As someone who has managed to open your own business or company, you should be proud of your entrepreneurial acumen. But that expertise might not necessarily translate so well into the world of marketing your business online, particularly when it comes to Search Engine Optimization or SEO.
There may be no more important tool to marketing your business than SEO, as it is the way that new customers will be directed to your company website by the major internet search engines. If you think that just throwing a few keywords around haphazardly will immediately push your business to the top of a Google page, you will be sorely disappointed.
There are experts available who know what to do and, just as important, what not to do in this field. That’s why you might want to consider SEO outsourcing for your business. If you do choose to proceed with your SEO efforts, here are some common mistakes you should look to rectify.
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Careless Keyword Choice
When you thought up your business, you might have done so in terms which seemed to define how you would separate yourself from others of its kind. However, it’s not the words you use to describe your business that matters in the world of SEO. By contrast, it’s how your potential customers might describe it. After all, they’ll be the ones on the internet searching. So try to think about how people in your client or customer base might search for what you’re offering. Then plan your keywords accordingly.
Content Neglect
Once some business owners think they have their keywords figured out, they have a tendency to splash those keywords onto every piece of content on their website. They seem to do this regardless of whether doing so makes for coherent, relevant information. This is a mistake. That’s because search engines are built to punish this sort of keyword-heavy content as spam. Even if a customer makes it through to the site, they’re going to see an awkwardly written piece of content that reflects poorly on the business. That can only be a big negative for your marketing efforts.
Insular Thinking
Let’s just say that you’ve defined your keywords well and have incorporated them into your website carefully. You have given your content relevant tags, meta descriptions and picture captions to draw in the search engines. All the same, it might not be enough to stand out in a crowded business environment. This might be the time when you need to reach out to other sites for a bit of cross-promotion.
So avoid insular thinking. Don’t be shy. Build relationships with other business owners and put the principle of reciprocity to work.
For example, reach out to a blogger whose site in some way relates to the way you do business or the products and services you’re selling. This person represents a prime opportunity for you to get folks to your website. And most likely, you’ll be doing them a favor, too. Most bloggers welcome quality material from others, if that material is relevant to their message.
Come up with a solid article that’s relevant to that blogger’s audience. Add links in it that shoot the reader back to the most important pages on your own site. Not only will that drive up the SEO traffic to your site, it could bring in a whole new audience.
These are just some of the mistakes you can avoid with your SEO efforts. If you implement the positive changes we suggest here, you will watch that website traffic start to grow.
