One of the most common questions I get in my line of work is “what is seo, and how can it help my business?”. Search engine optimization, or SEO as it is commonly called, is the process of “optimizing” your website for the search engines. In other words, it is the process of preparing your website so the search engines rank it well in the search results.
You see, the search engines have an incredible task in front of them. They need to provide relevant searches. Google became #1 in the search engine world because their search engine provides good results. When someone looks for something, Google helps find the most relevant result.
So how do you convince the search engines that your website should be ranked high? Well, that’s what SEO is all about.
Convincing the search engines that your website is valuable is a lot like running for an election. You need to make sure that your website:
- Contains what people are looking for. It needs to have valuable and unique content.
- Other websites need to be talking about it, and “linking” to it.
- Is updated on a regular basis.
Search engine optimization is a two-step process. The first step involves analyzing your current market, and determining the kinds of search engine terms you would like your website to rank for. The second step involves doing the actual optimization.
As I mentioned earlier, ranking well for local search terms is INCREDIBLY important. These are people that are literally sitting down at their computers and looking for a business in your market. These are the kinds of people you want to make sure your website is appearing in front of.