Breaking Down SEO: How It Helps Your Business
SEO is a powerful tool that any businesses can make use of to create long-term, sustainable results: such as leads or sales.
Unfortunately, this avenue of marketing has long been shrouded in technical jargon and what professionals would call: black hat SEO. This term refers to unethical & and in some cases, illegal practices to increase your business SEO score.
However, this shouldn’t take away from the fact that there are good SEO practices out there. To help you differentiate the two, and to clear away some of the mystery, we’ve compiled a detailed breakdown of exactly how SEO can help your business.
What Is SEO?
You’re most likely aware that SEO stands for ‘Search Engine Optimisation’ – but what exactly does this mean?
Essentially, a search engine is Google – although technically there are plenty of others, like Bing or Duckduckgo – and optimisation refers to getting your business on the first page of Google’s search results. Ideally, you’ll also be in first place, at the very top of the page, too.
This excludes Google Ads paid results.
For example: if you were to do a Google search of ‘Gold Coast Plumber’, the first three results would have the word Ad next to them. These are Google ads.
The next search result would likely be of Google maps (with its own realm of SEO results & Google ads.)
Then you get to your actual search results: Plumber websites. Google ranks these according to your search: they will all be plumbers based in the Gold Coast, preferably close to your suburb. They are all benefiting from SEO, and how relevant Google thinks they are to your search.
How SEO Works
This is important, because Google’s latest reports show that a whopping 87% of people click on the very first three websites they see, rather than scrolling down the page.
To get the top of your target audience’s search result page, SEO will make your businesses website appear as relevant as possible to Google’s search algorithm.
If Google thinks your business is exactly what someone is looking for, your site and brand is trustworthy, and you’re most likely going to give this viewer a good user experience then Google will show your website to them.
SEO relies heavily on geo-location in order to make your business appear relevant. For example: you have a much higher chance of appearing high up the page if you’re a Burleigh based plumber, when someone searches Google for ‘Burleigh Plumber.’ If someone were to search ‘Gold Coast Plumber’, then you would face stiff competition.
A quick note on typical SEO practices used by marketing agencies to rank your business website higher:
- Building relevant backlinks
- Publishing blogs on high domain websites
- Ensuring website copy has relevant keywords
- Accumulating positive Google reviews
- Keeping your Google my business profile up to date
Advantages:
Great Trust Signal: There’s no better method to impress upon your target audience that you are reputable and trustworthy than to appear at the very top of their search page. Google users tend to associate lower page results as potentially risky.
Consistent Returns: Unlike Google ads and Facebook ads – which are at the mercy of IOS updates and algorithm changes – as long as people are searching for your business, industry or niche, then you have a consistent inbound channel.
Once You’re On Top, Its Easier To Stay There: Climbing the Google ranks is the toughest part. Once you reach rank #1, then Google will take your increased web traffic as a great sign, and continue to show your website to more and more potential customers.
Shortcomings:
It Takes Time To See Results: Unfortunately, due to the nature of SEO you are unlikely to see any tangible results for at least three months. Moreover, things will really get going only after six months (in most cases.) SEO is definitely more of a long term strategy, rather than a quick results scheme.
You’ll Need To Avoid Unethical Practices: More than any other marketing method, SEO is renowned for unethical practices. Many marketing agencies will outsource their SEO work to offshore agents, who in turn may not know your area or industry at best, or at worst not speak your language, and even employ spam or harassment methods. Ensure you use a trusted SEO agency.
Harder To Track Results: Unlike Google ads or Facebook ads, SEO will not display something like ‘X amount of products sold today.’ Instead, you will need to keep a close eye on your website’s search console and Google analytics, from when you start to SEO to see if you are gaining traction.
SEO can sometimes be confusing and technically tedious to understand, but nonetheless it is an extremely powerful way to grow your business and remain competitive. It’s no wonder that some of the biggest businesses in the world employ their own in-house SEO team.
If you’d like advice on vetting your potential new SEO partner, or if you’re interested in highly effective ways to grow your business, then call The A Firm today – we’ve got you covered!