Only 30% of small businesses have developed an SEO strategy. Without a plan in place, you could leave gaps in your SEO pursuits. Instead of reaching the top of a search page, you could continue to lag behind competitors. Keep reading to learn 8 tips on building SEO strategies for your start up in Fort Lauderdale.
Don’t risk your ranking! Instead, consider these eight tips for building SEO strategies that work.
With these tips, you can finally reach the top of the page! A higher ranking will help you generate brand awareness, acquire new leads, and improve your ROI.
Ready to get on board? Keep reading for the steps you need to start marketing businesses online with SEO.
1. Consider Your Target Audience
Before you can reach your customers with high-quality, SEO-optimized content, you need to know who they are and what they care about.
First, define your ideal customers based on demographics like:
- Age
- Location
- Gender
- Household income
- Pain points
- Marital status
- Buying behaviors
- Interests
Are you focusing on a broad target audience? Try separating your larger audience into smaller groups, or buyer personas. Then, you can create content that will appeal to each group.
Segmenting your audience will make it easier for you to personalize your content. Personalization makes it easier for you to appeal to and connect with customers. Otherwise, customers might not feel like you’re helping to solve their problems.
Do you want to focus your SEO strategy on appealing to the customer’s needs? Do you want to establish yourself as a thought leader in your industry?
How you decide to communicate with your audience will impact your strategy.
2. Complete Keyword Research
Once you decide to target an audience, learn as much as you can about them. That includes the content they’re already reading. What keywords do they use during a Google search?
Keyword research is essential for building SEO strategies that work. Without keyword research, you’ll fail to create content that appears for your customers’ searches.
Instead, you’ll likely appear in front of another niche. You could waste valuable time weeding out low-quality leads.
To start developing your keyword plan, use tools such as:
- Ahrefs
- Google Trends
- SEMRush
- Google Keyword Planner
- Moz
Create a spreadsheet to keep track of the keywords you want to target.
Search Intent
It’s not enough to choose keywords with a high search volume. You also need to understand the user’s search intent for these keywords.
What answers are your customers looking for? Do they want to learn more about a product or service? Maybe they’re looking for a tutorial or helpful guide.
Understanding the search intent will help you enjoy the many benefits of SEO. Otherwise, Google might decide your content doesn’t match the search query. You’ll fail to improve your ranking as a result.
If you don’t understand a search phrase, search it yourself! What results appear at the top of the page? This process will help you gain a better understanding of your customers.
Try to focus on long-tail keywords (phrases of four or more words) instead of short-tail keywords. When someone searches “coffee,” millions of results can appear. Nearby coffeehouses, coffee beans for purchase, how to brew coffee, coffee machines…the possibilities go on.
One piece of content won’t always fit the search intent for a short-tail keyword. For example, if someone is looking for coffee beans and you create a guide on using a French press, the reader will leave.
Instead, use long-tail keywords to focus on more specific queries.
3. Evaluate the Competition
Did you complete a SWOT analysis to recognize strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in your industry? A SWOT analysis could help you get a step ahead of competitors.
Which keywords are they already ranking for? What type of content are they creating?
Are they missing certain SEO trends?
If you want to target an audience your competitors are pursuing, you need to do a better job than they are! Recognizing their weaknesses will help you gain an advantage.
4. Review Your Website
About 88% of online shoppers won’t return to a website after having a bad user experience (UX). Meanwhile, bad mobile optimization bothers nearly 50% of users. About 53% of mobile users will leave if a page takes longer than three seconds to load.
If your website isn’t up-to-date, well-designed, and easy-to-use, you’ll lose customers. You need to make updating your website part of your SEO strategy.
Is your website visible to search engines? If Google’s bots can’t crawl and index your website, there’s a chance your ranking is suffering for it.
You can use Google cache to determine which site elements are visible to search engines.
Once you’re visible, make sure you’re mobile-optimized. Use Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test to double-check. Since Google uses mobile-first indexing for rankings, using mobile SEO is essential.
Are plugins, images, and other pieces of content slowing your site down? If your site is slow, people might leave without clicking around. Your bounce rate will rise, which can hurt your ranking.
Meanwhile, your clickthrough rate and dwell time will suffer.
Speed up your site to give users the best-possible experience.
5. Appeal to Voice
About 60% of smartphone users have tried voice search at least once. Meanwhile, about 43% of voice assistant owners use their device to make buying decisions. By next year, 41% of consumers will use voice assistants instead of websites or apps.
Is your content written with voice search in mind? Voice queries usually differ from the queries we type into a search engine. Usually, we ask Siri, Alexa, or Google a question during a search.
Use these questions as your target keyword. Then, answer the question at the beginning of your post.
As your post continues, go into more depth. Make sure to back up any claims you make with research.
Appealing to voice search can help you rank higher on search pages. You might even reach the zero-click position, putting you ahead of the competition!
6. Create Scannable Content
Is your content easy to read and understand? If people get bored looking at your content, they won’t stick around. Remember, a low dwell time and clickthrough rate, along with a high bounce, will hurt your ranking.
Instead, try to improve the user experience with readability in mind. Making your content easy to skim-read will keep readers on the page. You can use:
- Shorter sentences
- Shorter paragraphs
- Bullet points
- Lists
- Headings and subheadings
- Bold and italicized text
Make sure the font and font size you use are easy to read, too. If your content isn’t decipherable, people will leave.
Try adding images throughout your text to give readers something else to look at, too. For example, if you have a piece of content that’s full of data, create an infographic.
Link-Building
It’s not enough to create content that’s easy to read. While building SEO strategies, it’s important to consider the value you’re offering readers, too. Consumers want to know they’re finding content that’s well-researched and informative.
You can show readers you’re an authority in the industry by using external links. Make sure your links send readers to helpful, informative resources. For example, you might find a medical study online you want to reference within your post.
When you link to these resources, Google will take notice.
Don’t forget to add internal links throughout your content, too. These links send readers to other pages on your site, such as your product pages or contact page.
Do you know an influencer in your industry? Working with an influencer is a great way to start marketing businesses online. At the same time, you can target an audience that already loves that influencer.
Working with an influencer will help boost your reach and authority. You’ll also gain backlinks, which can further boost your ranking.
7. Optimize for Conversions
Where can users convert on your website? Conversion optimization will help you boost leads and sales. Otherwise, you’re missing a chance to grow your business!
Try using a heat map to determine where visitors spend the most time on your website. You can also use A/B testing to make adjustments to:
- Headlines
- Color palettes
- Call-to-action language
- Call-to-action button locations
Learning from your target audience will help you make informed decisions when building SEO strategies.
Make sure to use multiple conversion opportunities. For example, you can use a button or form to encourage people to contact you. You can also link your phone number on the page or encourage visitors to subscribe to emails.
8. Work With the Pros
Google’s SEO algorithm changes constantly throughout the year. If you’re not keeping up with the latest changes and trends, you could unintentionally use black hat SEO. Google penalizes websites that use black hat tactics.
Don’t make costly SEO mistakes!
Instead, consider working with a professional SEO company that has experience marketing businesses online. They’ll know the importance of building SEO strategies with your goals in mind. With their help, you can improve your ranking and reach more customers!
Give Your Business a Boost: 8 Tips for Building SEO Strategies That Succeed
Don’t fall behind competitors or lose your top-of-the-page ranking! Instead, consider these eight tips for building SEO strategies that work. With these tips, you can get a step ahead and start accomplishing your business goals!
As your SEO strategies improve, your ROI will, too.
Need help improving your SEO strategy? We’re here to help! Discover our latest SEO deal now to get started.
