We bet the reason why you’re here, reading this post is because you are a business owner who’s struggling to keep up with competition. You want to explore something different other than brick and mortar, networking, paid advertising, or whatever it is you’re in on just to make profit. Your business is failing or perhaps it isn’t making money the way you envisioned it. Now, you turn to building presence online because it is what experts say. But did they tell you how to start and make the most out of your time and effort in creating online presence?
Well, it’s probably safe to assume that you already have a website right now. The problem is when you type in exterior car accessories Pennsylvania in your browser, you don’t see your website in the first five or ten pages. So how will prospective customers find you? This is where you must learn more about Google, how it works, and the concept of search engine optimization in general.
The bad news is the entire concept is so freaking large that you will need an entire year to understand everything. But the good news is we have collected some of the most important things you should know to begin your quest for profit from your business. So pay attention and be sure you read everything.
To begin, here are three basic things about SEO courtesy of CIO.com, and to your surprise, these “basic” things are actually stuff you still aren’t aware of.
1. Content Is King—But Good Content Rules
In the past year, content marketing has become a big buzzword among online marketers, partly due to Google algorithm updates that penalize low-quality content. Online marketers should be focusing on quality content publication, both on and off their websites, content can be text-based, visual-based, or audio-based, or even a combination of two or three. The bottom line is that search engines want to deliver high-quality, valuable content to users. If you want your content served up in search results, it better have those attributes.
2. Links Should Be Earned, Not Bought
Paid links have especially been in Google’s crosshairs as of late. If you bought a link in some way, you should assume it won’t count—and it might even hurt you. Organizations are encouraged to earn links though endorsements instead of paying for them. We’re seeing Google pass out penalties for easy links, and we think the crackdown is really just beginning.
Google Algorithms
In the past, some marketers have embedded keyword-rich anchor text in online press releases in hopes of boosting their chances of being found in Google for the keyword contained within the anchor text. (Anchor text is the link used in a hyperlink; for example, “To download Adobe Reader, click here.”)
The indications are that Google has taken a tough stance against the practice, treating anchor text links in press releases as unnatural “paid” links. “What this means is that Google is stopping unnatural link building from press release distribution,” notes the blog of press release syndication company Business Wire.
However, there’s still value in online press releases, particularly as a way to attract attention from journalists and bloggers. If others write about your product or service and link to content about it, then that’s considered a legitimate “earned” link to Google. And those are the links that count the most today, SEO experts say.
3. To Improve Social Status, Use Google+
In its 2013 SEO Ranking Factors, SearchMetrics, a search analytics software company, likewise noted the growing importance of Google+ and Google +1 shares to Google search rankings.
Sharing content on Google+ (and receiving Google +1 endorsements from others) has “definite SEO advantages. Google uses Google+ to discover new content, and Google tends to index anything shared on Google+ quickly. In addition, Google+ posts are much easier for Google to index than some content on Facebook and Twitter, if for no other reason than Google owns the Google+ social network.
That’s why people need to adopt Google+ in addition to other social networks. If you haven’t already done so, set up a Google Place page for your local business or a Google+ page for your company, and start building your Google+ community.
Read the rest of the article here.
Putting content to your website a decade ago was more than enough for Google to take notice of it. But today, content cannot be just anything – it has to be relevant, interesting, and compelling. Likewise, no website today can survive or at least stand out without the help of social networking sites like Facebook and Google+. And yes, social media is already a huge part of search engine optimization as a general concept.
Next, Entrepreneur.com, in the blog post titled “Top 7 Things You Don’t Know About SEO,” talks about some misconceptions about SEO and the fact that most people tend to look at them at the wrong way.
Viral content isn’t as valuable as you think.
Even with millions of pieces of content published every day, unique content stands out. Viral content is incredibly rare, and usually random. You aren’t going to be able to predict what will capture the attention of the people of the interwebs, and devoting resources to create the next big thing is probably not the best use of your SEO dollars.
Don’t get me wrong. Viral content is great for country-wide or global businesses with a wide customer base, and some advertisers have a knack for hitting just the right notes to create viral commercial spots. The right kind of advertising can boost your business and help establish your brand in the minds of consumers. But for brick-and-mortar businesses with a local audience, chasing elusive viral content is a waste of time and money. If an SEO company promises you viral content, don’t hire them. You don’t want to deal with an SEO company who lies to make sales.
Duplicate content can hurt your SEO, but not always.
Speaking of how black hat status changes over time, duplicate content isn’t as bad as it once was. As long as you use canonical tags when you republish content on your site, duplicate content isn’t as devastating for your ranking as you might imagine.
You should still report sites using your content without permission, but there is less need to worry about Google consequences.
Incoming links are not always good SEO.
Incoming links are awesome and a great way to boost your ranking, right? Yes, mostly. Except when the place that is linking to you has some sort of authority issue. Questionable domains and sites unrelated to your industry can hurt your rank. Quality is far more important than quantity.
Everything must be relevant.
The SEO Handbook from GoUp points out that everything you write or code on your website must be related to your website’s focus, or at least to the focus of the web page. Image descriptions, HTML tags, title, subheaders, and other page attributions should all be semantically related to the purpose of your website or the page itself.
Find this post helpful? If so, you can learn more about the article by clicking the link.
Perhaps the most important thing you need to understand about this whole SEO stuff is that you, the business owner can launch your own campaign anytime you want and without having to spend a lot of money like when you’re paying for a TV or magazine ad. The best thing about establishing online presence is that you get to do so much in very little capital. But of course, you’ll have to do more than just sit and wait for Google to rank your site. You need to be constantly active online.