It Isn’t Hide & Seek: Make Your Online Business Easy To Find With SEO

March 20, 2014 Blogging Guide

SEO may sound like a fancy thing that only big businesses need to worry about, but it’s something every online business should look at. Search engine optimization is essential to help your website become found online, no matter what size your business may be.

Most big businesses have the budget to hire SEO professionals to handle their search engine optimization strategies. Unfortunately, most small businesses do not, forcing them to try and implement this strategy in house. Thankfully, even if you’re not familiar with SEO, there are some easy things you can do to improve your searchability. The following are six tips to help your small business improve your SEO.

1. Add descriptions to audio and video.

Audio and video files contain sections for descriptions and tags, and it’s very important that you add relevant content and keywords to these sections of these files. Search engines can crawl through the back end of audio files, video files and even images and use the content they find to help rank your website more appropriately.

2. Add tags to every web page.

Most websites contain multiple web pages. If your site has more than one web page, it’s very important that you add different title tags to each page. When a search query is performed, different pages of your website have the ability to appear in the search engine results page (SERP). By adding different titles to your web page, you’re giving your site a better chance at earning traffic and boosting SEO. Make sure to choose title tags that are relevant to each respective page, and don’t use the same static content for everyone.

3. Optimize your website for mobile.

More search engine queries are being performed on mobile devices than desktop or laptop computers, which is why it is absolutely essential that you optimize your website for mobile. If your website doesn’t work on mobile devices, takes too long to load, or simply doesn’t look right, it will hurt your overall SEO efforts. Learning how to optimize your website for mobile is easier than you think, and there are plenty of programs and website that you can use to seamlessly integrate this strategy and start improving your SEO.

4. Add local content.

Search engines are using geolocation technology to make search queries automatically generate local results. For example, if you’re in Chicago, you no longer have to type in “shoe stores in Chicago”. Instead, thanks to geolocation, by simply typing in “shoe stores”, your results will automatically appear in the Chicagoland area. When your content contains local verbiage, it will help push your website to the top of these SERPs. Be sure that your contact information and address are physically found on your website, and also feel free to add any content that describes your location, such as nearby major highways or buildings. To increase your local content, you should also be sure to add your website to local listings, such as Google Places.

5. Add some frequently asked questions.

Search engine optimization is now focusing on conversational tone. Instead of scouring through all of your copy and trying to make quick changes, you can add a frequently asked questions section to your website. FAQs use question and answer format, and they are typically more conversational in tone than traditional website copy. By adding an FAQs section to your website, you can boost your SEO by providing quick and accessible conversational content to your website without too much hassle or content reworking.

6. Transcribe audio and video files.

Having audio and video files on your website is a great way to break up the copy and provide value in new and exciting ways. Unfortunately, search engines cannot crawl through the content on audio and video files, which means any content on these files will not help to improve your SEO. Since audio and video files tend to contain conversational tone that is completely relevant to your business, it’s a smart idea to have these files transcribed and placed on your website. A professional transcription of your audio and video files can be crawled by the search engines, and the content they find can be used to help rank your site and improve your overall SEO campaign.