How Dover ranked first on Google for "Free ATS"
Max Kolysh
CEO @ Dover
August 19, 2024
•
3 mins
First up, we put plenty of time into our on-page SEO optimization. On-page SEO involves optimizing parts of your website to make it look better in the eyes of the ranking algorithms. The nice thing about on-page SEO is that you can completely control all aspects of it because it’s all on your website. With the right strategy, you can climb the rankings for the keywords that matter to your business. Some good ways to improve your on-page SEO include:
1. Find your keywords
We didn’t reach the #1 spot on Google for “free ATS” by accident. We were able to rank for this keyword by specifically targeting it in our SEO strategy. That means fitting it into our website pages, blogs, page titles, headers, meta descriptions and anywhere else it was relevant. Consistently using the keywords you want to rank for helps Google understand what you want people to find.
Of course, this doesn’t mean you can just stuff your website with keywords. Google is a little smarter than that. Instead, you need to make sure the keywords you’re using are relevant to your audience and that they’re naturally and seamlessly integrated into your content.
2. Quality content matters
Speaking of content, it’s time to get that blog going. We post on our blog and our socials about our free ATS to help people understand what we offer. Our blog posts also cover various topics that are relevant to startup founders who might use our product, which gives us another great opportunity to explain why our product can help them with the question they Googled to get an answer to.
For instance – a tech startup founder might want to know “How to Hire the Right Software Engineer.” So, we create a rich, informative and engaging blog about that topic and also include information on how Dover can help make that hire. It’s a win-win because they get an answer to their question, we potentially find a new customer and help them make great hires. Plus, Google notices that people are spending time on our page and finding answers to hiring-related questions, helping us to boost those rankings.
3. Meta descriptions & headings
Make sure you don’t let the little stuff fall through the cracks. Although meta descriptions and headings might seem like a more minor consideration, these help tell people what to click on when they’re searching Google. Make sure your headings, title tags and meta descriptions are optimized so Google knows what your page is about and so the user knows too.
4. Internal linking
Internal linking is a powerful yet often overlooked SEO tactic. It’s pretty easy too. All you need to do is link to other relevant pages within your site, preferably linking to keywords that you want to rank for. This helps push people to different parts of your website, and can also guide them to content that’s relevant to what they want to know.
Off-page SEO can be a bit trickier, but it’s just as important as keeping your website optimized. Off-page SEO involves SEO-related strategies outside of your website to build authority and visibility. This can take some reaching out to external sources if you want to really build that off-page SEO, but it also means creating great content that can help you build authority. Some off-page SEO strategies include:
Building quality backlinks
One ranking factor that Google places a ton of weight on is backlinks. Backlinks are links from other websites that point to yours. Some ways to increase the number and quality of your backlinks include guest posting on other industry-related blogs, getting featured in news articles and getting other reputable websites to link to your website or blog pages. Again, this means you need to have quality content people actually want to link to. Google places importance on the quality of your backlinks too, so getting backlinks from just any website won’t necessarily help your rankings.
Social signals
Social media isn’t a direct ranking factor, but social signals can indirectly affect your SEO. Making shareable content that people post about can increase your visibility and credibility, while also bringing more people to your website.
You should definitely be working to improve your organic rankings, but don’t neglect your other marketing channels while you do it. SEO doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and you can complement your SEO strategy with paid advertising. We use targeted ads to help startup founders and businesses find our free ATS, so we’re covering both organic and paid rankings.
Use an applicant tracking system (ATS) to hire a great team
Of course, you can’t beat having an incredible team working on your SEO and marketing, and Dover’s product and marketing teams are always pushing the envelope. Like improving your SEO, building a great team can take some time and effort, but that’s where tools like Dover can help.
Dover’s free ATS is the best all-in-one hiring and recruiting solution to help you make more great hires in a fraction of the time. Our ATS helps you post to job boards, communicate with applicants, sort applicants with the power of AI and much more. Ready to learn more? Get started with Dover for free today.
