The Ultimate Cannabis SEO Checklist for 2024

In 2024, standing out in the booming cannabis industry means mastering SEO. Here’s a straightforward guide to ensure your cannabis brand shines online:

Understand the Market: Stay ahead by keeping tabs on legalization trends, market growth, and changing regulations.
Legal Compliance: Ensure your SEO strategies adhere to current laws to avoid penalties.
On-Page SEO: Optimize your website’s content, meta tags, and images to improve visibility.
Technical SEO: Enhance website speed, mobile optimization, and security to rank higher.
Off-Page SEO: Build quality backlinks and optimize for local SEO to increase authority.
Content Marketing: Use engaging and informative content to attract and retain customers.
Measure Success: Use analytics to track performance and adjust strategies accordingly.

With these key points, cannabis brands can navigate the complexities of SEO, adapting to changes in the market and regulations, while engaging effectively with their audience.

Major Market Trends

The cannabis industry is going to keep growing in 2024. Here are some big changes that might affect how you use SEO for your cannabis brand:

More places might legalize cannabis – Expect more states in the U.S. and countries like Germany, Mexico, and Thailand to possibly make recreational or medical cannabis legal. This means you can aim your marketing at new places.
Companies joining together – As the cannabis world gets more established, we might see more companies merging or teaming up. This could mean you need to tweak your SEO if your brand or others change names or looks.
More people buying – With less stigma and more curiosity, sales could jump by over 18% worldwide. Using SEO can help your brand reach these new customers.
New products – There might be more cannabis stuff to buy as companies invest in research and development. SEO can help show off these new items.
Changing rules – The laws about selling and marketing cannabis are always updating, and they’re different everywhere. It’s crucial to keep up so your brand doesn’t get in trouble.

Implications for SEO

With all these changes, keeping your cannabis brand visible online means staying on your toes with SEO in 2024. Here’s what to keep in mind:

Keep an eye on new laws, company changes, and market shifts to find new chances for marketing and partnerships.
Make sure your website and content follow the latest rules about what you can say and sell. This keeps you out of trouble.
Update your site to talk about new products and what customers are into, so you attract the right visitors.
Work on getting links from other websites, especially as new big players emerge in the cannabis world.
Use tools like Google Analytics to see how changes in the market or rules affect what people search for. This helps you adjust your SEO strategy.

By watching the market closely and tweaking your SEO tactics, your cannabis brand can stay ahead of the game, even as things keep changing.

Pre-SEO Checklist: Setting the Foundation

Research and Understand Your Audience

Before you dive into SEO, it’s super important to really get who your audience is. Here’s how to do that:

Ask your customers directly: Use surveys or chats to find out what they care about and how they ended up on your site. This gives you a clear picture of what they’re looking for.
Create detailed profiles for your ideal customers: Think about their age, what’s important to them, and what problems they’re trying to solve. This helps you make content they’ll love.
Look at the data you already have: Check out patterns in who’s buying from you. This can show you a bigger picture of your audience.
Find out what words they use when searching: Tools like The Google Keyword Planner can show you the terms your audience uses. This guides you on what topics to focus on.
Plan your content around big and small topics: Pick a few big ideas related to your products, like "health benefits of CBD," and break them down into smaller bits, like "CBD for sleep." This way, you cover everything your audience might search for.

Knowing your audience well sets you up for success in making your site and content better for them.

Compliance and Legal Considerations

Since selling cannabis can be tricky with all the rules, it’s key to make sure your SEO doesn’t break any laws.

Don’t say your products can cure diseases unless the FDA says it’s okay
Remember, different places have different rules
Make sure what you put on your website is okay with the laws about selling and talking about cannabis
Keep up with the latest rules from the FDA and FTC about what you can say about health benefits
It’s a good idea to ask a lawyer who knows about cannabis to check your website and plans

Here are a couple of places to get reliable info on the rules:

Staying on top of the rules helps you grow your brand without getting into trouble.

On-Page SEO Checklist

On-page SEO is all about making changes on your website to help it show up higher on search engines like Google. Here’s a simple guide to doing on-page SEO for websites in the cannabis industry.

Keyword Research

Look for words or phrases people might use on Google to find your cannabis products or services. Use tools like SEMrush, Google Keyword Planner, and Answer the Public.
Check how often these words are searched and how hard it might be to rank for them. Choose your main focus words wisely.
Use your main words in important places on your page, like titles, headers, and picture descriptions.
Also, think about longer phrases or questions people might ask and include those.

Content Creation

Write useful and interesting stuff for your website, like articles or product descriptions, to attract people.
Add your main words into your writing naturally. But don’t overdo it.
Show you know what you’re talking about by using data or examples. Make sure your info is trustworthy.
Make your content easy to read with clear headings and lists.
Link to other pages on your site to help spread the love.

Meta Tags and Descriptions

Write short, snappy titles and descriptions for your pages using your main words. This can make more people click on your site from Google.
Start your titles with the most important word.
Make sure your descriptions match what’s on the page.
Use headings (like H1, H2) to organize your page and help Google understand what’s important.

Image Optimization

Make your pictures and videos smaller so your site loads faster.
Name your pictures with words that describe them and add a description (alt text) with your main words if it fits.
Make sure pictures look good on phones, too.

Technical SEO Checklist

Website Speed Optimization

Making your website fast is super important because it helps your site show up higher on Google and makes visitors happy. Here’s how to make your site quicker:

Make images and videos smaller: Use TinyPNG to shrink images. Make sure videos don’t have to fully download before they start playing.
Clean up your code: Remove extra spaces and characters from your CSS and JavaScript files to make them smaller. There are plugins like Autoptimize that can help.
Use caching: Caching saves parts of your site so it loads faster next time someone visits. There are plugins that can do this for you.
Pick a good web host: Look for web hosting that uses fast drives (SSD) and has a network (CDN) to make your site load quickly everywhere.
Load important stuff later: Make your website load the main content first and other things like some CSS/JS files later. This makes your site appear faster.

Check your site’s speed with tools like PageSpeed Insights and GTmetrix. Try to get scores of 90 or more for both mobile and desktop.

Mobile Optimization

Since a lot of people use their phones to go online, your site needs to work well on mobile devices.

Make your site responsive: Your website should adjust its layout for any screen size. This is called responsive design, and it’s important for mobile users.
Use AMP: AMP makes pages load faster on phones. Consider adding AMP to make your mobile site speedier.
Speed up server response: A fast server makes your site load quicker on phones. Using a CDN and a good web host can help.
Avoid pop-ups: Pop-ups can be annoying on mobile. Google might lower your site’s ranking if you use them too much.

Use Google’s Mobile Friendly Test to make sure your site works well on mobile. Also, check for any issues with how your site loads and fix them.

Secure Your Website (HTTPS)

Making your site secure (HTTPS) is important for safety and for Google rankings.

Get an SSL certificate: This makes your site secure. You can get one from Comodo, Digicert, or Let’s Encrypt (which is free). Install it on your server.
Change your site to use HTTPS: Update your website and sitemaps to use HTTPS instead of HTTP. Make sure all requests to your site are redirected to HTTPS.
Fix mixed content issues: Make sure all parts of your site use HTTPS, not HTTP. This includes images and other resources.
Turn on HSTS: This tells browsers to only use a secure connection when visiting your site.

Switching to HTTPS makes your site safer for visitors and helps with your Google ranking.

Off-Page SEO Checklist

Building Quality Backlinks

Getting good backlinks is key for cannabis brands to do better in SEO and be seen more online. Here are some smart and fair ways to get those links:

Write guest posts for well-known cannabis blogs and websites. Pick ones with a lot of visitors and trust. You can include links to your site in your author bio or within the content when it makes sense.
Make stuff people want to share, like cool infographics, useful guides, and handy templates. Find people with influence to share your stuff.
Put out top-notch content that other sites will want to mention and link to. Use social media to get your content out there.
Join in on forums and online groups that talk about cannabis. Help out by answering questions and you can sneak in links to your site.
Send out press releases to big cannabis websites like Cannabis Now, High Times, and Leafly.
Connect with influencers in the cannabis world and work together on projects that get you both more backlinks.
Create cool tools like calculators or quizzes that other sites might want to use. Let them know about your tools.

The goal is to use honest methods that actually help others, so you get links without having to beg for them or pay. Keep an eye on your backlinks to make sure they’re good quality.

Local SEO Optimization

If you run a dispensary or cannabis shop, focusing on local SEO is super important. Here’s what to do:

Google My Business – Fill out your profile completely with photos, what you offer, and updates. Ask customers to leave reviews.
Schema markup – Use specific code like LocalBusiness to help search engines understand what your business is.
Citations – Get listed on directories like Yelp to make sure your business name, address, and phone number are the same everywhere.
Reviews – Work on getting positive reviews and show them on your Google My Business listing and website. Always answer reviews professionally.
On-site optimization – Use your city, state, and keywords in your website’s titles, headings, content, URLs, and picture descriptions. Link to your Google My Business page.
Link building – Get links from websites that are relevant to your location, like city guides, local chambers of commerce, local news sites, and partners in your industry.

Being easy to find in local searches can help bring more people to your store, get more calls, and increase sales. Keep track of how you’re doing in local search results and adjust your plan as needed.

Content Marketing and SEO

Content Marketing Strategies

If you’re in the cannabis business, using stories and information (content marketing) can help you draw in more visitors, show you know your stuff, and boost your SEO (search engine optimization). Here are some simple ways to do it:

Educational content – Write detailed guides and FAQs to answer common questions people have about cannabis. For example, explain what THC and CBD are or clear up myths.
Industry trends – Keep folks updated on new products, changes in laws, and how the cannabis market is doing. It shows you’re keeping up with the industry.
Lifestyle content – Share stories about wellness, food, travel, etc., that involve cannabis. Personal stories are good here.
Creative assets – Make cool stuff like infographics or quizzes that people will want to share.
Video – Put together how-to videos or an explainer video for your website. Videos are popular and can keep people on your site longer.
Keywords – Make sure your content has specific words or phrases that people might search for. Look up how often these words are searched and how tough the competition is.
Promotion – Share your content on social media, through emails, and by getting other sites to link back to yours. Make it easy for people to find and share your content.

Check regularly to see what’s working and what’s not, so you can focus on the stuff that’s bringing people to your site.

Updating Content

Google changes how it ranks pages, and what people are interested in can shift. If your content is old, it might not rank well or interest visitors. Here’s what to do:

Audit old content – Look over your old pages and blogs to see if they’re still useful. Update or get rid of stuff that’s out of date.
New topics – Keep an eye out for new questions or trends to write about. Stay current with the industry.
Revise evergreen content – Update your always-relevant content with new info, expert opinions, or examples.
Repurpose content – Turn old blogs or guides into new formats like videos, podcasts, or infographics to get people interested again.
Maintain a schedule – Have a plan for regularly putting out new content, not just when you happen to have time.

Keeping your content fresh shows you’re dedicated to providing useful, up-to-date information.

Measuring Success: SEO Analytics and Tools

Track Your SEO Performance

Keeping an eye on how well your SEO is doing is super important. It helps you know what’s working and what needs fixing. Here are the main things to watch:

Organic traffic – How many people are visiting your site from search engines. Look for trends over time.
Keyword rankings – Where your site stands in search results for important keywords. Keep an eye on changes and aim to get higher.
Click-through rate – The percentage of people who see your site in search results and then actually click on it. Try for 2-5%.
Bounce rate – The percentage of visitors who leave your site after only looking at one page. You want this number to be low.
Conversion rate – The percentage of visitors who buy something. Watch how many sales come from people visiting through search engines.

For tools, think about using:

Google Analytics – Helps track who’s coming to your site and what they’re doing.
Google Search Console – Keeps an eye on your search rankings and site performance.
SEMRush, Ahrefs – Great for looking deeper into keywords and what your competitors are doing.

Look at your reports often to spot problems early. Start by recording your current numbers so you have something to compare to later.

Adjusting Your Strategy Based on Analytics

It’s important to keep checking your SEO data to make sure your strategy stays on point. Here’s what to do:

Spot areas that aren’t doing well:

Not showing up well for important keywords
High bounce rates
Low rates of people clicking through or buying

Jump on new chances:

More people searching for new keywords
Competitors making mistakes
Hot topics or new interests

Some common tweaks might be:

Adding more keywords
Making your site faster
Fixing up your site’s pages
Creating content that’s more interesting
Getting more sites to link to you

Set goals and let your data guide what changes you make. Keep testing and tweaking based on what’s working. Always measure again to see the effect of your changes.

Staying flexible and ready to change is key for keeping ahead in the fast-moving world of cannabis SEO.

Conclusion

As the cannabis industry keeps growing and changing in 2024, it’s really important for brands to have a good plan for SEO. This means making sure your website and content are set up in a way that makes it easy for people to find you online.

Here’s a quick look back at the main points we talked about:

Really get to know your audience and what’s happening in the market
Follow the rules to avoid any legal issues
Make sure your website’s pages have the right keywords and details so people can find them easily
Work on getting links from other websites and being listed in local directories
Create content that’s interesting and helpful
Always check how you’re doing and make changes if needed

As things change, like new rules or what people are interested in, it’s important to keep checking your SEO strategy. Even though it might seem a bit tricky, getting SEO right can make a big difference in reaching the right customers.

With these tips, cannabis marketers can feel more confident in making their online presence stronger. If you need extra help with making your website more visible, we’re here to help!