Greg Ichshenko

Calgary SEO expert and digital marketing specialist,
developing advertising strategies for businesses of all sizes

(403) 308-5949

greg@to-the-top.ca
1509 14 Ave SW, Calgary,
AB T3C 0W4

    Submit your request or question, and I will get back
    to you shortly

    Please prove you are human by selecting the key.

    How to Use Meta Tags for SEO

    Meta tags confuse more small business owners than almost any other corner of on-page SEO. A client in Calgary forwarded me his developer’s invoice last spring, eighteen hours billed for “meta tag optimization.” Most of it went to the keywords tag. Google has ignored that field since 2009. The handful of meta tags that genuinely move rankings took about twenty minutes to fix, and he had been paying for the wrong ones the whole time.

    So this guide sorts the useful from the useless. You will learn which meta tags search engines actually read, how to write them, and where they belong. As Calgary SEO specialists we open most site audits in the same spot: the head section of the HTML, where every meta tag lives. Get those right and you have handled a real slice of on-page SEO before touching anything else on the page.

    (more…)

    How to Find Long Tail Keywords: The Research Methods That Work

    Most of the search traffic that converts comes from queries nobody predicted. An accounting firm in Calgary starts ranking for “bookkeeper for independent contractors Edmonton.” Never targeted. Never optimized. Just earned because a related page existed and the intent matched. That is a long tail keyword delivering a real client. Three to five words, specific intent, thin competition, and a searcher already at the decision point.

    Finding these deliberately, before a competitor does, is what any SEO agency in Calgary does before writing a single page. The process is not complicated, but it requires more than typing guesses into a keyword tool.

    (more…)

    How to Add Meta Keywords in WordPress

    A client emailed last month asking why his competitor outranked him. His theory: the other site must have better meta keywords. So he wanted me o stuff a long list of keywords into every page on his WordPress site and watch the rankings climb. I added the tag for him, because he asked. Then I showed him his own analytics, where that field had changed nothing for eleven years running. (more…)

    How to Improve SEO on WordPress: A Practical Guide

    WordPress runs a little over 40% of the web, and most of those sites are leaving rankings on the table. Not because the platform is weak. Because the defaults were never built for search. A fresh install indexes fine, loads reasonably, and then quietly fails at a dozen small things that decide whether Google sends you traffic. We see the same pattern on nearly every Calgary WordPress website we audit. Good content, decent design, and a technical foundation full of small holes.

    This guide walks through how to improve SEO on WordPress in the order that actually matters: audit first, fix the foundations, then push on content. The work is not complicated. It is just specific, and WordPress hides some of it in settings screens people never open. If you would rather hand the whole thing off, that is what we do at To-The-TOP!, our home base being Calgary SEO since 2007. But every step below is something a site owner can do without writing code.

    (more…)

    How to Do Competitor Analysis in SEO

    The most common mistake in SEO competitor analysis is running it against the wrong list. Business competitors and search competitors are not the same group. A local HVAC company might compete with ServiceMaster on Google even though they never compete for the same customer. Starting the analysis with the right set changes everything downstream.

    Here is a five-step process for doing this systematically. Each step builds on the previous one. Skip any of them and the analysis produces gaps that turn into wasted effort later.

    (more…)

    How Much Does SEO Cost in Calgary?

    The question that comes up on every discovery call: just give me a rough range. Fair ask. Most websites quote SEO pricing in vague tiers and bury the number behind a contact form. Here is the honest answer.

    Calgary SEO pricing in 2026 sits between $1,200 and $7,500 per month for the majority of small and mid-size businesses. The lower end gets you a focused local campaign with one or two services optimized. Higher up, the budget runs aggressive multi-service rankings against entrenched competitors. Hourly consultants charge $100 to $250 in this market. Project work for an audit or one-off cleanup lands between $1,500 and $15,000 depending on site size.

    (more…)

    SEO Keyword Selection: How to Choose the Right Keywords

    The most common mistake in keyword research is choosing keywords by volume alone. High-volume keywords look attractive in the data. They also tend to be the most competitive, the vaguest in user intent, and the slowest to move. Targeting them without understanding what ranks and why leads to months of effort on content that never reaches page one.

    Choosing the right keywords requires four assessments before any content gets written. Search intent. Traffic potential against ranking difficulty. Business relevance. Competitive landscape. Each one on its own is incomplete. All four together produce a shortlist worth building content around. Here is the process To-The-TOP! uses across every SEO campaign in Calgary and the other markets we operate in.

    (more…)

    How to Improve Local SEO

    Four signals drive local search rankings: Google Business Profile completeness, citation consistency, review volume, and local backlinks. Get all four working and visibility in the map pack follows. Miss one and the others compensate less than most business owners expect. The question that comes up constantly: which one do we fix first? Start with the profile. Everything downstream depends on it.

    What follows is the sequence we use for local SEO programs. Each section covers one lever. Order reflects impact, not alphabetical convenience.

    (more…)

    Focus Over Density: How Many Keywords Per Page in SEO?

    Practical answer: one primary keyword per page, with two to five supporting terms appearing naturally in the content. Not because some rule says so, but because each page should serve one clear search intent, and one intent maps to one primary query.

    The longer answer is that “how many keywords per page” is the wrong question. Right question: does this page serve one intent clearly, or does it try to do too many things at once? SEO specialists in Calgary and everywhere else have watched this confusion cause more wasted effort than almost any other SEO misconception. Good keyword basics address this distinction before going any further.

    (more…)

    How to Do an SEO Audit: Step-by-Step Guide

    An SEO audit is the diagnostic before any sensible optimization work begins. Skip it, and the campaign starts blind. Most Calgary SEO clients do not need quarterly audits, but every site benefits from a thorough one at least once a year, and always before signing with a new agency.

    What follows is the actual process. The tools that matter, the checks that catch the most issues, and the order to run them in. Designed for someone running their own audit, but useful for anyone hiring out the work who wants to know what should land in the deliverable.

    (more…)