The internet is amazing, putting a vast trove of information right at our fingertips. But with the current Google page count at an incredible 130 trillion, getting your business to appear near the top of those search results isn’t easy.
That’s where search engine optimisation (SEO) comes into play. And the good news is, with a bit of effort and understanding, it doesn’t have to be expensive.
Here’s what you need to know:
Understanding SEO
Before you can optimise, you need a basic understanding of what influences page ranking. As Google puts it: ‘search engine optimisation is about putting your site’s best foot forward when it comes to visibility in search engines, but your ultimate consumers are your users, not search engines’.
The continually-evolving Google algorithm considers around 200 factors when deciding which pages to list in the result of a search – including when your page was last updated, original content, image tags and meta-descriptions.
Google ‘robots’ continually crawl sites and store information about every single webpage, ready to be called upon when a search term is used.
Making your site a favourite with the robots
Keywords, labelling images, creating fresh content and writing relevant page titles – there are numerous ‘hacks’ that help optimise your website for search. Most of these are simple and don’t cost you anything, and, importantly, also improve the experience for visitors to your website. experience.
It won’t happen overnight
Improving SEO involves playing the long game. Fresh, relevant content is loved by search engines and this takes time and committment. Once you create a bank of interesting, unique content it also becomes shareable, and other websites may even link to it. Called ‘inbound links’, these are Google robot gold.
Focus on making your website relevant, up-to-date and customer-friendly. Not only will this help boost your Google rankings, but it will provide a better experience for your customers and prospects.
Gaining a basic understanding of SEO will make the world of difference for your business.
