If you run a small business, I do not doubt that you have a website, and you have probably heard of SEO. But do you understand the marketing benefits that an SEO-optimized website could mean for your small business?
SEO is the abbreviation for Search Engine Optimization and is a digital marketing strategy that, when done effectively, draws positive attention from search engines. A correctly optimized website will help people searching the web to find your website more quickly when they conduct their online search.
When developing a site for SEO, a website owner needs to use well-researched keywords or key phrases that the search engine will notice.
The optimum number of times to use the target keyword is three to five times. If you use the term less, it may not be noticed, and if you use it much more, it may be considered ‘keyword stuffing,’ a spamming technique that will lead to search engines penalizing your site. You may also find the content hard to read if you insist on placing the keyword or phrase in locations that do not read naturally.
You’ll notice that the title of this article has to do with blogging. When you conduct a web search using various keywords, you will often find blogs among the top ten for the keyword you used. If you develop a business blog to benefit your online business, you should also work to ensure your target keyword or phrase is evident in your posts.
If you’re wondering why blogs might rank better than a standard business site, it’s because blogs are updated more often than entire websites.
Search engines love to find new content, so their interest in your website may be substantial due to the new content you are making available. A small business blog can outperform a large organization’s website in search engine rankings simply because there is more recent information to consider, which often translates into improved trust and rank position. This means you may have more visitors to your blog than your primary site.
However, this scenario is precisely why your business blog can be an essential marketing tool for your small business website.
You just need to ensure that every blog article includes a reason for visitors to come to your main website, and you need to ensure a link is provided with every post on the profile page.
Did you know that when you blog for Search Engine Optimization, you also work to improve the overall traffic flow to your main website? You do that by consistently blogging with a laser focus using targeted keywords.
Consider your business blog a funnel that helps direct the curious to a better answer to the questions they have about the very search term they used to find you. In other words, make it easy to find your site – and visitors will.
