All companies want to have a maximum number of visits to their website and increase their conversion rates. Although the answer to this is a solid search engine optimization (SEO) strategy, some business owners are reluctant to hire an SEO agency to do the work for them.
It’s important for business owners to be aware that SEO is a never-ending game that does not provide results overnight. However, it is much more affordable than paid advertising and patience is worth it seeing as SEO increases organic traffic, improves brand awareness, supports content marketing, improves website usability, maximizes PPC campaigns, helps you rank better in local searches and gives you a competitive edge.
Why is SEO a long-term process?
In the past, it was only necessary to choose a relevant keyword that could get a significant amount of traffic and then insert that keyword into the content to be published. Back then, web pages were being indexed regardless of whether the websites had high quality and relevant content. However, SEO has evolved over the years and now there are many more websites than when SERPs first started. As a result, search engines like Google have fine-tuned their search algorithm and regularly update it.
Aside from the basic concepts, SEO considers user experience, page speed, competitors, keyword density, on-page optimization, internal and external links, website authority and more. Successful SEO campaigns start with a full-site audit. This involves an SEO specialist looking at various areas and finding issues that could prevent the website from ranking. Your website may look good to you or your customers, but it may not comply with Google’s ranking terms.
A site audit is the foundation of every major SEO decision you make. SEO experts evaluate your site in the following areas:
- Indexing: It may be the case that, because you do not follow good SEO practices, your website prevents bots from crawling pages before adding them to its index.
- Usability: It helps you improve the experience of your potential customers. If your website is not user-friendly, users will leave quickly and may end up on your competitor’s page.
- Code quality: Improperly written code can negatively affect how your site is crawled by search engine robots and how people see it on different devices. It’s important for your website to be responsive and mobile-friendly.
- URL: Some websites have long and complicated URL addresses which don’t include keywords. It’s important not to overlook URL optimization!
- Internal links: Internal links are basically hyperlinks that point to different pages on the same domain. They relate relevant content and increase the time users spend on your website as well as how they interact with your content. An SEO specialist can check the anchor text in your web pages and optimize your internal linking strategy.
- External links: Also called backlinks or outgoing links, external links are hyperlinks that link two different domains. The number of external links that point to your website is important when it comes to website authority. They are generally used to add more context to content.
- Other important ranking factors
Broken links are a very common issue when SEO maintenance is not done. In addition to the user experience being affected, Google’s algorithm penalizes this. As you can see, many aspects of your site need to be analyzed and improved when it comes to SEO.
You should keep in mind that the time it takes to index web pages can vary (from days to months), SEO testing is necessary to develop the best strategy, creating content is an ongoing process to increase traffic to your website and monitoring rankings is essential to see if on-page optimization is necessary on existing web pages. Improvements must regularly be done on your website for your business to remain relevant and competitive.
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5 reasons why you need a long-term SEO strategy
1. Organic search is usually the main source of traffic for web pages
Most websites owe much of their success to organic search. It is a key component of the buyer’s funnel since it convinces them to take a certain action. As you have probably already heard, Google has a large portion of the search market compared to other SERPs like Yahoo and Bing.
Although the other search engines also contribute to the visibility of a website, Google owns 75% of the search market worldwide. Therefore, it’s important for businesses to follow its guidelines, which are constantly changing. A long-term SEO strategy is essential for any brand to make sure it adapts to changing guidelines.
Google is not only the most visited search engine in the world, Gmail is also the most popular email provider in the world. Furthermore, YouTube is the second-largest search engine. The vast majority of people around the world who have access to the Internet visit Google at least once a day to search for information. Therefore, having high visibility on the first search engine pages generates significant user traffic, which will translate into increased conversions for your company.
2. Good SEO improves the user experience
All brands are looking for better organic rankings in the search engine results and maximum exposure. However, not everyone is aware that a good user experience is an important part of getting there. Thanks to its crawling and constant algorithm changes, Google has learned to interpret whether a user experience (UX) is favorable or not. Nowadays, UX is a critical ranking factor for SEO.
If customers search for something on Google, click on a web page and can’t find what they want, they will get frustrated and leave. Google is a great example of how you can build a strong user experience, delivering searchable data directly from the SERPs to search engine users. The intention is to give users the information they are looking for with fewer clicks. This can be achieved with a long-term SEO strategy, which is constantly monitoring the performance of your website and making regular modifications to optimize the user experience.
3. SEO best practices are constantly updated
It is always good to implement SEO tactics and strategies on a website. However, if the commitment is short-term and the website is not constantly updated, it will reach a point where it will no longer rank well and be relevant. As Google is always changing its algorithm and evolving, it is necessary to constantly monitor changes to keep up with the competition and appear in the first search engine results pages of Google.
To benefit from a good SEO strategy, you have to be proactive and monitor all the important trends and changes that are made in the algorithms. Brands should be aware that Google makes thousands of algorithm changes every year. If you fall behind too much, it will be quite difficult for your website to rank well. Hiring SEO professionals helps ensure that this will not happen as they constantly review algorithm changes !
4. SEO builds trust and credibility in users
A SEO consultant will aim to lay a solid foundation for a functional website that offers a friendly and effective user experience. In addition, the website must be easy to find in the SERPs thanks to the authority, trust and credibility of the brand and its content.
There are many elements that go into establishing domain authority in search engines like Google. In addition to the ranking factors we have mentioned, authority is gained over time as a result of the application of:
- Quality backlinks
- Positive user behavior
- Evolution of machine learning
- Optimized SEO content marketing and page elements
A business that has a good website authority will rank higher in the search results pages. However, building trust and credibility is not something that is done overnight. Authority is earned over time, which is why SEO is a long-term process. Increasing the authority of a website and brand requires a lot of strategy, commitment, and time.
5. SEO is relatively cheap
SEO, like the best things in life, costs money. However, SEO is relatively cheap when compared to different forms of paid advertising. Plus, the reward is substantial in terms of profits and conversions. It should therefore not be considered a marketing cost, but a business investment. When implementing a SEO strategy, you should be aware that the more attention and investment it receives in the long run, the better the end result will be!
Need to increase your visibility online?
At Leadsier, we help businesses of all sizes increase their website traffic, improve visibility and maximize conversions. Even better, we follow up on results and show our clients how to develop a solid SEO strategy.
SEO is more of a science than an art so we use a scientific approach to better understand Google’s Algorithm. We know it can be daunting to outsource any kind of business strategy to someone else. That’s why we make sure that we discuss every step with you before carrying out any of our SEO strategies!
