10 Best SEO Tips for Small Business
….Just Kidding
First off, if you don’t know what SEO is, then head over to our friend Wikipedia for the definition. Click Here: Search Engine Optimization. After you get caught up, get back here and start learning the proper way to do it for your small business so that you can start growing.
1. SEO is NOT keyword density.
If you merely focus on what and how much keyword content you have, you’ll do absolutely nothing for your site. Keyword density may have been significant in 1997, but it is completely irrelevant in today’s search engines.
2. Create content for your audience, not for search engines.
Fit keywords into your content naturally. Never, ever create content simply for the purpose of jamming as many keywords into it as possible. This will likely get you penalized by most search engines for “keyword stuffing”.
3. Don’t try to do it all yourself.
Even if you run a small business, you can afford to hire an agency like ours to work on your SEO for you. It is time-consuming and requires constant effort, but it doesn’t require a Ph.D either. You can hire an SEO Company like Blue Bigfoot Media who has the experience in optimizing and promoting your content for you. Or…if you love writing and keeping up to date with the latest search engine algorithm updates and marketing strategies, then, by all means, go for it! We’re here to help you either way.
4. Content is king.
This tip should really be number one on the list. It is by far the most important tool in SEO and search engine rankings.
Google and other major search engines have increasingly given more and more priority to the quality of content for measuring the ranking of a site in search results. This means that if your site rambles on with testimonials, self-glorification, or eight versions of a “company mission statement,” it will most assuredly never see the first page of search engine results. All of your web content should be of value to your audience, and it must have very high value to be ranked well in search.
5. The better your content, the better your SEO.
So what does that mean? How does a single-product sales business or an office-cleaning service consistently produce quality web content?
You have a business to run. You can’t spend all of your time writing time-consuming articles and researching things that will engage your audience. So again: hire an agency like Blue Bigfoot Media to handle all of this for you. However, consider this about hiring a marketing agency: while there are a lot of Internet Marketing Agencies that offer these services, keep in mind that you usually get what you pay for. It may be tempting to hire that cheaper agency from India or wherever to handle the content for your U.S. audience. But, if an Indian writer has never stepped foot in the U.S., it is highly unlikely he or she will resonate well with your U.S. audience. Think about it.
In sum, don’t hire the cheapest agency simply because they are the cheapest. Likewise, if your main target audience is Japanese, then by all means, hire a Japanese writer. Fit your content to your audience. While backlinks and other components certainly weigh into SEO, if your content is terrible, so will your SEO be.
6. How do you get backlinks? Provide compelling content others want to link to.
There are small efforts you can make to encourage backlinks to your site, and some low value links you can create yourself. However, the links you create yourself via social media, article directories, and social content sites will not be enough to significantly affect your rankings in search engine results pages (SERPs).
The best way to get valuable backlinks to your site is to provide information that compels people to link to and share it.
How to do that – well, that is another article.
7. Use all of Google’s tools and targeted searches.
Businesses that can benefit from local online traffic and increased visibility especially need to take advantage of things like Google Places, Google Maps, Google Shopping Network, Google Deals, and so on. Listing your business on these targeted search sites helps drive local traffic directly to your physical business.
8. Be sure to have a mobile website(optional)
With daily increasing amounts of users who access the internet primarily from their mobile device or smartphone, it is unwise to ignore the addition of a mobile site. Yes, mobile search engines are able to display your site on mobile devices, but this is not equivalent to an actual mobile site, which is much better for increasing customer traffic and sales. A mobile-friendly site, along your business listing in Google Shopping, Maps, Places and/or Deals, can literally drive customers to your physical location at the exact moment they are ready to make a purchase.
9. Use social media wisely.
Social media can be a fantastic tool for brand management, increased visibility of your business, and attracting more traffic to your site, all of which helps SEO. However, there are right and wrong, good and bad ways to use social media for small businesses. Directly soliciting your social media audience for business and sales is largely ineffective on most social media. This is another topic that can be expounded upon in a separate blog or article, but in short, know how to interact in each form of social media for optimum results.
10. Request to publish guest posts on related, reputable blogs.
This is a great way to gain higher value backlinks, which have a significant impact on SEO and SERPs.
For example, Jeff owns a fishing bait and tackle store, where customers can place orders online. Jeff is also an expert at fly-fishing, and he writes an article about all his best inside fly-fishing tips. He then sends a short excerpt and a request to publish his article to a few of the highest ranked fishing blogs on Google. Wa-la, he now has a backlink from a highly-ranked, related and reputable blog: all important qualities of a good backlink.
Share Your SEO Ideas
We hope this helps and gives you a couple pointers on what great SEO is. If you’ve got questions or maybe even ideas of your own that have worked for you, please drop us a line or leave us a comment below. We’d love to hear from you.
Want to know how your business is doing online right now?
Use our FREE website scanning tool below to get your visibility score – Takes 45 seconds.
