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SEO for Actors

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Search engine optimization (SEO) means shaping your content so it ranks high in search engines like Google and Bing for the queries you target. Your Actor's page in Apify Store can rank in search results when people look for the problem your Actor solves. That brings you users for free, often for years.

Two things decide how your page performs in search:

  • Your keywords, titles, and links decide for which queries your page appears.
  • The quality of your content decides how high the page ranks for those queries.

If you target high-volume queries that don't match your Actor, visitors leave right away, and search engines push your page down. If you address a niche group of users who then run your Actor, search engines push the page up.

Always write for your users first. Create quality content that provides value and engagement to your users. Over-optimizing for search engines can get your page penalized.

Understand search intent

It's important to understand why people search for a tool like yours. Your Actor's page should address the problems that brought users to Google, for example:

  • What are users trying to accomplish?
  • What challenges are they facing?
  • How might they use your Actor?

Make sure your README demonstrates how your Actor aligns with the search intent. This alignment helps users recognize your Actor's value and helps Google understand your Actor and rank it higher.

For example, let's say you're building a YouTube hashtag scraper. When you search for “YouTube hashtag scraper”, the results show that most people want to extract hashtags from YouTube videos, not download videos that use a certain hashtag. Your Actor's page should address the first need.

Find keywords

Keyword research can help you find phrases your potential users type into search engines. Without it, you might target the wrong phrases and lose traffic to other tools.

Google autocomplete suggestions

Type your Actor's main purpose into Google. As you type, Google suggests popular search terms based on common queries, which show what your potential users are searching for.

For example, type “product review scraper” and note the suggestions:

  • product review scraper free
  • product review scraper amazon
  • product review scraper python
  • product review scraper api

These suggestions reveal potential features or use cases that you can highlight in your Actor's README.

Alphabet soup method

Add each letter of the alphabet after your main keyword to find more specific, long-tail keywords:

  • product review scraper a (autocomplete might suggest “api”)
  • product review scraper b (autocomplete might suggest “best”)
  • product review scraper c (autocomplete might suggest “chrome extension”)

Continue through the rest of the alphabet.

People Also Ask

Search for your Actor's main purpose on Google and scroll down to the People Also Ask section. For example, for a product review scraper, you might see the following questions:

  • How do I scrape product reviews?
  • Is it legal to scrape product reviews?
  • What is the best tool for scraping reviews?
  • How can I automate product review collection?

Select each question to expand it. Google then adds more related questions, which you can answer in your README.

Google Keyword Planner

Google Keyword Planner requires a Google Ads account, which is free to create.

To collect keywords with Google Keyword Planner:

  1. Open Google Keyword Planner and select Discover new keywords.
  2. In the Start with keywords tab, enter your Actor's main purpose.
  3. Set the region to United States and the language to English.
  4. To see keywords related to your Actor, select Get results.

Ahrefs Keyword Generator

Go to Ahrefs Keyword Generator, enter your Actor's main purpose, and select Find keywords. Add the results to your list.

Prioritize keywords

Turn your list into a ranked set of keywords:

  1. Remove duplicates, for example with Dedupe List.
  2. Put the keywords in a spreadsheet, with one column for the keyword and one for its search volume.
  3. Look up each keyword's search volume in Keyword Tool. The tool also shows related keywords, so add new ones to your list.
  4. Sort the list by search volume and relevance to your Actor.

Use the top keywords in your Actor's name, title, and the opening of your README. Use the rest in your README headings and body text.

Apply keywords

Your Actor has several elements that search engines read, and each one serves a different reader.

Actor name and URL

The Actor name is the technical name of your Actor, prefixed by your username, for example bob/find-broken-links. Apify generates your Actor's URL from that name, so it's an important signal for search engines. However, the name should also be readable, so that people using your Actor can understand what it does just from the name.

For details, see Name your Actor and Importance of Actor URL.

Actor title

The title is the human-readable name of your Actor, and it's the most important field for SEO. Match it to the most likely search query.

  • ✅ Do: Amazon crawler, Google Places API, Kickstarter search
  • ❌ Don't: Crawler for Amazon, API for Google places, Search in Kickstarter

Actor descriptions

Actor descriptions help people decide whether to use your Actor. Say what your Actor does and skip the boilerplate.

The SEO description appears in search results. Use it for popular variations of your title and the phrases from your keyword research, while still describing what the Actor does:

  • ✅ Do: This Amazon bot will help, whereas the Amazon API won’t. Use the crawler...
  • ❌ Don't: This crawler will search through results in Amazon and offers you...

For details, see Actor description and SEO description.

Actor README

The README gives you the most room for SEO, without compromising readability for your users. Make sure the text includes other variants of what potential users of your Actor might search for. It's also a good idea to repeat the name of your Actor several times.

  • ✅ Do: You can use this Amazon Crawler with your code (Python, PHP, Java) to crawl Amazon without the API...
  • ❌ Don't: Follow the instructions in the README and if you have any comments, see the FAQ section...

For details, see Actor README.

Keywords decide which searches your Actor appears in. Links tell search engines your Actor is worth showing.

Add the following links to your Actor's README:

  • Similar Actors and relevant Apify articles that can help your users
  • External libraries your Actor uses
  • The website your Actor scrapes

If you have multiple public Actors, promote them at the end of the README:

  • ✅ Do: Like my Amazon Crawler? See my Amazon Review Crawler.

Share your Actor

Every link from another site to your Actor helps search engines find it sooner. Share your Actor on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, Reddit, and other platforms. In your posts, include the Actor's name and link. In group discussions, add a sentence on why your Actor is useful.

  • ✅ Do: Need to crawl #Amazon or #Yelp? See my Amazon crawler https://...
  • ❌ Don't: I just created something, check it out on Apify...