So you’ve finally got your brand new website up and running and it’s looking great, time to relax right? Sadly not, for your business to be a success having a good website is just the first step.
The meteoric rise of the internet over the past 20 years or so has meant that there are now literally billions of websites out there and so if you want yours to be seen by those who matter then you need to be willing to do what it takes to achieve that. That’s where search engine optimisation (SEO)comes in.
Having a website without doing SEO for it is like setting up your market stall in the Amazonrainforest, nobody’s going to be able to find you unless you let them know that you're there. So what exactly will SEO do for your site?
You Can Get Local Traffic
A little SEO work on your site will allow it to show up in the search results when someone in your area searches for a service or product that you are offering. Think of search engines like Google and Bing as the new high streets and if your site is on page 1 of the search results then it’s the same as being on the main street of your local town.
You’re going to be getting traffic coming into it. Having a Google Places profile and knowing how to optimise it well is a great way to ensure you show up in localised search results.
Your Visitors Will Be Proactive
The best thing about SEO is that it brings in traffic to your website that is made up of people who are proactive potential customers. They are proactive in that they are actively searching for the products you sell, the service you offer or they want to read the content you produce.
If they weren’t interested in it then they wouldn’t have searched for it in their browser. This is a huge advantage over traditional marketing where you are advertising your business in a newspaper or television commercial to an impartial audience who bought the paper to read the news or tuned in to watch the football, not to be sold something. Because SEO focuses on proactive consumers all you have to consider is which terms or keywords you want your website to appear for.
The Times Are Changing
Yes Bob Dylan was right; the times are changing and fast. In the past it was ok to have your business and a website that acted as a glorified business card and people would find you online because there wasn’t that many other sites like yours around. Well that might have been the case in the 90’s but today the face of consumerism has changed and you have to be able to adapt or you’ll get left behind, just ask HMV, Blockbuster and Jessops.
Consumers want to find what they are looking for online instead of going into town to look for it. They are more discerning as they compare prices and deals from a few sites to see which deal is the best. Therefore it’s important to understand the psychological significance of being the number 1 result in Google for a particular search term.
It’s also important to be active within the world of social media which is an extension of the SEO process. You need to build up your brand image by connecting with the right people in the right industries, engaging with your target markets and gaining exposure by communicating your latest deals and promotions.
That is the way the new generation of consumers do their shopping and so for the foreseeable future SEO has a huge role to play in the success of both online and offline businesses.
