Search engine optimization (SEO) has become an important part of any marketing strategy. If a brand can land at the top of search results for a particular topic, that business is more likely to connect with the very customers who may be looking for its services. But SEO is constantly changing as search engines adjust and update their algorithms.
There are a few SEO basics that will likely endure through any algorithm changes. Once a business includes these strategies as part of a marketing campaign, that business is likely to find itself beating the competition and reaching new customers. Here are a few essentials that will help you improve your search rankings.
High-Quality Content
Gone are the days when simply jamming a series of keywords into a page’s content would push it up in rankings. To protect the quality of its service, Google regularly updates its algorithms to ensure customers are delivered the best information on any subject. Someone searching for a way to unclog a drain is now more likely to see informative, useful how-to tips than a spammy ad for a local plumbing company.
What does this mean for you as a business? Instead of pushing your services or products on customers, you must find innovative ways to answer their questions through content that establishes you as a thought leader in your industry. Once you’ve established this, customers will naturally search out your services.
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Optimize Everything
When creating content, make sure your page title, page description, and title tags are optimized, as well. Name your subpages for the key phrase customers are most likely to search when looking for businesses like yours. These small touches will make a big difference.
A tool that helps you create your page can help. Landing page creation tools like GetResponse offer built-in optimization tools that will ensure every element on your page is optimized to rank well, in addition to many other features.
Avoid Bad Links
Bad linking habits have become a source of contention among businesses trying to rank well with Google. While there have been some shady behaviors in the past, often businesses simply don’t realize they have links either pointing from or to their sites.
Tools like Ahrefs have built-in backlink and referring domain detection to alert you to any links that need to be fixed. You can also use these tools to learn more about the many sites linking to your pages in order to discover how your efforts at getting those links are paying off. This will help you build more effective campaigns through guest blogging and posting content on high-traffic websites.
Plan Your Keywords
You may think you understand how potential customers would search for your services or products, but do you really know? You can use a keyword planner to find phrases and words that are often used to find services like yours. This will ensure that the content you provide matches what customers are likely to enter to find you.
In planning your keywords, consider geography in your choices. If you have more than one location, you’ll want to make sure your sites rank well for customers near each of those locations. If your service area encompasses multiple cities in one metropolitan area, create content for each of those locations to make sure customers who live in those areas can find you.
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Think Audience First
As important as SEO is to your marketing campaign, if you focus on your audience first, you’ll always win. This means creating content you know your own customer base will connect with and, once they do, recommend to others. When you have interesting, authoritative content, search algorithms will always reward it with high rankings.
If you’re at a loss for content to create, look around at popular publishers for trending ideas. You can access recommendations for information customers currently want to read and learn the best format for delivering that information.
SEO is an important part of any business’s marketing strategy. Entrepreneurs should focus on creating quality content and optimizing their pages and page elements to make sure they work well with Google’s algorithms. With the right analytics in place, a business can constantly refine its strategy to make sure it continues to reach as many potential customers as possible.