Intro To SEO
Over $72 billion was spent on SEO marketing by businesses last year. The amount continues to increase each year as well for this channel of digital marketing. If you don’t already know, SEO is the commonly used acronym for Search Engine Optimisation, a tool that every business owner should learn about, especially in an increasingly digitalized world. Once the playing field for larger businesses, smaller businesses have also started to see the benefits of leveraging this search engine optimizing tool.
SEO optimization allows your business to compete with bigger companies and shouldn’t be overlooked even if your marketing budget isn’t large. SEO is more than ads or keywords, it’s also about the look and feel of your brand, and how you respond to the market. It is about your blogs, the links on your website, and the content you have. You can choose to gain valuable insights from experienced professionals such as marketing agencies in tampa, or choose to stand out from the masses with the right SEO marketing strategy.
Undeniable Returns On Investments (ROI)
Though the ROI on SEO may not be the fastest, it is one of the most effective in the long run. SEO optimization is just behind email marketing in terms of ROI, though results can only be seen after months of investment into an SEO strategy. You could say the same about email marketing to a lesser extent as well, but many email marketers build or buy their lists as fast as possible.
The longer time frame needed for SEO is because SEO aims to capture organic traffic— traffic which is unaffected by paid advertisements. Due to this, it is essential that the leads are targeted and of high quality. It’s a case of quality over quantity here, as quantity just results in a large amount of money spent for results that are negligible.
Instead, it is wise to look into improving your website, social network accounts, and content posted with the help of a marketing agency that specializes in SEO. These actions will help to bring more traffic to your site, increasing the chances of marketing conversions.
Commitment Is Key For SEO Strategy
Oftentimes, what businesses fail to achieve when undertaking an SEO strategy is commitment. Though results may not be seen quickly, SEO is the best value you can get for your marketing budget. Don’t lose faith as time is needed for results to be seen for an SEO strategy, as compared to straightforward ads where results can be seen almost immediately.
Starting to lose faith? Don’t. Instead, track your progress with the use of statistics. Keep in mind that organic search traffic is nearly 20% more effective than traffic generated through paid advertisements. After all, people are less likely to click the paid links which appear on the top of the search results when compared to the top links below the paid ones. With the correct SEO strategy, your business could be in one of the top links.
It’s All About The Information
The key thing about SEO is how it’s inextricably linked to search results and the way people search. Data on how people reach your website and what they do on your website is aplenty, but the value of this data lies in processing it such that it can be leveraged to drive more traffic to your site.
An experienced SEO team will know how to do so and will be able to educate you on the reasons behind the successes or failures of your online presence. Various tools are available to the teams such as Google Search Console or Google Analytics, though the linkage of collected data to how it is analyzed is often only doable by experienced SEO professionals.
The correct SEO team will be able to give you information such as your customer demographics, the source of your customers, which ads are doing well or not, feedback on your content, feedback on your internal links as well as the bounce rates of visitors to your sites. Together, these data points make up your SEO strategy.
Why SEO Audits Are Important To Have
When using SEO marketing, it isn’t uncommon to do multiple tests and research on your competition. Of great importance is keeping an eye on your competitors, while running regular checks on your own website.
When auditing your website, weed out technical errors, slow loading pages, invalid links and raise a ticket to your web developer if your site isn’t mobile-friendly. It is also helpful to link your website to other sites of authority in your particular business area, as it shows that your business is credible. In an SEO strategy, attention to detail is key in ensuring that your website ranks highly on Google’s search engine as well as with customers.
Google Is Your Best Friend
The largest barrier to SEO success for small businesses is being able to organically appear in any search result. While it is possible to appear through paid advertisements, it is the appearance through organic searches which are of higher value. The focus for this article is on Google since it is the default search engine for nearly three-quarters of internet users worldwide. Coming in a close second would be Baidu, a search engine based in China with 15% of the market share. Other top search engines include Bing, Yahoo, AOL, MSN, Yandex, DuckDuckGo, and YouTube (owned by Google). It is likely that if your site is optimized for Google, it would be well- ranked in other search engines too.
It’s not just because you have lesser competitors on the smaller engines, but it’s also because of how complex Google’s algorithms are. If you rank well on Google, you’re probably also going to rank well on YouTube. Hence, it’s important that you diversify your content type too.
The Importance Of Being Unique
When starting out your SEO process, one of the more noticeable differences is that listings with more information than text will stand out and be ranked higher. This might be because they are listed via Google My Business. Pay attention because this is also what you want to do for your local company.
When customers look for listings for things close to their current location, they are more likely than not, ready to make a purchase. More than half of these customers who search up directions within the neighborhood will visit on the same day they search up the place. Hence, it is of paramount importance that the data regarding your business is accurate, such that when it shows on Google, customers can easily find out about your business.
The information available should include your name, location, and contact details. For those entrepreneurs and small businesses further along your SEO journey, you might even wish to give links to your website, social network accounts, or even pictures of your business, setting you apart from the competition. Also answer common questions that customers have and update your hours for special dates like holidays to optimize your listing further.
Conclusion
In a rapidly digitalized world, the importance of SEO marketing cannot be further emphasized. Yet, SEO marketing doesn’t stop at just digital impressions and most certainly doesn’t stop with a single audit. Search engine optimization is a process that has to be continually undertaken for the survival of your business.
