Search engine optimization remains an incomprehensible topic for many entrepreneurs — but even a basic knowledge of how to optimize your online presence can generate significant benefits.
Why SEO?
When someone types “roof repair” or “washing machine installation” into Google, a search engine algorithm finds the most relevant results. Like most cases, you want your company to be on top of Google’s results pages.
Search engine optimization is particularly important for small companies because it gives them the chance to compete for an online presence with large companies that already have high visibility. Since search inquiry results depend on relevance, content quality, website usability, location, and other aspects (aside from advertising), small companies can be displayed prominently — even more prominently than much larger competitors — in organic search results.
Designing an SEO Strategy
Whether you are developing an SEO strategy for your company website for the first time or you are looking in to improve your current SEO activities, there are various things you can do to get ahead start. Let’s take a look at five crucial tips for improving your search engine optimizations in Google.
Keywords of Importance
Keywords are phrases that appear on your website. They help the search engine define the site’s importance to the user’s search. For instance, let’s say your business is a plumbing service in Los Angeles, CA.
In this case, the most apparent keywords would be:
- Los Angeles Plumbing
- Los Angeles Plumbing Services
- Los Angeles Plumbers
- Plumbers in Los Angeles, CA
- Plumbing Services in Los Angeles, CA
These keywords should repeatedly appear in your website’s content (once or twice on every page) and frequently used in your H1 and H2 headers. You’ll also want to use niche keywords, such as “Los Angeles Leak Repair,” “Sink installation in Los Angeles,” and so on, to increase your website visibility on the search, when the user has a particular service in mind.
Crawling of the Google Robots
Google regularly “crawls” through websites to find the content, defines overall relevance, and compares keywords against all other crawled websites. This means that you need unique and well-written content on your site. Many website owners make the mistake of placing relevant keywords or text in image files then merely putting the image on their site. Words that appear on the images are not crawled and will not improve your website’s relevance and visibility.
Check Up on Your Meta Tags
Meta tags and meta description is the text that is shown on the Google search results page. This metadata is regularly crawled by Google, as part of establishing a site’s relevance to a user’s questions or request. In this case, you must place keywords in both meta tags and meta titles. For instance, if your page is about sink installation, your meta tag for that page should read something like “Los Angeles Sink Installation – Company Name.” Metadata that is general or repeated can decrease a website’s SEO rating.
Comply Your Company to Directories
Your website shouldn’t be the only place your company is present. There are various business directories around the web that Google includes in defining a company’s’ authority. In this case, you should take the time to make sure that your business is correctly placed in Yelp, Google+, Yellowpages.com, Local.com, Whitepages.com, etc. Expanding your visibility on these sites builds relevant backlinks to your company’s website, and shows Google that your business is an engaged part of your industry’s online environment.
Publish Systematic and Relevant Content
It is highly useful to keep and update a blog on your site. Adding unique content pages to a site can efficiently improve its SEO health, and Google tends to favor websites that are updated continuously and active. Post content that is industry-specific, easy-to-understand, and educational. A blog is also an excellent platform to share business news, nearest events, and industry innovations. Share these posts once they are published on your social pages and distribute relevant search keywords in your blog articles.
To start optimizing your website and learn more, we recommend The Complete Beginner’s Guide to SEO from Buffer.
