Many people may have heard about SEO and how it can improve the online presence of their business but may be reluctant to attempt any because it sounds too technical for them. However, even though there are certain technical aspects involved there is no reason why even the biggest technophobe shouldn't give it a go.
Search engine optimisation has received a bad press in the past because of the way certain people within the industry have used spam-like and unethical tactics to achieve better rankings in the search engines. However, thanks to a few Google algorithm updates and the threat of future punishment, the industry is a lot cleaner and SEO is now big business.
So for anyone wanting to give it a go but who have been reluctant up until now; here are 4 steps to a successful campaign.
Build The Foundations
A lot of people start building links and using other SEO tactics before they have built a proper foundation for their search engine optimisation. And what does a proper foundation involve? It involves creating a website that can be effectively optimised. It's easy to get carried away with how the search engines are going to view your site but you first need to make sure that it is useable for humans. The better the usability of your site; the more likely your visitors are to stay and purchase something once they find you.
Onsite Optimisation
Once you have the foundations in place you can then start to improve the way that your website is seen by the search engines by carrying out some onsite optimisation. It's hard to reduce the whole notion of onsite SEO into one paragraph but essentially it is all about telling the search engine robots what your site is about so that they can then rank it highly for the people that are looking for this information.
To do this you need to make sure that your title tags (essentially the name of each page) include your primary keywords and are no longer than 70 characters each. You should also include relevant keywords in the copy of your site; ensuring not to overuse them and to include a substantial amount of words on each page. For more about onsite SEO click here.
Link Building
The most effective tactic for offsite SEO is known as link building and involves creating external content that links back to your website and therefore builds up its authority. This can be done in a variety of ways and it best to use as many different ones as possible. You can post interesting and unique articles on other people's websites, you can comment on other people's blogs or you can register your site on trusted online directories.
All these will help to increase the power of your own site because the search engines will see that it is associated with lots of other sites and must therefore be quite useful. The best way to build links effectively is to target the most influential sites that have the most regular visitors and attempt to get links from them. The higher the authority of the site; the better the link is.
Social Media
It terms of SEO social media is still a relatively new and growing part of making your site more effective on the web. The first thing to do is pinpoint a couple of sites that suit your business and your consumer base and create a business profile on them. It's important that you only use sites that will benefit your business otherwise you will be wasting your time. For example, if you run a cake making company or something else where people would benefit from seeing pictures then Pinterest would be a great place to start.
Once you have created your profiles it is important that you go about your social media activity in an effective manner so that you get the most from it. The best way to use these platforms is to release the content that you create via them to build new links through people liking and sharing what you have written.
Social shares are a great indicator for the search engines as they show that a lot of people are interested in your site and that others might benefit from visiting it also. You can also use social media to find out what your audience wants to know regarding your business and use this to fuel your content.
After that it is all down to patience and refining your strategy to include the things that are working best for you. Good search engine rankings won't appear overnight and so you should keep plugging away at your SEO until you achieve the desired results.
Published on behalf of Mr. Chris Mayhew. He works for Marketing By Web and is part of their in-house writing team. This internet marketing agency offers professional SEO in Bristol, Bath and the surrounding areas.
