Why is SEO Important for Your Business?

Benefits of Search Engine Optimization include higher rankings in search engine results, increased organic traffic, and ultimately more customers for your business. Learn how SEO can help your business grow from the inside out!

The internet has changed the way we live and do business. The next generation of consumers will be born into a world where they’ll never know what it’s like not to have access to information at their fingertips.

The advent of the internet has created unprecedented opportunities for businesses, but also new challenges in terms of how customers find you when your products or services are so easily accessible by competitors.

If you want to succeed online, you need an SEO strategy that puts your business in front of potential customers when they’re looking for what you offer and meets all Google’s requirements.

An effective SEO strategy is nearly the complete opposite of the traditional methods of driving traffic to a site. Essentially, when it comes to think about your business’s website ranking in search results, you have to realize that Google considers relevancy above all else.

While keywords are important, they don’t exist in a vacuum. They need to make sense within the context of the page they are on.

If you want your business to succeed online, it’s vital that you start with an SEO strategy that includes keywords and phrases relevant to your industry, location, and audience. There’s nothing more frustrating for a potential customer than clicking on a search result only to find that it doesn’t answer their question or meet their needs.

Google Ranking Factors and why they are important

When you follow Google’s guidelines, your business website will be more likely to appear higher in search rankings.

Google creates algorithms that crawl the internet and use complex formulas to rank sites based on thousands of different criteria. Google uses about 200 factors to determine how it ranks sites which are bound by its algorithm, but there are 5 primary criteria that Google uses to rank sites:

1. Unique and relevant content
   Content is king when it comes to ranking in search results. You need a strategy that focuses on adding unique and relevant content to your website and making sure the pages you use for SEO purposes don’t suffer in quality because of links or keywords. Also, when you do use keywords and phrases in your content, make sure to mix them up and spread them out throughout the page.
2. Authority and trustworthiness
   The more often a website appears in search results for highly-searched terms and phrases, the more important it is considered by Google. Sites with higher authority rank higher in search results and are more likely to be clicked on by searchers.
3. Backlinks and relevancy
   Backlinks are links from other websites that link back to your site and help determine its authority. A higher number of high quality, relevant backlinks will increase your website authority and rankings in the search engines, especially Google’s prime search engine results page, or SERP.
4. User experience and engagement factors
   Google is looking to optimize this for users as much as possible. Sites that load quickly and are easy to navigate rank higher in search results because Google wants its customers to have the best user experience possible when searching for information online. Engagement indicators include things like bounce rate, time on site, pages per visit, etc.
5. Mobile friendliness
   As more people use mobile devices to search online, Google is looking for sites that are optimized for viewing on tablets and smartphones. Sites that are not mobile-friendly will rank lower in search results because they’re being filtered out by Google.
   With the demand for mobile-friendly websites on the rise, make sure your website is up to par by checking out this free Mobile-Friendly Test tool from Google.

How to optimize your website for search engines

As a business owner, you’re probably going to need a website sooner or later. It’s not just for show — it’s a powerful way that you can connect with potential customers and show them what your company has to offer that the competition doesn’t.

Having a website is a good start, but if you want people to actually find it in search engines, you have to have an optimized website strategy. Optimizing your website is the key to making your company succeed online because this allows you to rank higher in search engine results, increase organic traffic, and ultimately gain more customers.

If you don’t want the competition coming out ahead of your business by changing its strategies up with every small turn of events on Google’s end, make sure you’re doing your part to stay ahead of the curve and optimize your site for search engines.

Here are some ways you can use SEO for your business:

1. Add metadata and keywords to every page and post on your website (that does not include links or other pages)
2. Make sure that all images have alt-text associated with them
3. Use SEO plugins to help you to stay on top of your optimization game
4. Make sure that internal links are pointing to other relevant pages on your site and linking out to quality, authoritative sites for backlinks
5. Update content regularly so that it stays relevant and Google knows that you’re still active
6. Optimize your site for mobile users so that it’s easier to navigate
7. Add social media sharing buttons to get your content in front of more potential customers on sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn

If you keep up with these basic SEO strategies while offering a unique and relevant user experience on your website, you will notice an increase in traffic and sales, especially if your business is new or you are competing with larger businesses.

Conclusion

The reason why SEO is important for your business is because it allows you to rank higher in search engine results, increase organic traffic, and ultimately gain more customers. If you’re not using these basic SEO strategies like adding metadata and keywords to every page on your site or making sure that all images have alt-text associated with them then make sure you start today! There are many benefits of having an optimized website strategy including the ability to stay ahead of the curve by staying up-to-date with what Google wants from its customers. Keep up with SEO by staying on top of your optimization game and following these steps!

If this seems like a lot of work and you would like to outsource this process to SEO experts, feel free to contact us at Radiant Hosting.