” “email marketing automation,” and “B2B marketing analytics.”

The goal is to add terms that users associate with your target keyword due to how often they appear within similar content and contexts. Semantic keywords give you a way to better align with user search intent by using long-tail keywords related to your keyword or rephrasing existing keywords.

     3. Provide Context Using Internal Links

Similar to how you would use keywords to indicate your content’s main subject, internal links are another source of context. By connecting pages that share themes (e.g., a pillar page), search engines and users better grasp what your business is about and whether or not it matters to the query.

For example, many ecommerce stores looking for a courier to handle their logistics and delivery start their search with “ecommerce logistics.” This leads them to a B2B logistics company’s page on how to manage ecommerce logistics, which links to its article on how to offer free shipping.

This internal link not only makes it easier to find related content that best addresses the user’s concerns but also affects the relevance of these pages in searches for a given keyword. That leads to longer dwell times on your website and boosts traffic and engagement on your pages.

     4. Apply Natural Language to Keywords

A key aspect of semantic search is that it follows natural language to better understand the goal behind people’s use of search terms. In a way, semantic SEO forces your keywords to adapt to rank better and reach more people, which also boosts your content quality.

Although keyword order is interchangeable, it has a noticeable effect on which results appear in searches and where they rank on the page. Search engines do their best to place keywords in context when generating results. Google’s People Also Ask section highlights this.

Searching for “ecommerce logistics” yields results discussing the logistics of ecommerce, while “logistics ecommerce” shows content talking about the role of logistics in ecommerce. B2B SEO agency experts can help you navigate this problem and optimize semantic SEO keywords. 

     5. Insert Semantic Keywords in Content

Nearly every aspect of your content strategy affects your ranking on search, and it is all too easy to exhaust your target keyword to the point of stuffing. This is where semantic keywords come in handy for your company. They help you cut stuffing while also giving you more chances to rank.

A real estate firm specializing in office spaces easily becomes redundant with its use of “room” in content pages. Mixing in semantic keywords such as “office,” “space,” and “area” helps target even more search terms and stops you from sounding robotic. Both improve the B2B SEO reach.

Common examples would be “lounge area” instead of “break room” or “lobby” instead of “waiting room.” Adding them to image alt text strengthens semantic SEO because they create a clearer picture of what your content is about while making it easy to discover on image search.

     6. Incorporate Your Local SEO Strategy

Local and semantic SEO go hand-in-hand because the former involves tying your content to a specific area, while the latter builds context around your articles to push them up in search results. These concepts overlap in how they work and how you apply them to SEO content.

To illustrate, anyone can produce generic content and insert place names, but that does not make it local. Any reliable B2B SEO agency knows context is key, especially with E-E-A-T being a prominent metric for high-quality content. In short, you need to emphasize being local.

Adding concrete examples rooted in the local context helps bring your content up to par with top results on search. A financial services firm targeting local businesses should focus on publishing financial and tax information applicable to their service area to boost its rank in local searches.

     7. Apply Structured Data Markup in Full

One of the most technically challenging parts of semantic SEO is using structured data markup. You need to know what attributes to supply and what to input for each one. Integrating the code into your page’s HTML is another problem with which most people are most likely unfamiliar.

Google’s Structured Data Markup Helper and Structured Schema.org’s Markup Validator make this process easier. The presence or absence of structured data matters to Google (and other search engines) because the information provided aids in indexing web pages for results.

Besides strengthening the association between your content and target keywords or concepts, it allows you to customize rich snippets for your pages. You get no guarantee that Google displays rich snippets, but when it does, it gives your content greater reach because it stands out more.

     8. Work on Mobile-Friendly Web Design

Today, search happens in almost every manner possible, from desktops to laptops to mobile devices to voice. That makes it crucial to adapt to the latest versions of search to optimize reach. Mobile-friendly design is the first step to that because of mobile-first indexing.

Search engines prefer to crawl the mobile versions of pages to index and present results for many reasons, one being that they are more optimized for speed and usability. The accelerated mobile pages (AMP) project furthers this by establishing a page version that prioritizes mobile.

The AMP focuses on providing fast and reliable results, which encourages the use of structured data markup to add context and prep your pages for rich results on mobile. The latter is important for expanding semantic B2B SEO reach by enhancing your content's results.

     9. Optimize Content for Voice Searches

More and more people are turning to voice search over traditional methods, especially with the rise of powerful virtual assistants that utilize voice recognition. These tools rely on natural language models to process search queries using spoken language as an input method.

Using natural language in content, such as adding semantic keywords and adapting your style to sound more conversational, makes it easier to find through voice search. B2B SEO agency experts, for instance, suggest using question headers and formatting content as direct answers.

In addition, writing in the active voice makes your content more contextually relevant to people searching online because they are looking for solutions to existing problems. Finally, applying principles for voice search also optimizes your content to appear as featured snippets in results.

     10. Track and Adapt to Changes in SEO

As with any other application of SEO, semantic SEO is ever-changing and requires you to track and adapt to new technologies and trends that affect semantics. Natural language, which affects semantic SEO, refers to how people structure their use of words and grammar to communicate.

It constantly evolves and requires prior knowledge to create context, so AI tools still struggle to fully grasp it. Part of semantic SEO is to constantly research and adapt to changes in search behaviors. That includes how people construct or determine the search terms that they use.

For now, long-tail keywords are the most effective in keeping up with semantic SEO and natural language principles. They are more precise in meaning and specific in their intent, which is also why they work better with voice search and align with how most B2B clients search.

Summing Up

Semantic SEO is valuable for B2B companies because it expands their reach by matching how their target markets search online. People who look for B2B solutions often type their searches to indicate informational or transactional intent, which provides a lot of room for interpretation.

Semantic SEO helps B2B companies by expanding the possible matches for their content using semantic keywords, natural language, and structured data markup, among other elements. Voice search and mobile-first indexing also benefit from applying semantic SEO principles.

Need help expanding your B2B company’s reach with semantic SEO strategies? Contact Digital Authority Partners (DAP) to learn how we can help.