How Google Works
An often asked question...How do Google searches work. Here's a great Infographic via PPCBlog
Does Your Business Website Actually Need SEO?
With so much emphasis on SEO these days, a question that many business owners haven’t given much thought to, is whether they even need it or whether search engine optimising their website is a worthwhile exercise. We believe that the importance of SEO can be determined simply by how you view your website.
If all you want from your site is a landing page for potential customers who have been driven there by other marketing material, then what you require is basically that – an online sales support tool. However, you may want to capitalise on the potential your website has to generate new customers and leads, and use it as your primary business marketing tool. If you identify with the second statement, then some form of SEO will be one of the crucial factors in driving more traffic to your website.
SEO is all about making sure your website gets found by the right people. Here are just a few key factors in this process:
- Tracking. It is useless to implement SEO strategies without a way to track their effectiveness. At Catchlight we recommend using Google Analytics – a free application which generates comprehensive reports on your website activity. This is easy to understand and quick to set up on your website.
- Keywords. These play a huge part in helping potential customers find you when they search for related products or services. There are some established guidelines for keyword distribution throughout your website, and using the right key phrases can require the services of a copywriter with SEO skills to ensure that your website content is both quality reading and search engine friendly.
- Linking. Your page ranking (where your website is listed by search engines) is largely determined by the amount of ‘in-bound’ links connected to your website. If your website has valuable content, then others will post links to it – a social vote which ‘vouches’ for you. It also helps to have relevant links within your website (internal linking), and external linking contained in content such as SEO informational articles which drive traffic to your website.
There is quite a bit to think about when it comes to SEO, (and that's not even thinking about social networking, email marketing, etc) but the good news is that you can take it one step at a time, adjust where necessary, and quickly see measureable results! The Catchlight team are passionate about creating effective SEO strategies that suit your business, so if you have an interest in getting more traffic to your website, then feel free to contact us for a friendly chat.
First stop for SEO
Search Engine Optimisation isn't all about Google. OK, so it's pretty much mostly about Google. It's certainly what most people tend to think of and it is by far the most popular search engine, so - first things first. If you're looking at Search Engine Optimisation for your website a great place to start is right at the horse's mouth.
Google have published a great introduction to SEO which includes their Search Engine Optimisation Starter Guide. Really, it's just a bunch of guidelines, but if you're in the dark (as many are) about what Search Engine Optimisation is, isn't, and how to get it, this will help clarify things.
Two quick takeaway points... One, make your site content as rich and as interesting as possible, two, get links coming into your website. Many Catchlight clients will have heard us rant about these two topics in depth, so we'll expand on them in later posts.
3 Keys for Creating ‘Rich’ Content
When it comes to marketing your business, it’s not as simple as creating a website, putting it on the Internet and waiting for the customers to roll in.
As of June 2011, there were 346,004,403 websites on the Internet. If that’s not competitive, I don’t know what is.
The problem is, when you type a word into Google Search, it will probably find a few million results, but only about ten will be selected for the first page. And while your website is most likely within those millions of results somewhere, if it’s not on one of the first few pages, it might as well not be in there at all!
So as we mentioned in our previous post, one of the best ways to boost your search engine ranking is to include “rich” content on your website. Here are three key techniques:
1. Include useful resources - Your website should be more than a list of services and your contact details. This one depends a lot on your business type and communication style, but the aim is to get people to bookmark your website or refer to it for useful or interesting information. You can do this by including articles, news or blog posts on your website. Even better, leave room for reader comments so people can interact with you and each other, to create a “buzz”.
2. Make it keyword rich - There are simple tools available such as Google Keyword Search, which you can use to find the most commonly searched words of relevance to your business. By including those keywords throughout your website, as well as in meta tags and meta keywords, you may very well boost your search rankings and help customers to find your website.
3. Keep it fresh - This is about discipline. In the constantly changing world of the Internet, your website will quickly become outdated. Make sure you regularly check and update your website; this can be industry news, FAQs, blog posts, articles, or anything else your customer may find interesting. Keeping your content fresh will keep people coming back to your website.
So that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to rich content and SEO, but it’s a great start. Another useful technique is link building, but we’ll focus on that in our next post.
Getting Listed on Google Places
Have you ever noticed that when searching Google for businesses in your area, often you'll end up with Google Map results. This is especially true if you typed a city or town name in your search. These results are fed from Google Places which is a service similar to a business directory. Once you've signed up to Google Places you can set up a free listing page so when potential customers search Maps for local businesses, they'll find lots of useful information about you - your address, hours of operation, photos and reviews etc.
The great thing about having a Google Places listing is that your business could end up on the first page of Google, especially if the searcher typed your suburb into their search. This very much depends on your particular industry though, so if you're in a competitive industry such as accommodation then you probably won't see much of a positive change in having a Google Places page. However, less competitive sectors could see their site in the top results.
Reviews and your Reputation
With Google Place reviews you'll have the chance to improve your credibility. Obviously good reviews are optimal but even bad reviews can be good for your reputation! Receiving negative reviews gives you a clear idea of what you might need to change in order to prevent further complaints and responding well to these negative reviews it also creates a feeling of customer satisfaction. Studies have shown that when complaints are responded to in a positive and satisfying brand loyalty is increased even more than customers who have not felt the need to complain at all!
An Important Note About Listing on Google Places
When listing yourself on Google Places make sure you do it carefully and don’t forget to verify your listing so that no-one can ‘claim’ your business and potentially damage your great online reputation.
If you haven’t signed up your business to Google Places yet then you should do so now: http://www.google.com/places/
And if you need any help with creating a listing then please contact us here at Catchlight to help.
The Importance of Link Building
In an earlier post we mentioned link building as a valuable technique for boosting your search engine ranking. So you’re probably wondering; why is link building so important?