The role of the internet and being found on the internet has become very important for any size business or organization. Among the millions of websites on the web, a good amount, to not say the majority of them, have outdated content and non user-friendly design. The purpose of having a website is to be found by people and to be found you need high rankings on search engine results. The next question then is how can someone’s website be ranked on the first page on Google and outbid their competitors?
Well, it is easy and it isn’t. Search engines are designed to rank the best and most relevant sites highly. It takes a long-term commitment to be ranked higher on search engine results, good content, it takes a good SEO team, and last it takes money.
For us the most important factor to SEO is content and how seriously a business owner takes the whole idea of the website and how it can be used to promote what you do. What that means is that in order to see results you need to invest some time into your website, add fresh and relevant content, monitor the analytics of your website, and possibly make the site personal. Being more involved with the website will add part of your personality to it and it can be done by adding a blog to your website, writing a descriptive “About Us” page etc. In the end people buy from people they like and people who they can relate to.
The best way to make the site personable and explain to your visitors what kind of expert you are in the field is by writing about what you do. If you do landscaping for example, write an article about lawn maintenance. The visitor will read your post about the lawn, and right away you are the professional in their eyes because you provide free expertise. To learn more about their lawn they’ll come back to read your next post again and again, and consecutively next spring you will be the one the visitor will call or recommend to their neighbor or friend. In a few words, if you are an expert at what you do, and as your business cards and expensive ads about your business say, here is the chance to prove it through what you know and for free.
A couple of months ago we were approached by a customer who needed SEO work and needed their website ranked on the first page. We explained the importance of a blog and content for SEO. However, they did not want to do anything with writing a post for a blog or content but still needed their site ranked really high which is more than understandable. Our response was the example on the above paragraph. The customer categorically refused that option and insisted that we provide the content. Keep in mind that not all web design businesses have an in-house copy writer. They can not afford one and when a job like that comes along they outsource. What we did next was to get a quote by outsourcing the job. Finally we send the proposal to the client by including everything requested. They got back to us in a couple of weeks by saying that they went with another company that had obviously guaranteed them top ranking. It has been four months since all this happened and out of curiosity today I went to visit their website. To my surprise the website is still the same and that SEO company did not live up to its name.
What we can make out of this example is that nobody knows your business better than you do. If you want to get ranked high on search engines but your budget is limited, just write about your business on your website’s pages or blog. Make it known to the public what’s great about what your product/services and why they should buy from you and not from your competition. If you don’t have the time to write about your business, delegate it to an employee. Tell them to write about what you do, your company, or at least why do they work there and what’s great about their job and working for you. If they seem reluctant, pay them a couple extra bucks and you’ll see that it will get their writing skills going. Even that will give sort of an insight to your client about who you are, what you do and how well you do it.
Moreover, the SEO team that will optimize your website needs to be capable of doing what they say they can do. Ask for examples of past work, references, and guarantees. When I say guarantees here I mean work guarantee. In most cases when you sign a contract you have to pay 50% of the project up front. If things go bad and the SEO company can not keep its promises your down payment is gone.
In our case we guarantee with honesty and integrity that we will do our best to perform what was agreed on the contract. When optimizing a site for search engines however, there is no guarantee and whoever guarantees that they will have your website on the first page and be ranked number one always and forever, they are pulling your leg. Only Google can do that. They are the only ones that control the algorithms and how the search results are hierarchically ranked.
Why a first page guarantee is almost impossible? The most crucial factor here on whether a website will be ranked on the first page, and for how long, is its competition of course. At some point there will be another company that will come into the scene and seek better ranking than what your website’s current first page ranking. It could also be because a website is not continuously updated with fresh content, while others always pour new information into their website, spend a bunch of money on SEO and therefore rank better. Then, another company might come along and do more work than the company who out-ranked your website and rank better again, and so on and so forth. That’s why there are no guarantees in SEO.
Next comes the price issue. We may have written a best-seller in our industry, we can write or outsource your content too, but in a tough economy you can not afford that. The guy who will write the content from 3000 thousand miles away doesn’t know what you know about your business and by the time everything is done you will have to pay a price tag of a $120 an hour. Here’s what I’d recommend. Put that money into a savings account, say that you are paying your self $120/hour to write about what you do, and write a blog post and your website’s content your self.
But site optimization is not all about content. It is about the way the site is coded and the framework that is built upon. Some websites are so outdated that it is not worth to even get into the code and try to polish it. It is like trying to race a 1992 Honda Civic by adding a ton of extras like turbos and nitro and God knows what, when you could very well buy a brand new Mercedes with that amount of money. What I am trying to say is that it takes longer to fix and optimize older code for search engines than what it would take us to build the site from scratch. Taking longer to fix means that overall you will be paying more than what you would pay for new website.
Summing it up, there are no SEO guarantees and be sceptical of anyone that guarantees your website will be at the top for always and forever. Put your personality and care into your website in the same way you care for the rest of your business assets. For many clients the first contact with you will be through your website. Don’t let that first impression be a bad one. If your website is so outdated just scrap it. Keep only the content and rebuild a new one. Is cheaper and easier to maintain in the long run. Remember content is the king and it will cost you much less than advertising with traditional methods like newspaper ads, radio and TV ads, ect.
Gentian, CSO and co-founder of Shero Commerce, guides the company and client digital strategies. He's an expert in technical SEO, Inbound Marketing, and eCommerce strategy.
