2 Minute Guide: SEO Strategies for Small Business

Search engine optimization (SEO) involves optimizing your website and content to achieve higher rankings in search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo! Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the foundation of your small business digital marketing strategy as it provides users with the most relevant and valuable content. A robust SEO strategy helps build customer trust and credibility which are vital to your customer relationships.

How Search Engines Work

Search engines crawl the web to index and organize online content for relevance, then return results in search engine results pages (SERPs).

SEM vs. SEO

SEM, which stands for search engine marketing, refers to using specific keywords to attract potential customers to paid content on platforms like Google Ads, Bing, and Yahoo! In contrast, SEO, or search engine optimization, involves creating optimized content that aligns with a search query to provide the most relevant content (organic) to users.

Important Stat

The #1 result in Google's organic search results has an average click-through-rate of 27.6%

a photo of a magnifying glass — 2 Minute Guide to Small Business SEO

How does SEO work?

Search engines routinely update their algorithms to enhance the user experience. SEO can be divided into three main components: technical, onsite, and offsite.

Technical SEO

This text focuses on the appearance and functionality of your website. Your site's rankings can be influenced by the inclusion of relevant keywords and the overall quality of your site.

Onsite SEO

Onsite SEO pertains to the actual content on your website. To maximize your onsite SEO, build a content strategy focused on valuable content oriented around the information your target audience might seek.

Offsite SEO

Offsite SEO involves external tactics, such as acquiring high-quality backlinks, to enhance your SEO.

Important Stat:

In a 13-month Semrush study, nearly all (92.3%) of the 100 top-ranking domains had at least one backlink.

How to Improve Your Site's SEO Ranking with an Effective SEO Strategy for Small Business

Create relevant and high-quality content. This includes blog posts, videos, infographics, and ebooks.

SEO is an ongoing process - create a schedule to revisit your strategies, content, and results.

Keep your target audience in mind - always. Address their needs, problems, and interests to increase the chances of attracting and engaging them.

Regularly update your content. Posting new content regularly keeps your audience interested and provides search engines with more content and keywords to assess.

Utilize alt tags and meta descriptions. These items provide additional information about your content. Learn more about alt tags and meta descriptions.

Things to Avoid in Your SEO Strategy

Not setting clear goals for your overall SEO plan, as well as individual campaigns.
Not understanding or focusing content on your target audience and what they consider valuable information.
Overusing keyword terms during content creation and optimization (seriously, don't do this). Strive for a balance that aligns with search/user intent.