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Health & Fitness

Did You Get Your SEO Workout Today?

Like your body, SEO requires a daily workout. While some may believe SEO is not hard, it is cumbersome. It requires commitment and organization. One should almost make it a habit or daily ritual of sorts in order to get your website into shape.  Just as you must work the muscles in your body in order for them to perform, it is equally important to flex your SEO muscles for your website to perform.

SEO requires patience.  Most SEO marketing plans should allow for three months in which to establish a solid foundation that produces results. The first phase of your SEO plan should involve razor sharp focus on your goals. Discovery through a sincere Q&A session like the following is necessary:

What are the overall goals to your SEO and your business? Let me guess, the answer is, “I want my site to rank number one with my SEO and I want my business to make money”.  Ranking number one is great, but means nothing if you are bringing in the wrong audience or attracting visitors who immediately bounce out because they inadvertently were pointed to your site.  (This can happen as a result of buying wrong Google Ad Words, or investing in software like Magic-Rank – which I highly recommend you avoid). Be sure you focus on the message you are sending so that you attract desirable visitors to your website that are seeking your products and/or services.

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With regards to your business making money – utilize the three month SEO strategy and your end result should be a good return on your investment of time. SEO fundamentally is the art of gaining targeted visitors.  If your site attracts large quantities of targeted prospects, you will more likely attain your financial goals.

What function does your website serve to fulfill those goals? Most businesses build websites to have an online presence. That is fine and wonderful, but what is your website doing for you? Does it define your corporation well? Is it identifying key players and their qualifications to better establish your website as an expert in your field? Does it include a “call to action” to further engage your visitors?  (For example, a non-profit organization seeking contributions should have a donations page. A restaurant should offer online table reservations.  A day spa should make online appointment scheduling available). Does your site allow you to track visitors by asking them to complete online lead generation forms? Are there available instructions for your visitors to reach you offline or via email? It is extremely important to map out your pages on your site and compare them to a list of all objectives you wish to have your site fulfill and rank them by priority.  You should then grade yourself to see how your pages measure in meeting those objectives you listed.

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How is your website connecting with your business goals? If your website is more fixated on the credentials of your management then on describing the value of your goods and services, you might want to make an adjustment.  If your content is geared toward existing clients and does nothing to entice new business, you may want a ‘clean-up in aisle 3’.

Your SEO campaign must also support your business goals and not just your website.  For starters, if you have inherited an old website that is all over the place, focus on the homepage as the page to draw traffic to the site. Develop calls to action on your homepage that are relevant to your place of business.  Then, drive traffic by improving inbound links, build your Twitter campaign to entice visitors to your homepage, blog frequently and make equal amount of Facebook updates.  Each of your inbound efforts should be directly related to the end result you are seeking.  For example, you sell clothing and wish to increase online sales with a promotion.  Be sure the message you are Tweeting, blogging, and Facebooking is clearly about discounts on clothing.

Who do I want to my site?  The person you most want to have visit your site is the person who is searching for exactly what you are offering! Aside from the obvious, others that you may want to consider appealing to would include; the press, potential investors, current and past customers. Figure out who your primary and secondary audiences may be and set your SEO framework to accommodate both.  Keep in mind that people who convert are your ultimate goal. The purchase of a product, the completion of a form, the new email subscriber, a LIKE on Facebook, a comment to your posts are all forms of conversion. Measure your conversions against your business goals and see how they measure up against one another. If you are finding that you are attracting more investors making inquiries and your goal was more about sales, then your pitch needs re-alignment.

Which pages on your website are most relevant? The pages you want optimized are those you want people to get to from the various search engines. These pages should contain the most useful information and compelling content. These are your “landing pages” as these are the pages that visitors will land on in your website.  These pages should focus on speaking to your target audience and contain a call to action. When determining which pages are more relevant than others, consider ultimately where you want your visitor to end up. If online donations are your goal, consider working backwards in determining how your visitor lands on your donations page.

How can you measure the success of your SEO? Without saying it is important to know which of your efforts are working and which ones are not.  The only way to accomplish this feat is to actually measure your SEO success.  This is no simple task as your SEO campaign must constantly evolve because the search engines rules are always changing! What works today may not necessarily work tomorrow.  If you do not track these trends, prepare to fall into the internet abyss. Google analytics is one way to track web traffic, but most of us really do not understand what we are looking at in Google analytics!  One best suggested practice is to measure by an increase in sales.  Another suggested practice is to actually ask your consumers “how did you hear about us?” Initiate surveys on your website and watch the counter for new email subscriptions; these are other effective measurement tools.  There are also software programs designed to help you monitor your leads.

Be reminded that an effective SEO campaign takes at least three months to start showing measurable results.  Your website pages need to cache before they can even start to rank.  Get ready to get dirty in your SEO workout! A daily routine of at least an hour to “fine-tune” your SEO muscle is recommended.

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