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Las Vegas
seems to be the land of small businesses. So if you have
FINALLY set up your website and you are so happy with the
content that you think people around the world would want to
read it, how on earth will you get readers? How will they know
you exist? The short, simple answer is SEO.
You may have heard all the hype about “SEO” which stands for
search engine optimization, but what does it really mean? SEO
gets you noticed so you can build traffic to your site. So today
I want to explain what SEO is in layman’s terms. I also will
explain how you can use some simple tactics to help improve the
SEO of your website and hopefully get yourself some more
readers. And as we know, more readers can equal more dollars
for you and your company.
First and foremost, your website better be good. If you’re
really smart, you’ve hired a professional to lay out your site
with a custom look and feel that communicates what you are
about: Selling product or services, Community Info (like VCO)
or a social networking site. Once your site is baked, it will be
ready for prime time! While you can pay people to help you with
SEO via online forums and word of mouth (not terribly effective
and highly time consuming), there are simpler methods for those
of you using.
Let’s start with the basics.
According to Google, “SEO agencies and SEO consultants
provide useful services for website owners, from writing copy to
giving advice on site architecture and helping to find relevant
directories to which a site can be submitted”. However, a few
unethical SEOs have given the industry a black eye through their
overly aggressive marketing efforts and their attempts to
unfairly manipulate search engine results.
Ultimately, as an honorable businessperson, you want to improve
the volume and quality of traffic to your company’s web site
from search engines via “natural” (”organic”) search results. So
in short, SEO is the a way of improving your page rank and
number of pages indexed by search engines so more traffic comes
to your site from search engine user searches. It really is that
simple.
If you are considering whether you really are ready for SEO, be
smart and do some research on the industry. Google is a great
place to start. You might also seek out a few of the cautionary
tales that have appeared in the press, including this article on
one particularly aggressive SEO:
Internet Advancement told to refund clients.
While Google
doesn’t comment on specific companies, they are aware – and you
should be too—of firms calling themselves SEO specialists who
follow practices that are clearly beyond the pale of accepted
business behavior. So, be careful. Use a professional like he
experts at Red Carpet
Marketing. We’ve been involved with Search Engine Optimization
for more than seven years. We get it. You can too so you will
get your site better visibility particularly if you have an
ecommerce company, you NEED SEO.
For more information or a free 30-minute consultation, drop me a
note at
MaryAnnButcher@LVRedCarpet.com
NEXT WEEK: Guerilla Marketing – Can you hang in the jungle?
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