Many businesses believe that SEO strategies do not apply to them. Either they see it as too complicated, or they think their brick-and-mortar business doesn’t see any benefit from search engines. Both are untrue. SEO helps your business in many ways and is an essential tool in your marketing and outreach efforts.
Everyone Uses Search Engines
Internet users rely on search to answer questions, to learn more about products and services, and to find companies. If your focus is local, potential customers still use search engines to look for reviews and directions.
Even if a customer is already familiar with your business name, they are likely to type that into a search engine rather than trying to remember your domain. At the very least, then, you’ll want to make sure searchers can find your site when they’re looking for you.
SEO Increases Traffic
If you provide valuable information and make it easy for search engines to find and organize it, they will reward you with higher rankings. This increased exposure means more visitors to your pages.
As with most marketing, you want to get your content in front of as many eyeballs as you can. Especially when your audience wants what you have, and SEO is a great tool for targeting.
SEO Brings You Qualified Leads (For Free)
Since search engines return results to users who are actively searching for a particular term or phrase, getting to the top of that stack means you’re providing information to the people who want it most, when they want it.
Unlike advertising, you aren’t trying to push information in front of people who might not be interested at the time. So, you have an active audience, and you don’t have to pay to get the message to them.
Overall, search engine optimization is one of the most effective and sustainable ways to build your online presence. Rather than seeing it as something to “fix” after you’ve created content, keep SEO top of mind from the beginning.
By following best practices at the start, you’ll create interesting, useful content that potential customers want (or need) to read. Then, the search engines will be happy to put you in front of a larger audience.