As a whole, I found this challenge to be very engaging and informative. It proved to be a great learning experience as it taught me to work well with others, effective SEO techniques, and pointed out areas I can improve on.
First, this challenge taught me how to work well in a team. Working in a group is a much different environment than I experienced when working on my personal site throughout the semester. It caused me to grow in delegation skills seeing as my two other team members and I had to split up much of the work, as well as take different aspects of the presentation when showing the rest of the class our work. It increased trust among us and provided assurance that the success or failure of the SEO endeavors on the site were not just on one person but instead split up between the whole group. First, as a team we searched for keywords relating to Grove City College and then from there brainstormed potential ways we could attract new students through engaging, compelling content. After this, we split up the work accordingly so that we could have different sections for each member to complete.
Next, I discovered what content should be included in a site and what should not. By comparing Grove City College’s current site regarding major and minor information, we were able to conclude that blocks and blocks of linked text are overwhelming to the viewer and not conducive to prospective students and parents of students that are unsure of what degree to pursue. Instead, what we decided to do was to include images and headings to break up sections to make the long lists of majors and minors more digestible to the viewer. We also decided to create and include more engaging content such as an interactive quiz, a video series, and a podcast.
Finally, by watching the other groups present in class, it was apparent that there were many other areas that we could improve in. For example, one specific feature that we could have added would be captions underneath images. These short descriptions could include keywords that would appeal to search engines and result in higher ranking on the SERP. Additionally, we could have added more blog posts or pages filled with optimized content. Overall, this was a beneficial project that helped me see the cruciality of implementing good search engine optimization strategies as well as encouraged communication and cooperation skills.
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