{"id":1711,"date":"2021-03-08T12:55:54","date_gmt":"2021-03-08T12:55:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seobuddy.com\/blog\/?p=1711"},"modified":"2021-03-08T12:56:33","modified_gmt":"2021-03-08T12:56:33","slug":"my-seo-journey-ray-delvecchio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seobuddy.com\/blog\/my-seo-journey-ray-delvecchio\/","title":{"rendered":"My SEO Journey: Ray DelVecchio from websiteprofitcourse.com \u2013 My Local SEO tips to rank my clients on Google Maps & Search"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

My SEO Journey is a new series where entrepreneurs and Indie makers will share their honest SEO Journey filled with failure and success, and most importantly proven results. Episode #4 features Ray DelVecchio from Website Profit Course<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Ray<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m Ray DelVecchio, and I\u2019ve been building WordPress websites since 2009. Right now, I work with small business clients and teach what I\u2019ve learned on my blog, Website Profit Course<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I first started, I became fascinated by people who made a living from writing online. I tried several attempts to do the same, but they all failed to gain enough traction to become sustainable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, that experience taught me so much about SEO, link building, and the importance of being passionate about your work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My First Success with SEO<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The first website that I got ranked was a tech blog back in 2011 made on the free platform, Blogger. I wrote a post on how the newly released iPad didn\u2019t support Adobe Flash, a popular internet technology of the era.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, it might be a \u201cgrey-hat\u201d technique (or worse), but I signed up for a service that ran hundreds of blogs in a network designed to submit and share your articles with backlinks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a month or two of using that service, I\u2019ll never forget when my traffic shot through the roof from a few visitors a day to almost 200 per day overnight once the post reached the top 5 in Google\u2019s search results. It kept ascending, and I hit over 800 visitors in one day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My only monetization method was inserting Google AdSense onto the blog, which resulted in roughly $1,000 in under a year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eventually, the Google algorithm caught on, the subject faded in popularity, and I stopped creating content. What I lacked was any form of content promotion or distribution – I would have benefited greatly from a cheat sheet like the SEO Checklist<\/a>!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Organic<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

During this period, I took on hourly work from people in my network who needed a web presence. I realized that freelancing was a better method to make money fast than through passive blog monetization, which relies on high traffic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How to Rank on Google Maps & Search<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For client work, I dove into the world of local SEO to drive more leads to the websites I was building and maintaining for small businesses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the early days, on-page optimization was usually enough to separate yourself from the competition. That meant making sure you had a plugin like Yoast SEO installed to customize each page title and description, targeting the client\u2019s primary services along with their local or regional modifier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then you want to break your page up into scannable sections, using keywords naturally within the headings and main content.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another factor that I learned early was not simply optimizing search engines but also building trust with people. For instance, almost all small business websites lack simple things like:<\/p>\n\n\n\n