On-page SEO refers to optimisations made directly on your website to improve visibility in search engines. While search behaviour has evolved - shifting towards AI-driven recommendations, internal search, and social platforms like TikTok and Instagram - Google remains a key discovery tool. A strong approach to on-page SEO ensures your site is technically sound, user-friendly, and optimised for the way people search today.
What is on-page SEO?
SEO is constantly evolving, and on-page SEO is no exception. With AI-powered search engines and social search growing in influence, best practices must adapt. Here’s what matters most:
Bot accessibility and technical foundations
The core elements that ensure search engines can crawl and index your site, including meta robots tags, robots.txt directives, XML sitemaps, structured data (schema markup), site speed, internal linking, and hosting configuration.
User experience (UX) and search intent
Search engines prioritise websites that deliver a seamless user experience. That means mobile-first design, accessibility compliance, fast load times, intuitive navigation, and engaging, relevant content that matches user intent - whether informational, navigational, or transactional.
Content that works for search and social
Content is still key, but how people discover it has changed. Google is no longer the only search engine that matters - users are increasingly searching on TikTok, Instagram, and internal site searches. Your content must be optimised for both traditional search engines and social search algorithms, ensuring it’s engaging, intent-driven, and enriched with the right metadata.
Why on-page SEO still matters
Even as AI and social search grow in influence, on-page SEO remains fundamental. A well-optimised site ensures search engines (and users) can find and understand your content. Even if organic SEO isn’t a major part of your strategy, basic on-page optimisation helps ensure people can find your website when they search for your brand.
Once your technical setup is in place, the next step is strategic content development. This is where SEO and brand storytelling align to create high-converting pages.
Optimised for intent
SEO today isn’t just about ranking - it’s about relevance. Optimising for intent means understanding what a user is looking for and guiding them from search result to conversion.
A simple way to check intent alignment is to search your target query and analyse the top three results. Are they blog posts? Product pages? Comparison articles? If they don’t match your content format, you may be targeting the wrong term.
The best-performing pages have clear, informative copy with strong calls to action - ‘Buy now’, ‘Learn more’, ‘Watch the video’ - to drive user engagement. Well-executed on-page SEO ensures visitors land on the right page and find exactly what they need, without frustrating detours.
The bottom line
On-page SEO isn’t just about Google - it’s about meeting users where they search, whether that’s on a search engine, a social platform, or your website’s own internal search. A strong foundation in on-page SEO makes your site easier to find, navigate, and convert, ensuring every visitor has a clear and compelling path forward.