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The New Era of SEO Brings New Strategies and Key Steps

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Over the past few months, I’ve been absorbing all kinds of new information on Search Engine Optimization (SEO). I’ve talked to professionals, read e-books and blogs like SEOMoz, and I’m in the midst of a great hard copy book that I’ll review in a future blog.  Over this time exploring the topic from many different angles- external link building, on-page tactics, and building content with optimization in mind- I’ve come to the conclusion that, just like building a successful business, there’s no easy way around SEO and there’s no miracle code that you just set and forget.  You really need all the components to optimize your site.

Here are some steps in the right direction:

Conduct Initial Research

Website Code / Code Audit
Is your website SEO friendly?  You will likely need to employ an SEO professional with programming knowledge to review the code, architecture, and content of your current website. After studying your current web presence, that professional can recommend both technical and content changes that will increase the innate SEO-friendliness of your site.

Keyword Research and Testing
In a nutshell, you need to explore to following:

  • Who your target audience is
  • What’s important to your audience
  • How often words are searched
  • Who your competition is (for targeted keywords, not necessarily business-wise)

In order to develop a set of keywords that your target might be using, step into your ideal clients’ shoes to determine what subjects/terms might interest them, what’s important to them, and what their pain points are. Search for those keywords yourself to see who your competition is. Remember that in SEO competition consists of sites competing for the same keywords as you and may not necessarily be your business-competitors.    Note, sometimes the broadest terms are not necessarily the best.  It’s better to have 10 qualified visitors to your site than 50 who will quickly bounce off.   Once you have a list of strategic keywords, use online keyword tools to find the best ones that will ultimately guide the creation of relevant content.  Keyword tools will help you determine:  volume of search per term; and how competitive the term is to rank for.

Content Audit
Review the existing content on your site against targeted keywords to ensure that basic on-page elements (Title Tag, URL, navigation links, image alt tags, and sub headings) are in line with your target keywords.

Take Action

Website Code Changes
After an audit, have a professional make the recommended code changes to ensure SEO-friendliness.

Employ a Local SEO Campaign (for firms conducting most business in targeted geographic areas) 
This is especially important for firms that have a client/prospect base in specific geographic areas.  Use Google Local and other local directories to establish a strong presence in local search.  The advantages of local SEO include less competition and quicker results.

Develop a Strategy for Content Creation
Once you’ve done your research to find out what key words resonate with your target audience, build content themes centered around these keyword themes.

Develop High Quality Links Back to Your Site
Research opportunities to syndicate content. Follow blogs and online publications in your industry or your target clients’ industries.  Reach out to social media influencers and engage with them. Comment and contribute to articles. Pitch your own articles and blog posts.  The higher level goal is to become positioned as a resource for these sources.  The secondary effect is a link back to your site.

Measure!

Set up a Google Analytics account and analyze traffic over periods of time in conjunction with your efforts. Also, take note of site conversion points (likes/shares, requests for information, etc) as well as points where visitors may leave the site.

With all the talk of search engine algorithm changes (almost ironically) it’s important to remember optimization is becoming less and less about just code, and there’s no longer a quick fix that works well. You need to actually connect with terms that real people search for, develop quality content on a consistent basis, and reach out to quality influencers in order to get your content in the right hands.  Social search is also becoming great influencer of search rankings, and I will touch on that more in a future post. My hope is the strategies above will serve as a foundational “tool kit” for getting with the new SEO program.  

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