Does your business operate in a competitive industry?
In a world of big money brands, all claiming to be #1, it can be difficult to communicate your unique selling point. Difficult, but not impossible. Think of big brands you see everywhere like KFC, Boots, Topshop and Pepsi. They have built their brands up overtime to dominate a large share of the market. The primary challenge facing small business owners is to create an SEO strategy that rivals that of established companies in their industry. The key to success is strategic planning, preparation and a positive attitude - you’ve got this!
It takes one intelligent marketing campaign to change the game forever. In today’s post, we look at ways you can stand out from the crowd. The following SEO strategies have proven successful for SEO London company, Bigfoot Digital, who now dominate the online market for competitive search terms related to their industry. How many of them are crucial to your marketing strategy?
Learn how to optimise your website for better Google rankings using these proven SEO strategies
1. Create Local SEO Strategies
Before we discuss ranking for organic search terms, you need to understand the primary differences between organic and local results. The local represents a proportion of the search results that are tailored to local searches, such as “Pizza Restaurant Sheffield” or “Pizza Near Me.” People are looking for a result, quickly. Google will deliver a map box complete with the top-ranking pizza spots in this location. If you’ve got your mobile location settings on, it will also list options for you to choose from. Appearing for these searches gives you more chance of attracting new customers to your business.
So, how do you appear for these searches? The first, and most frequent, SEO strategy is to create a Google My Business (GMB) listing. By now you’ve probably all heard about the importance of keeping your listings consistent with accurate opening hours, address and phone number. Google takes location and proximity into account when ranking your website online. Optimising your listing with the correct location (don’t attempt to rank for multiple areas where don’t have a business address), images and customer reviews will give you a significant boost.
Next up, create location pages optimised for the terms you are looking to rank for in the search engine results pages (SERPs). This may sound easy enough but getting it right is a fine art - stuffing keywords in every sentence will not slide with big G. Google likes to see quality content so all keywords should flow naturally.
2. Keyword Research
The second step is to look for keywords that your customers are searching for online. You want to find the most popular keywords or phrases that your customers are searching for and prioritise those. By signing up for an Ahrefs account, you can get access to the keyword planner, which gives you a complete overview of keyword volume, difficulty to rank and click-through rate (CTR).
Typically, people tend to target broad keywords as they have the highest search volume. “SEO” is a great example as it has a search volume of 42,000. But, what information are people looking for when searching? SEO jobs, blogs, resources, a definition or agency provider. It’s an extremely difficult keyword to rank for as there is so much competition. You will generate quality traffic using long- tail keywords, such as “SEO Company” and “SEO Sheffield Company.” The result is relevant, local traffic from people who are genuinely interested in your business.
3. Write Fresh Content
Updating your small business blog can be time-consuming, and you may think it will have no real impact on the success of your website. However, Google likes to see unique, fresh content on a site. What Google likes, even more, is a website updated with blog posts on a weekly basis. If you are having trouble ranking on the first page, including a section on your website that is dedicated to optimised content is going to give you a significant boost ahead. This will tell Google the following 2 things:
- Your website is relevant: By updating your website with content pertaining to topics relevant to your industry, you are giving Google the go-ahead to show your content in more searches. It also gives you the opportunity to rank for keywords that are relevant to your business.
- You have a stable internal linking structure: Of course, this will depend on the topics you choose to write about. Prioritise topics that have some relevance to your internal landing pages and be sure to link to them with a follow link. This will transfer authority and trust from one page to another (like link building). This will create a map of pages online so that Google’s bots find all your pages, not just the one blog post.
4. Find Link-Building Opportunities
A business that ranks well is likely to have a list of mentions on other websites. The process of obtaining these links for your website is called link building. It’s Google’s number one ranking factor, which decides where you should be placed in the search results. Get link building right, and you’ll be sitting pretty on page one. Get it wrong, and your rankings will plummet. So, what is considered a good link? You are looking for a site that is relevant, credible and has authority. If you own an architectural business, it goes without saying, don’t look for a link on a beauty blog. That’s common sense. Here are 3 different types of link building opportunities:
- Citations include a combination of your business name, address and phone number, with the best citations including them in that order. Google looks at citation structure, and consistency of those citations across the web, so you want to make sure you are using the same details every time. Look for local and industry directories that offer free placement.
- Guest posting is the process of providing bloggers or online influencers with an article including a follow link to your website. This is a benefit for both the blogger and your business. They get free, fully-optimised content exclusive for their website, and you get the benefit of a link that passes authority from their site to yours.
- Social media profiles offer you full access to a profile for you to optimise as you wish. Many social media platforms exist away from the famous Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Complete your profile with an optimised image, hashtags and links to your product and service pages. Be sure to keep your social profiles updated with fresh content, as pages created for links are often reported.
The Bottom Line
The process of optimising your business for search is an uphill battle. Just when you think you have hit the top spot, your competition will come along and outrank you. You need to be continually looking for new ways to optimise your business to ensure you never stop bringing in online customers. The good news is that by following these steps, you get to understand the process of how to rank your business in a competitive industry.
