Making the most of the internet | FOCUS
SEO – dark art or just misunderstood? S
Matt Battherham, account director at digital marketing agency Browser Media, sets out to demystify the black art of search engine optimisation
earch engine opti- misation (SEO) is arguably the most misunderstood of all marketing channels. I’ve worked with
dozens
of businesses in my 10-plus years as a digital marketer and I know that to the uninitiated, SEO can seem like a bit – or a lot – of a dark art.
A large part of my job is demystifying these miscon- ceptions to help business owners gain a better understanding of the core principles of SEO.
The SEO basics SEO is the process of improving a website’s visibility in organic search results. In theory, the better the visibility a website has, the more visits it will receive and the greater potential it has to make sales. The great thing about SEO is that once you achieve and maintain good organic visibility, or ‘rankings’, for your website’s key pages, the resulting clicks are essentially free.
This is different from PPC (pay-per-click) advertising, which can deliver more immediate results, but will also command a fee every time a user clicks on an ad.
Where a web page ranks in organic search results is not down to luck, but rather very complex search algorithms. These help the likes of Google serve users the most relevant results to their search query. Only Google knows the exact inner workings of algorithm, however, over time it
its
has become clear that certain elements, or ‘ranking factors’, impact search performance more than others.
Key ranking factors Ranking factors are like signals that search engines look at when determining the quality and relevance of a web page, and which web pages to display in search results. Google uses more than 200 ranking factors.
These factors hold varying amounts of infl uence, and according to a recent survey based on the experience of more than 1,000 SEO professionals. The top fi ve are…
• Page content relevance This
simply refers to the
relevance of the content on a web page in relation to the search query. Google wants to match searchers with the most relevant results, so understand what your users want or need, and research the types of queries they use to fi nd it.
• Quality of links
Links from other websites (aka ‘back-links’ or ‘inbound links’) play a crucial role. Search engines treat links as virtual votes of confi dence from one site to another, and the more authoritative the site that’s casting the vote, the bigger the impact it will have on a website’s ability to rank.
• Use query-relevant words and phrases This really means keywords.
Create a website that ticks as many boxes as possible, while putting the needs of users fi rst
Google’s algorithm might
be very advanced, but you still need to be explicit when describing the theme of your website if you want to be found. Keyword research is crucial and can have a huge impact on organic search visibility. Once you know what your users are searching for, you can apply these keywords to your website’s key pages.
• Perceived expertise, authority, and trust Expertise,
authority,
Google rolled out ‘mobile- fi rst indexing’, ranking pages based on how they perform on mobile rather than desktop devices. Simply put, if your site does not work well on a mobile device, it’s unlikely to perform well in search results at all.
Two ranking factors that are not mentioned here, but also have a major impact on SEO, are page load speed and ‘crawlability’ – ensuring Google can actually ‘read’ all of the elements on a page. The key thing here is that almost none of the 200 ranking factors are likely to have much of an impact in isolation. It’s all about creating a website that ticks as many boxes as possible, while putting the needs of users fi rst.
Tracking and
trust are the three pillars of modern SEO. You should be looking to create best-in-class experiences that blow your competition out of the water.
• Mobile-friendliness Most Google searches are now conducted from mobile devices and in 2018,
For those starting out, there are only two tools you need to track performance – Google Analytics and Google Search Console. The former tracks website traffi c – from the most popular pages to how users move through your site, while the latter helps monitor and troubleshoot your site’s presence in search engine page results (SERPs).
Constant changes SEO can seem impossible to keep up with. By focusing on creating websites that convey expertise, authority, and trust, businesses can enjoy the benefi ts of SEO without having to
worry about everything going on around them.
step, based on evidence, represents the customer journey. This includes understanding and predicting your customers’ needs, thoughts, choices, decisions and actions.
What will they be searching for on the internet? What words will they use? Do you understand what they expect from your website? Can you predict how they will interact with your website, so they place that important order, call you by phone, fi nd you on a map or visit you? If your customer profi les need some development before you can best understand customer journeys, it’s important to do your research. We often survey and monitor our website users to fi nd out if we’re providing them with the best online experience. We use a range of analytical tools to understand how our trade users are interacting with our website. We also study the ‘search intent’ of new
December 2019 · kbbreview
customers to win new business. This focuses on what searches are made in an internet search engine before the new customer fi nds our website. We then ensure our website fi ts what they’re looking for perfectly. We do this by using search data and search engine optimisation (SEO) tools. What’s more, all the R&D does not need to cost a fortune. Help is available in the form of free and paid- for analytics and SEO tools. Then, when it comes to testing the user experience of your website, it’s down to you as a KBB business. You know your clients’ needs and are best positioned to assess if their needs are met effectively.
Building and then maintaining good SEO for your website requires analytics and maintenance. We allocate plenty of time and resources to ensure our in-house developers are on-hand to make our website perform as well as users expect it
to. Achieving a really good website user experience can take time, but it’s a very worthwhile task. We also believe the ‘digital versus print media’ debate is redundant. There is a need for both online and physical media, and kbbreview magazine is a good example of this. So HPP’s marketing, sales and customer support materials include digital and print media. Yes, we have rationalised our printed leafl ets, catalogues and brochures, but print material remains a very important part of the mix. We put a lot of effort into creating a range of trade and consumer print materials and advertise in print media, too. But our website provides us with a range of tools and information that we can use to assist our other marketing activities.
The online and digital world is forever changing, developing and growing, so it’s only natural our own websites do the same.
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