So you’ve started your business, the website has been launched and you are so excited for all of your new customers to see it. However, time goes by as does the tumbleweed, crickets are chirping in the background and you’re sat there feeling disheartened and discouraged wondering why you aren’t getting the website traffic and reach that you want and deserve.

You’ve analysed other businesses in your sector and you’ve noticed all of the blog comments, views and instagram followers. You’ve followed the advice on how to market your business and yet the question keeps rolling around in your mind, ‘Why can’t I do it? Why isn’t that me?’

Sound familiar?

So now I’m going to remind you of the word that you’ve probably been trying to ignore.

SEO.

Yeah, that thing.

The term that seems very technical and confusing and there’s no way that you’ve had the time or the effort to properly sit down and figure it all out.

That is why I have written 5 super easy and quick SEO tips to help increase your website traffic & Google ranking.

 

So first of all, what is SEO?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation. As Google explains, “it is the process of maximizing the number of visitors to a particular website (website traffic) by ensuring that the site appears high on the list of results returned by a search engine.”

Why is SEO important?

When somebody searches for what your business/blog offers, of course you want them to be able to find you. However, the internet is a big place. With over 1.8 billion live active websites, you need to enhance your SEO to be able to have the upper hand and be noticed.

So how can I enhance my SEO?

First of all I would just like to clarify that by following these tips, will not guarantee your website to appear first on Google’s list. I once had a potential client tell me that they wanted a brilliant website that ranked #1 on Google. I had to tell them that although I can design them a great website, unfortunately I have no control of Google’s rankings. Of course I can maximise the SEO to help rank higher, but achieving #1 is what everyone wants and strives for.

 

So with all that said, let’s get on to the SEO tips.

 

Keyword Research

Before we begin, it is super important to start doing some keyword research for your business website/blog. This is so you get an understanding of what your potential customer is searching for when trying to find your company.

It is a great idea to start with a search engine, like Google. Simply, start writing down all of the keywords/phrases that come to mind when thinking about your business.

E.G If you had a website selling yoga classes in London, start by typing that into Google search and see what other businesses come up and take note of what keywords and phrases they have used to rank high on Google.

Don’t forget to include:

• Your area

• Your services/products

• Who you provide them for

• Your niche

• Your USP (Unique Selling Point)

Other great resources to find keywords are Google Keywords Planner and KWFinder

Type in your selected keywords and see how popular they are and who else is using them. This is a great way of identifying the keywords that will help you expose your website without drowning in the crowd.

 

Include keywords in your website SEO & blog

Now that you have your effective keywords, it is now time to put them to action. Start by going into your website’s SEO and create a great title and description from a mixture of your keywords.

For example: Let’s say you need to create a great title for your web design business.

Title: [Name of Company] | Professional web design for music artists in London

We provide responsive and interactive websites to help music artists stand out from the crowd and connect with their audiences. Based in London and have ten years of experience.

If you run a blog, adding your keywords into the content can be very beneficial!

 

Change image Alt text

When you add an image to your website or blog, have you ever notice the Alt text box? Hmm, no?

Well it can be super useful. This is used because Google has a hard time ranking images using SEO because it wasn’t taught to read images like it does with text.

Therefore, by adding keywords and describing the image for Google can help your site rank higher.

So now go through every image on your site and start filling in that empty Alt text space, pronto!

 

Keep URL short

Good bye super-long-and-unnecesssary-url’s and hello short and sweet ones!

So you’ve clicked on a blog post and it has taken you to:

www.mycompanynamehere.com/blog/post/ten-lessons-I-learnt-when-I-turned-thirty-that-I-wish-I-knew-when-I-was-younger-23-08-2019-archive

First of all it must be so annoying trying to link this blog post to any social media, but also it isn’t necessary. Although your blog will automatically add your blog title to the end of your URL, it is totally customisable and I think you should take advantage of that.

All your URL needs it the keywords. Not only to differentiate your blog post URL’s, but so that it is easy to remember and so Google has a better time understanding it.

Isn’t www.mycompanynamehere .com/blog/post/ten-lessons-learnt-at-thirty so much better?

 

Link Building

The more live websites that link back to your website, which can also be any mention of your page, website or brand, helps Google to know that your website is legit and may hold some sort of authority. Therefore, Google uses this as a way to rank you higher on it’s search results.

Makes sense, right?

Great ways of link building can be through guest posting, joining a website directory, blog posts, or if you are a website designer like myself, then adding your link to your client’s website footer.

You can see which websites you are linked to by using Google Search Console.

At the end of the day, enhancing your site’s SEO should become a recurring project. Trends and searches change all the time and you should constantly be updating your site in order to continue climbing the ranking ladder, in the hopes of ranking #1 and getting more website traffic.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You’ll also love…

• 5 simple ways to improve your website

• How to get started with Pinterest to grow your business

• How to optimise your business listing on Google

• The secret to landing clients without being a ‘saleswoman’

• 5 steps to finding your business niche & defining your ideal client