A lot of my customers ask me if I ‘do SEO’ and whether I can help them ‘get to the top of Google’. It would be wonderful if I could simply say ‘yes and yes!’ However, the process of optimising websites for search engines is quite a bit more involved than this.
Just to add to the deluge of advice that is available online you will also find that if you seek advice from several SEO ‘experts’ you will probably end up with different opinions from all of them. I feel your pain!
That said if you are the owner of a small or medium sized enterprise or business (SME) then my advice is: take a deep breath, stay calm and know that there is plenty that you can do to help your business get seen on line. All of the following are pieces of the puzzle that makes up a solid SEO strategy for your business:
YOUR OWN WEBSITE SEO – believe me you can do this! There are plenty of website builders out there than have some great SEO tools and plug ins that can be completely without the need of a professional. Wix has an SEO Wizard that gives suggestions on what to do as well as an easy to use interface.
NOTE: I’d like to mention right now that your website SEO will not be affected if you use Wix instead of Wordpress. Use whichever platform you like for your website but no one site is specifically better than the other.
CONTENT IS KING – Do you have a flair for writing? If so, you can write for your website or blog. Search engines really like good, informative and relevant content to give to its users. Make sure you consider the following when creating articles or posts:
Give your article a relevant title with subjective keywords
Give the reader useful information but do not sell to them.
Make sure that you use paragraphs and have plenty of white space
Include images to break up the text and make it more digestible
Avoid jargon. Your readers may not understand technical terms
BECOME AN INDUSTRY EXPERT – don’t be afraid to use the term expert. There are probably lots of other websites that you can write for like Quora or Reddit. It is free to create and account on sites like these. Put a link back to your website in your articles and you have a back link which also helps your SEO.
SOCIAL MEDIA – Another free but extremely useful tool is to create a Facebook business page. This can include all of your business details, product or service info, images and a link to your website. A link can also be put on your website to your Facebook page. Do the same with Twitter and other social media platforms and you will have built more backlinks. Make sure you post regularly with interesting and engaging info.
PUT A PIN IN THE MAP – Have you ever searched for something on Google and your results give you a map with a few businesses right there at the top of the list? There is nothing stopping you from having a pin in the map. It is free and instantly places you above all of the organic listings. You will go through the process of setting this up when you set up a Google My Business page. You can do this by:
Go to Google My Business and hit the green START NOW button
Follow the instructions to set up your page
Verify your page
Get pin in map.
There is plenty more that you can do. The above are just some examples taken from the iPromote Online system which is specifically designed to put the small business owner back in control of their business. CLICK HERE to go through to Amazon to check this system out.
For more information visit www.fullcirclewebsitedesign.co.uk and head over to our learning hub for loads of useful articles and advice.