All online business gurus love to say the proverbial digital marketing catchphrase: I need SEO.
Ever since the good old days of Ask Jeeves and AltaVista, there’s been a mad dash to get your business on the first search engine page for your product or service.
The only problem is that most people need to learn what SEO truly means. Sure, most of us know that it stands for Search Engine Optimization, and according to the search engine gods of the interweb, if you use the right “keyword formula,” you will land yourself in the number one spot on the first search engine page for everything remotely related to your company.
Unfortunately, this could not be further from the truth. At one point during the dot com boom, digital marketing pioneers found this to be a very effective method. Nowadays, this method is like racing a covered wagon next to a Ferrari – you’ll never come close to crossing that finish line first.
With the information age in full swing, Search Engine Optimization has evolved into something else entirely and requires a comprehensive strategy that even the big league marketing agencies have trouble keeping up with.
Let’s back it up and not put the cart before the horse (remember, you’re racing a Ferrari here). Instead, let’s look at the finer details of modern SEO practices and procedures.
This article will start with the basics and get more complex. We will:
1) Introduce SEO: Definition and Benefits
2) How to Start SEO Basics: Quick Tips
3) Finding the Right provider: Build a comprehensive SEO strategy with a full-service creative team
Introduction to SEO: A definition
Search engines are now such an integral part of our lives that we often take them for granted. However, they are a relatively recent development in human history.
The first-ever search engine, Aliweb, was launched in 1992, paving the way for future search engines such as Google. Despite its pioneering role, Aliweb wasn’t very practical. The internet had yet to become mainstream, and only a select few understood its potential applications.
The guys at Google clearly recognized its potential. When they came along in 1999, they eventually revolutionized the search engine game, and as they say, the rest is history.
(Did you know: that Buffy the Vampire Slayer was the first televised event to use Google as a verb?)
If we are going to use a boilerplate definition for SEO, we can start with the following:
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of optimizing a website to increase its visibility and ranking in search engine results. It ensures that a website is structured correctly, relevant to users’ queries, and easy to navigate.
More simply, we can understand SEO as specific techniques using keywords to improve your chances of coming up on search engine result pages (SERPs) when people use search engine pages like Google.
For example: Say I want to find the closest fish market. I might type into Google “Fish market near me.”
If you are a local fish market in my immediate area, good SEO practices will land you in the top results of my search engine query.
What are the Benefits?
The benefits of a comprehensive SEO strategy are innumerable for businesses and brands. As a full-service creative team, our SEO goals for a brand include the following:
- Increased website traffic
- Increased brand awareness
- Increased leads
- Build trust and credibility with a target audience
- Increased sales and conversion rate
- This list is by no means exhaustive.
These are just a few of our primary end goals for SEO implementation. It is important to note that these are what we expect due to increased visibility from using SEO. You will not see these results simply through SEO. It is part of a larger marketing strategy.
(Did you know: that a marketing plan differs from a marketing strategy? Check out our blog post on Marketing plan vs. Marketing Strategy!)
How to Start SEO Basics – Quick Tips
If you are starting a business or trying to bring your brand into the 21st century with a new website, blog page, or even product page
(effective SEO on e-commerce sites like Amazon is crucial! Check out this post from Amazon that explains the best SEO practices for their site!)
then here are a few helpful tips to get you started with basic SEO practices:
Start with Keyword Research
Good SEO keyword research is not about finding as many keywords as possible. Instead, it is about choosing targeted, long-tail keywords that are searched more than 100 times a month but are less commonplace and competitive than every company on the internet use for their targeted keyword strategies.
(What do we mean by long-tail keywords? Since there’s too much to cover in just one paragraph, check out this comprehensive article on long-tail keywords!)
Helpful tip: If you’re not sure where to begin with your keyword research, Google Ads has a free keyword planner that you can use to find some critical keyword data.
We recommend finding a competitor’s website you like and plugging their URL into the keyword planner along with a few words related to your product or service. You should get some valuable keywords and keyword data to start you out on your SEO journey!
Optimize your website for your target keywords.
Optimizing your website for target keywords is an essential part of keyword research. This work includes optimizing for both on-page and off-page SEO.
- On-page SEO includes optimizing your website’s content and structure so that search engines can easily crawl and index your website.
- Off-page SEO includes building relationships with other websites and creating backlinks to your website, which will help increase your website’s visibility in search engine results pages.
(Need to know more about creating backlinks? Check out this comprehensive article on creating backlinks!)
Helpful tip: Guest posting on blogs is a great way to build backlinks to your site! Reach out to some of the blogs you like to see if they offer guest posting. This service typically costs money, but it will be well worth it in the future. Make sure you research to determine if it is worth the funds!
Metadata and potential pitfalls
Metadata is essential when it comes to SEO.
This is the data that is associated with a web page, and it can include titles, descriptions, and keywords.
Using relevant and accurate metadata is vital to ensure that it accurately represents your website in search engine results.
Additionally, you should avoid potential pitfalls that may harm your website’s visibility in search engine results pages.
These practices include keyword stuffing, cloaking, and hidden text.
These tactics are considered black hat SEO practices and will cause your site to be put on Google’s naughty list if you’re not careful.
(There’s much to know about black hat SEO practices. Check out this article from Hubspot to learn more!)
Helpful tip: If you’re concerned about being penalized for black hat SEO practices, remember that there will be far less chance of penalization if you use good quality content that is reader-friendly.
We recommend getting in touch with a full-service creative team that can help you create engaging content.
A good creative team will also use software systems to ensure your content is not “over-optimized.”
Finding the Right SEO provider: Build a comprehensive SEO strategy with a full-service creative team
A comprehensive SEO strategy is essential for optimizing your website to get the best search engine rankings possible. However, it is not enough to simply incorporate SEO tactics. Quality content that helps define your brand identity and image is necessary for a successful strategy.
You must ensure that your message is consistent throughout your website, social media, graphic design, package design, and more.
This colossal undertaking can be a daunting task for one person to manage. SEO is just one part of a giant puzzle that encapsulates your entire brand.
(Check out our blog post on Brand Development Strategy to learn more about these elements for your brand!)
Our Creative Agency
Suppose you genuinely wish to incorporate these elements into your comprehensive SEO strategy. In that case, you will need help from some experienced marketing professionals. Typically you can piecemeal these services together using freelance marketing professionals or hire a full-service creative team to develop your branding strategy.
Although there are some great freelancers out there, issues of communication and brand comprehension can arise from using individuals to create your brand.
(Need to decide which option is best for you? Check out our blog post on Freelancers vs. Full-service Marketing teams!)
That’s why we recommend getting in touch with a team of professionals who can work with you and use every facet of their expertise to build a well-rounded brand and SEO strategy.
Conclusion
It’s great to learn a bit about these complex marketing topics to better communicate with whichever professionals you choose.
It may sound crazy, but this article barely scratches the surface of SEO practices and procedures.
Either way, this developmental period should be an exciting time for you to begin telling your story!
We would love to help you write the next chapter of your brand development saga!
What are you waiting for? Get in touch today!
Hockman, Stephen. “How to Build Backlinks for Free (56 Ways to Create Backlinks).” SEO Chatter, 19 Sept. 2022, https://seochatter.com/how-to-build-backlinks-for-free/.
“Long-Tail Keywords: What They Are & How to Use Them for Seo.” Semrush Blog, https://www.semrush.com/blog/how-to-choose-long-tail-keywords/.
Quaker, Daisy. “Blog.” Amazon, 2020, https://sell.amazon.com/blog/getting-started/amazon-seo-to-optimize-product-listings.
Robbins, Colin. “Aliweb: The World’s First Internet Search Engine.” Nexor, 12 Apr. 2021, https://www.nexor.com/aliweb/#:~:text=Back%20in%201992%2C%20Martijn%20Koster,the%20world’s%20first%20search%20engine.
“What Is SEO – Search Engine Optimization?” Search Engine Land, 13 Dec. 2022, https://searchengineland.com/guide/what-is-seo.
“‘To Google’: Which TV Show First Said This Phrase? – News.” News.com.au, https://www.news.com.au/technology/online/buffy-the-vampire-slayer-was-the-first-tv-reference-of-the-term-google-it/news-story/2370b53baac5109b040f82a1c67dbafc.
