“Google only loves you when everyone else loves you first.” – Wendy Piersall
Search engine optimisation, or SEO, has become a fundamental part of owning a website or a business – and in particular, a small business. And SEO has many benefits that small businesses can benefit from. SEO can really help your business succeed and grow online. We have seen numerous brands build a business off the back of organic traffic.
SEO can play a pivotal role in your overall revenue and business growth. But still, many small business owners fail to see the value in investing in digital marketing, and specifically in their own SEO efforts. Whatever your marketing budget or business plans, it’s likely you should have an eye on your SEO activity, and how it can be improved. So, what exactly are the benefits of SEO for small business? We have seen numerous businesses grow thanks to an increase in organic traffic, and if you need more information you can see our SEO services.
- Find new customers
Marketing should get you knew customers, and SEO is no different. While SEO is primarily all about improving your rankings in the search engine result pages (SERPs), you need better rankings in order to get more traffic in order to attain new customers. Better rankings in the search results means more visits to your site, which should convert into more customers.
- Find customers in the discovery phase
Finding new customers isn’t always easy, but by focusing on SEO, you are likely to find customers in the discovery phase. People who are searching on Google or other search engines are attempting to learn more about what they need, or what the choices that lie in front of them are. This is the ideal time to get your business in front of them. They may be searching for specifically what you offer. But if you aren’t ranking, how will these people find you? Well, they won’t.
- More traffic
While it isn’t traffic for the sake of traffic you want, getting traffic to your website is a key aspect of digital marketing. Even if your website is perfect and offers everything people want – if there’s no traffic coming to it from Google, then no-one is going to convert. By getting more traffic from organic channels, your chances of getting conversions and subsequent sales rises. Even if your conversion rate is very low, doubling your traffic can essentially double the number of enquiries and/or sales your business achieves.
- More targeted traffic
If your SEO is done right, then you should be attracting more relevant traffic to your site. This means you will be targeting terms with the right search intent behind them – meaning the people searching these terms will have the intent of looking for a service or product like yours. So they are more likely to convert than those searching for less relevant terms.
- Improved conversion rates
With more traffic, and more targeted traffic to specific landing pages, comes more conversions. This means the overall conversion rate of your site will improve along with your number of enquiries or sales. At the end of the day, if people coming to your site are genuinely interested in what you have to offer (as they should be due to the fact, they were actively searching for something relevant) then they are more likely to convert than a more generic audience.
- Heightened brand awareness
Anyone searching for terms relevant to your small business will be more likely to come across your business when making searches. The more they see your business pop up in the SERPs, then the more aware they are of your brand. Which means they will be more likely to click onto your site, and consider you for the future – if not there and then.
- Overtake competitors
Many businesses will have that one competitor that is number 1 for terms they think they are more suited to. But if you haven’t invested in SEO, how can you expect to be number 1? By rising up through the rankings, and hopefully taking their spot in the rankings, you can take traffic and potential sales directly from the competition. People who were previously clicking their site will now be more likely to find your brand instead. Similarly, if your competition isn’t ranking, but they are still a big player within your industry, this is the perfect opportunity to more easily take them on.
- Cost-effective marketing
While the big players in your industry may be able to out-spend you on the marketing front, SEO can be a very cost-effective form of digital marketing which is winnable on some fronts – even against the biggest competitors. Big businesses with big budgets can spend more on pay-per-click advertising, or other forms of ads. But with a well-thought-out SEO strategy, you can go toe-to-toe with the big players in the search results.
SEO often has a very high ROI – as the ceiling for returns is endless if you get the right traffic, and once your website is ranking well you aren’t actively spending money on paid marketing campaigns. You need to keep maintaining your SEO, but you aren’t paying for ad space.
- Improved usability
User experience is key in order to drive conversions, but also for SEO. Essentially, most SEO practices boil down to improving the experience a customer has on your site. Google is focused on giving its own users the best experience possible. That is the idea behind how it ranks sites. Which site is the best for this search? We are simply giving Google the information it is looking for. When a user or customer is finding what they want on a usable website, Google is happy. By focusing on improving your SEO, you will also be improving the usability of your site. And by improving the usability of your site, your search engine rankings will improve. It’s a win-win situation.
- SEO results are long-lasting
If you pay for online ads, or offline ads, the results only last as long as you spend money on them. While you do need to maintain your SEO efforts in the long-run, once you start ranking, your website will stay up there for a decent amount of time. Again, there’s no real guarantees, but as long as competitors don’t outrank you, and your website isn’t vandalised, you should be safe for a good length of time.
- More customers to grow your business
The whole idea of your website and marketing in general is to get enquiries, or sales, that ultimately grow your business. SEO is no different. Businesses investing in their SEO will grow faster and gain more customers than their competitors in the search results that do not. SEO brings customers to your website that are actively searching for your product or service. You aren’t marketing to people who aren’t interested.
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