SEO can be overwhelming for small business: getting started
I had an enquiry from a business this week about getting started with Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and I thought I’d share my response here as you might also find it helpful.
SEO can be an overwhelming topic for a business to get their head around but it can also be simplified if you can strip it right back which is no easy feat. For brevity I chose to focus on one element of SEO in my email response: an SEO professional could rightly point out that there is so much more to SEO but I didn’t want to scare off this curious business with a 6,000 word email that covered everything.
My response:
“The challenge with SEO is that almost every business wants to rank at the top of Google results for a range of keywords their customers use to find their services. What most businesses don't realise is that it's a marathon and not a sprint and to reach the top is a bit like an elite athlete reaching the pinnacle of their sport. It can take years of effort and the time it takes is relative to the competitiveness of the industry sector too.
Keyword example #1 - SEO coaching online
One key element to focus on at the beginning is keyword research: what keywords are you trying to rank for and what are the real search results on Google for each? In the first example (above), I might believe, without research, that SEO coaching online is a highly desirable keyword for my business to rank well for but a deeper look with SEO tools reveals there are only between 0-10 searches per month on Google Australia for that phrase which is not high.
Luckily Regional Rising is currently ranked #2 for that phrase (and there isn't a lot of competition for that keyword) so I might get a couple of those prospects click on the search results and come to my website. If my website stinks then I might lose them in the first 10 seconds! But a #2 ranking for highly relevant but low volume keyword is not to be dismissed. If I was ranked #35 in Australia for SEO coaching online then I might abandon efforts to get into the top 5 as I might perceive it to be a lot of effort and investment for possibly little reward.
Keyword example #2 - Website design course
I also deliver a “learn to build your own website” online course. My SEO tool tells me between 100-200 people search for website design course every month and at #23 on Google my ranking is encouraging but not great. But the volumes are pretty decent in my opinion (compared with my first example) and I know if I can get into the top 10 (ie. page one of Google) and ideally into the top 5 then I might get a few dozen clicks to my website per month out of that 100-200 searches. I am prepared to invest time to create more quality content on my website that includes this keyword phrase and optimise it continuously to try to reach my goal.
The point of these two examples is that every business should develop a long list of keywords they believe are highly relevant and describe their services.
We would then add these keywords to SEO tools to check actual volumes because what you and your peers within your profession think target clients use on Google and what real people like me (a target customer) may use could be poles apart or a mix of the two.
As part of this research we would also look at competitors and who is actually ranking well for the keywords you want to prioritise (pro tip: you don't only focus on the highest volume keywords... The low volume ones can be gold if they are a great fit).
Armed with more knowledge from Google and SEO tools we then look at how you currently rank for the keywords you want to prioritise and it is very likely that there is a very big gap between your current rank and where you want to get to. This is where it gets challenging: you need a roadmap and strategy to continuously create high quality, relevant content on your website that matches those priority keywords (among other tactics) and it's an ongoing process, especially if there are dozens of peers in your industry all investing in SEO and content development to improve their ranking.
There may also be some amazingly relevant, high volume keywords you may never rank well for if there is high competition and your peers are already ahead of you or they simply may be too broad.
I'm providing this background to illustrate that SEO and ranking well on Google to attract new leads is a marathon that requires research, strategy, planning, creativity, effort and measurement.
It's not something you will crack in an hour, 10 hours or 50 hours. Back to the athlete analogy: once you reduce or stop training the others who keep training or increase may overtake you. We can discuss a few things but at the end of the day if you can learn what your target customers really enter into Google searches (and not just the phrases you think they use) then you can begin to develop high-quality, relevant content that appeals to both customers and search engines using those keywords and your rankings will improve over time.
You might conclude after our chat that it's too much effort (given the competition and likelihood of success) and our chat may save you time and many thousands of dollars over many years on a futile journey. I don't think you'll come to that conclusion but it depends on whether you see Google as a key driver of new business for you.”
