Get Started

What is SEO?

Search engine optimization is the process of improving the quality and quantity of website traffic to a website or a web page from search engines - especially Google. SEO targets unpaid traffic rather than direct traffic or paid traffic.

More from Google on how Search works

What is See Tickets’ SEO (Search Engine Optimization) Feature?

See Tickets’ SEO (Search Engine Optimization) Feature allows you to adjust your metadata on a client level and on an event level, to ensure you’re getting the best possible listing results on search engines. 

Where do I find the SEO Feature?

On the Client or Event level, go to the Manage section in the main navigation in the left column and find the SEO link.

Setting: Client or Event Dashboard > Manage > SEO

What does the See Tickets’ SEO Feature allow me to do? 

On the SEO page, you will be able to control:

• Page title 
• Keywords 
• Description
• Create a custom URL for your event

How does the SEO Feature work?

Once the data is saved, all changes will appear ‘under the hood’. The metadata is stored on the profile or event page but is not visible on the actual page. This data is hidden content but can be accessed by Google and other search engines to help serve the right content to their users. You can learn more about Google search works here.

Improving SEO: Title Tags, Meta Descriptions, and Override Links

Title Tags

Keyword research is one of the most important on-page SEO factors. If you haven’t had a chance to do this yet, you can take a look at the Google Adwords keyword tool. It is free, if you set up an Adwords account (https://adwords.google.com).

The title tag tells search engines what the page is about and that the page on your website is relevant for that keyword or keyword phrase. Title tags should be unique for every page. In search results, search engines will highlight your keyword phrases if a user has searched for those terms. This increases visibility and click-through rate. 

Let’s say you’re trying to rank for “Live Blues in Chicago”, your title tag may look like this:  Live Blues in Chicago | Your Venue Name

Best Practices

• Your title tag should be written like this: Primary Keyword – Secondary Keyword | Brand Name.
• Use a dash in between your keyword phrases and a pipe at the end before your brand name.
• Avoid duplicate title tags.
• Keep title tags at 55 characters or less in length, including spaces.

Example of a title tag in a browser:

Example of a title tag in search engine results:

Meta Descriptions

Meta descriptions, while not as important in search engine rankings, are extremely important in getting users to click through from the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) to your website. 

Meta descriptions should use keywords wisely, but more importantly they should include a compelling description on which a user would want to click on.

Much like title tags, the SERPs will highlight keywords that the user searched for, increasing the likelihood of the user clicking through to your website.

Best Practices

• Write compelling meta descriptions.
• 150 to 160 characters is the recommended length.
• Avoid duplicate meta descriptions.
• Do not use quotes or any non-alpha characters (Google, cuts them out of the meta description).

Example of meta descriptions in search engine results:

Facebook & Twitter Share Link Override

In these share link override fields, event editors can enter a custom link that will populate when a user clicks the respective social media icons on the event ticketing page (top-left next to the event name/title) instead of the event's original URL.

Improving SEO: Content with Targeted Keyword Phrases

Your content is the meat and potatoes of your website. It is extremely important that your content is unique and relevant. If you have multiple pages with the same content (or if you have your content on other people’s websites), you will run the risk of getting penalized by Google and your search rankings will suffer.

We want to keep Google happy, so keep your content unique.

Best Practices

• Create content that is extremely relevant for that keyword phrase.
• Use your keyword phrase 4 times within your content (but don’t force it, it should read “natural”).
• Include links from other pages within your website that point back to this, when appropriate.
• Create unique content for every medium (press releases, blogs, guest blog posts, etc…). If you send out a press release, do not copy and paste that press release onto your website. If it gets picked up in multiple publications, the search engines will see that you have duplicate content and penalize you for it.

Improving SEO:  Header Tags and Keyword Phrases

A header tag, also known as an H1 tag, is much like the subject line of your web page. You should only use your keyword phrase once in the H1 tag. This should be included on a page to which you are trying to drive unique traffic to. You can also use H2 tags (second header) if there are multiple sections.

Best Practices

• Use your keyword phrase once in your H1 tag
• Use H1 tags on pages you are trying to drive unique traffic to (SEO page)
• Use H2 tags if there are multiple sections

Example of an H1 tag being optimized for “Buy Tickets”:

Improving SEO:  Internal Page Linking with Anchor Text

Internal linking refers to a link on a page that points to another page on the same website. Internal linking is important because it helps strengthen those keywords internally for those pages, it allows users (and search engine robots) to navigate through the website, and it tells the search engines that the page is relevant for that keyword phrase.

Best Practices

• When linking to another page on the same site from within the content, select good anchor text (keywords) to use in the actual link and do this often. For example: “We offer a wide range of seating options” rather than “Click here for options.”
• In the above example, you would link “seating options” to your seating options page instead of linking “click here.”

Check Wikipedia - as a site they set a great example of how to use anchor text in your internal links.

Improving SEO: Image ALT tags and Filenames

An alt tag is essentially the name of an image. All images should use appropriate alt tags. Not only are alt tags good for search engines; they are also good for accessibility. If someone is using a screen reader, they will be able to hear what that image is.

 You should try to include your keyword phrase in the name of your image, if possible, but don’t overdo it. Image filenames should also be SEO friendly. Image search is much more widely used than believed, so traffic from there is also valuable.

Best Practices

• Name all of your images in a way that describes what they are
• Use dashes between the words, rather than underscores ( purple-hat.jpg rather than purple_hat.jpg)
• Do not use non-alpha characters in your image or file names (so no %, &, $, etc…)

Improving SEO:  "Easy to Read" Content

This is not a huge factor in search engine rankings, but will help your users easily scan your content and find the keywords they are looking for. You should use bolding and bullet points to set apart words in the text, and this further tells the engines what is important on the page. Don’t go wild or you’ll end up cluttering up your page and aggravating the user.

Best Practices

• Paragraphs should be roughly three sentences long. Extremely long sentences will lose the users’ attention.
• Use bullet points and bolding to break up large blocks of content. Users tend to scan content looking for keywords.
• Do not overuse bullets and bolding.

Example of Easy to Read Content: