How to Do SEO in 2026: A Step-by-Step Guide

To do SEO in 2026, make sure search engines can crawl and index your pages, give each page one clear search query to answer, and write the most useful answer to it. Then make the page fast on mobile, earn links and mentions from real sites, and check Search Console every month.

I am Ujjwal Rupakheti, a web developer and SEO specialist in Itahari, Nepal. This is the order I work in on every site, whether it is a hotel in a small town or a SaaS product selling abroad. Each step links to a deeper guide if you want more detail.

The steps are written for small and medium websites, especially Nepali ones. They work the same way for any site, because Google uses the same rules everywhere. Where Nepal is different, such as slow mobile networks or searches in romanised Nepali, I point it out.

The ten steps, in the order I do them:

1. Connect Search Console, Bing and analytics
2. Fix crawling and indexing
3. Research keywords, one page per intent
4. Write pages that answer the search
5. Add structured data that matches
6. Make the site fast on mobile
7. Get found locally on Google Maps
8. Earn links and mentions
9. Make content easy for AI to cite
10. Measure and improve every month

What Does SEO Mean in 2026?

SEO, or search engine optimisation, is the work of making your pages easy to find, understand and trust, so they appear when people search. In 2026 that means normal Google and Bing results, the Google map pack, Google AI Overviews, and answers from AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity.

The tools have changed, but the job has not. Search engines and AI assistants both need three things from you. They need to reach your page, they need to understand what it is about, and they need a reason to trust it over the other pages that answer the same question.

Most SEO work falls into four groups:

Step 1: Connect Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools and Analytics

Before changing anything, connect Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools, and install an analytics tool such as Google Analytics 4. Search Console shows the queries people use to find you and any indexing errors. Bing matters too, because its index feeds Microsoft Copilot and other AI search tools.

Verify your domain in Google Search Console with a DNS record, so it covers every version of the site. Submit your XML sitemap. Then import the same site into Bing Webmaster Tools, which can copy the settings from Search Console in a few clicks.

Write down where you start: total clicks, impressions, the number of indexed pages and the number of enquiries per month. Without this baseline you will not know whether later changes helped. My SEO tools guide for Nepal explains each free tool in detail.

Step 2: Fix Crawling and Indexing Before Anything Else

A page that Google cannot crawl or chooses not to index will never rank, however good the content is. So the first real work is technical: check that important pages return a 200 status, are not blocked in robots.txt, have no stray noindex tag and point to themselves with a canonical tag.

Open the Pages report in Search Console. It lists every URL Google knows about and why some are not indexed. The common reasons on Nepali sites I review are these:

• A staging site or a “Discourage search engines” setting left on after launch.
• The same page reachable at http://, https://, with and without www, with no redirects between them.
• Thin tag, author and archive pages that crowd out the real pages.
• Content loaded only by JavaScript, which Google renders later and sometimes not at all.
• Old URLs from a redesign that now return 404 instead of redirecting to the new page.

Fix these first. They are usually quick, and they often release rankings the content had already earned. If you would rather have someone go through it for you, that is exactly what my technical SEO audit covers.

Step 3: Research Keywords and Give Each Page One Job

Keyword research tells you the words your customers actually type. Collect real queries, group the ones with the same intent, and give each group to exactly one page. One page per intent stops your own pages from competing with each other and makes it clear to Google which page should rank.

Start with the queries already in Search Console. Then add ideas from Google autocomplete, the “People also ask” box, Google Keyword Planner and your sales calls. In Nepal, check three forms of the same search: English (“hotel in Itahari”), romanised Nepali (“sasto hotel itahari”) and Devanagari.

Sort each query by intent:

The result is a keyword map: a simple sheet with one row per page, its main query, a few related queries and the intent. I build these for clients as part of my keyword research service.

Step 4: Write Pages That Answer the Search Better Than the Others

On-page SEO means writing the page so that a reader, and a search engine, can see in seconds that it answers the query. Put the answer near the top, use headings that read like real questions, add proof such as prices, examples and photos, and link to related pages with descriptive anchor text.

Title Tags and Meta Descriptions

Write a unique title for every page, with the main query near the start. Around 50 to 60 characters usually shows in full. The meta description does not affect ranking directly, but it is your advert in the results, so write about 150 characters that say what the page offers. Google may rewrite both if they do not match the page.

Headings and Structure

Use one H1 that states the topic. Use H2s for the main questions and H3s inside them, without skipping levels. Start each section with a two or three sentence answer, then add the detail. This format is also what AI Overviews and assistants find easiest to quote.

Proof and Experience

Google’s guidelines ask for content that shows experience, expertise, authority and trust. In practice, that means a named author with a real profile, first-hand details, and specifics a competitor could not copy: your prices, your process, your photos and your results. If writing is the bottleneck, my SEO content writing service works from your own facts.

Internal Links

Link from each guide to the service it supports, and from each service to its case studies. Use anchor text that describes the target page, such as “local SEO for Nepali businesses”, not “click here”. Internal links help Google find pages and understand how they relate.

Images

Use WebP or AVIF images, set width and height so the layout does not jump, write alt text that describes the image, and lazy-load images below the fold. Never put important text inside an image.

Step 5: Add Structured Data That Matches the Page

Structured data is code, usually JSON-LD, that labels what a page contains: an article, a business, a product, a person or a set of questions. It can make you eligible for rich results such as product prices and review stars, and it helps search engines and AI tools connect your pages to your brand.

Use the types that fit: Organization or LocalBusiness on the home page, Article or BlogPosting on posts, Product on product pages and BreadcrumbList everywhere. Link them with @id values so the author, the site and the business are clearly the same entities across pages.

Two rules matter more than the type you chooseThe markup must describe what is visible on the page, and it must not invent anything. Fake review stars or ratings can lead to a manual action. Test every template in Google’s Rich Results Test.

Step 6: Make the Site Fast on Nepali Mobile Networks

Google ranks the mobile version of your site, and it measures real users with Core Web Vitals. A good page loads its main content in under 2.5 seconds (LCP), reacts to taps in under 200 milliseconds (INP) and does not shift around while loading (CLS under 0.1). INP replaced the old FID metric in March 2024.

Speed matters even more in Nepal, where many visitors use mid-range phones on mobile data that drops in and out. The fixes that help most are usually simple:

• Compress images and serve them in WebP or AVIF at the size they are shown.
• Remove plugins, sliders, chat widgets and tracking scripts you do not need.
• Host close to your visitors, or put a CDN such as Cloudflare in front of the site.
• Load Devanagari web fonts with font-display: swap, and only the weights you use.

Check your pages in PageSpeed Insights. Speed alone will not lift a weak page to the top, but a slow page loses visitors before they read a word. On WordPress, my WordPress SEO guide for Nepal shows the exact settings.

Step 7: Get Found Locally with Google Business Profile

If you serve customers in a town or district, your Google Business Profile often matters more than your website. It decides whether you appear in the map pack for searches like “dentist in Itahari”. Claim it, verify it, choose the right primary category and keep your name, address and phone identical everywhere.

Then keep it active. Add real photos, list your services, set accurate hours and answer every review. My Google Business Profile setup guide for Nepal walks through verification, which is where most Nepali businesses get stuck. If you want this handled for you, see my local SEO service.

Step 8: Earn Links and Mentions from Real Websites

Links from other trusted websites are still one of the strongest signals that a page deserves to rank. The safe way to earn them is to publish things worth citing, such as original data, useful tools and honest guides, then tell the people who would care about them.

Good sources of links for Nepali businesses include local news sites, industry associations, suppliers and partners, event pages, universities and colleges, and directories that real people use. Brand mentions without a link still help, especially for AI assistants that learn which brands are linked with which topics.

Avoid bought link packages, private blog networks and link swaps at scale. They break Google’s spam policies, and cleaning up after them costs more than they ever earned. I explain the safe approach on my link building page.

Step 9: Make Your Content Easy for AI Search to Cite

AI Overviews, ChatGPT search, Gemini and Perplexity pick sources they can read easily and trust. To be cited, let their crawlers in, answer questions in short self-contained passages, back claims with specifics, and keep your brand details consistent across your site, your profiles and directories.

• Crawler access: check that robots.txt does not block Googlebot, Bingbot, OAI-SearchBot or PerplexityBot. You can block training crawlers such as GPTBot separately if you prefer.
• Answer-first writing: open each section with a 40 to 60 word answer that makes sense on its own.
• Specific facts: prices, dates, steps and numbers you can stand behind are easier to quote than general claims.
• Consistent entity data: use the same business name, description and links on your site, LinkedIn, GitHub and Google Business Profile.

What about llms.txt?An llms.txt file is a proposed way to describe your site for AI tools. No major search engine has confirmed using it, but it takes ten minutes and does no harm.

Step 10: Measure, Report and Improve Every Month

SEO keeps going after launch. Once a month, compare clicks, impressions, rankings and enquiries with your baseline. Look for pages that rank in positions 5 to 15, because small improvements to them often bring the fastest gains. Then update, merge or remove pages that do not earn their place.

Track what the business cares about, not only rankings: calls, form enquiries, WhatsApp messages and sales. In Google Analytics 4, mark form submissions and click-to-call taps as key events so you can see which pages bring leads.

A Real Example: Nimtto, Built for Search

Nimtto, a wedding invitation product I built for Nepali families, shows these steps working together. The site publishes five sitemaps, gives every design its own indexable page with Product and breadcrumb markup, and separates Nepal and international audiences with hreflang.

Its robots file allows AI crawlers such as GPTBot, ClaudeBot and PerplexityBot, it has an llms.txt file, and private areas like the studio and payment pages are blocked from crawling. Pages are pre-compressed static files, so they load fast on Nepali mobile networks. The site is live at nimtto.com and the source is public on GitHub. You can read the full Nimtto case study, or see how the same thinking applies to a local business in the Hotel Aarohi case study.

SEO Mistakes I Often See on Nepali Websites

Most problems I find are not advanced. They are basic settings that were never checked, or habits copied from old advice. Fixing them costs little and often helps more than any new content.

• One home page trying to rank for every service, with no dedicated service pages.
• Keywords stuffed into the Google Business Profile name, which can get the profile suspended.
• Text inside images or PDF menus, which search engines read poorly.
• Copied service descriptions that appear on dozens of other sites.
• No author name, no address and no prices, so neither readers nor Google can judge trust.
• Buying cheap backlinks and then losing rankings after a spam update.

How Long Does SEO Take, and What Does It Cost?

Expect early movement in 3 to 6 months and steadier results after 6 to 12 months, depending on competition. With me, a technical SEO audit starts from NPR 15,000 and monthly SEO from NPR 30,000. Nobody can honestly guarantee a ranking position, so be careful of anyone who does.

For a full breakdown of what each budget buys in Nepal, read my SEO cost in Nepal guide, or see all services and starting prices. If you need a full site built for search from day one, my web development service includes the technical SEO base.

About the author

Ujjwal Rupakheti

I am a full-stack web developer and SEO specialist based in Itahari, Koshi Province, Nepal. I have worked in web development and SEO since 2022 and have published more than 200 SEO-optimised articles across five-plus domains. Since June 2026 I have been a full-stack web developer at Ektukra Digital Agency, after a year there on SEO content strategy and QA testing.

Author profileAbout meCase studiesLinkedIn