For those of us that aren’t technological gurus, it’s easy to get lost in the flurry of constant, new technological and social media features. You might be overwhelmed asking yourself what’s important, what you should invest your dollars in, and why even bother, but don’t worry, you probably aren’t the only one confused.
For any business owner wanting to capitalize their dollars in online marketing, search engine optimization or SEO, is considered to be among one of the most cost effective ways of marketing today. Here are some things you should know about SEO.
- When understanding the need and benefits for SEO, you need to know the basics of why people search your site.
- Typically, people run a search because they need a specific question answered or a problem solved. Unfortunately, many websites and search engines efforts are not efficiently answering visitors’ questions.
- Websites often send visitors to their home page rather than directly to the content they are looking for, and visitors have to search longer for what they need and often give up before finding it.
- SEO improves internal and external aspects of a website in order to increase traffic from search engines and help drive users to specific parts of the site to answer their questions.
- There are many areas of SEO, including finding what terms and phrases generate the most traffic, improving the ease of navigating a site, and building links that distinguish an organization and make it on the top of the list of search results.
- SEO considers how search engines function, what people are searching for, the terms they are typing in, and what search engines they prefer.
- SEO uses various tactics and research to optimize the site in efforts to drive users directly to their needs, often by editing content and HTMLs, and making them more relevant to specific keywords that people search.
- SEO is often about making small changes to parts of your website that may seem trivial but can have a noticeable impact on a user’s experience and search results.
- If done correctly, SEO is a cost-efficient marketing plan that will lead to increased traffic to your site, higher sales, increased brand visibility, easier navigation, 24/7 marketing, faster loading of pages, and other long-term benefits.
- Although hiring an SEO firm usually saves time and improves the overall quality of your website, SEO firms can vary and one should be conscious of the type of SEO firm they hire. Some SEO firms have a highly specialized focus and others have a more general approach; each has its perks depending on what type of website you have. It helps to be informed and familiarized with how search engines work before hiring an SEO firm. Take a look at these links to begin learning…