5 Basic SEO Rules Every Small Business Owner Must Live By
As a small business owner, you face a number of challenges. Not only do you have the challenge of competing with large companies with an established reputation, but you also have the difficulty of doing so on smaller margins. But with the power of the internet, small businesses are in a unique position. Now, you can use your website to promote your product or service without having to invest in expensive advertising.
To do this well, you need to be able to be found by your customers. One way you can do this is through search engine optimization (SEO). To optimize your website for search engine success, here are a few basics you must live by.
Mix it Up – Google, Bing and other search engines don’t like to see duplicate title tags, meta descriptions and content all on one web page. In fact, duplicating these important attributes of your website can harm your company’s image in front of the search engines. Instead, mix it up and use different keywords and text on each web page within your website. This way, you can get a variety of keywords present throughout your website making your presence stronger online.
Do your Research – When people want to find what your business offers, they typically do not search for your name. There are a number of search terms used to find a variety of products and services. By using a variety of keywords throughout your website, you can target a larger group of searchers than if you only focus on one keyword specifically. Carefully research to find which of these keywords will allow you to yield the best results. Google has a keyword tool that allows you to check how competitive keywords are so that you can find the best ones for your product.
Use Header Tags to your Advantage – On the web page itself, putting keywords inside the header tags, such as H1 and H2, will help your keywords stand out more to search engines and therefore give your SEO a boost. If header tags sound complicated, think of putting your keywords in headlines and sub headings throughout your page. Then, have a coder update these to stand out on the page and stand out to search engines.
Use Images without Keywords – Images are a great way to make your page look impressive and draw visitors in when they arrive, but they do not work as well for SEO efforts. Google and Bing cannot see words that are put in images and therefore, having a keyword within an image makes it invisible to search engines. Instead, try putting your keyword somewhere else around the image, such as underneath a picture as a caption or above the image as a heading.
Put your Keywords in the URL – The URL or the web address is another big tool used by search engines to find relevant websites for their searchers. When you use a keyword in your URL, you let the search engines know that you have what their customers, the person searching, is looking for. To do this, create landing pages specific to various keywords or try adding them into long tail URLs.
SEO offers small business owners, such as yourself, an inexpensive and highly effective way of drawing in new leads and boosting your image online. This can give you a competitive advantage of attracting new customers you may not have otherwise reached. For help optimizing your website, contact us today. We will put our experience and expertise to work for you and help you to be found on the internet by more people in your target market.
