If you’re not an experienced web designer, than your ideas for a web design of your own might rely largely on what you’ve seen while browsing around other people’s similar websites. Using existing themes, color schemes, templates, and designs as the basis for your own web design is a very common and admittedly useful practice.
However, as you pick out what you like and what you don’t like, you may also catch yourself thinking “when I build my own site, I’ll replace these words with my own, and then of course, I’ll replace this header with my own”….and this is the point at which the practice becomes flawed. In simply swapping somebody else’s words for your own, you might be putting together a nice website, but sadly, it won’t really matter….because nobody will ever find it.
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, which plays a very large role in how successful or unsuccessful your business is. If you’re building a web site for the first time, you may wonder why SEO should have anything to do with your business, or why you’ve never heard of it, if it’s so darn important. SEO really only begins to impact you as you enter the online market, but what an impact it can make!
DISCOVERABILITY
As of September 2014, there was a measured count of over 1 billion hosted websites that are currently active on the world wide web. The internet is a hulking mass of seemingly limitless information; yet you are trying to put your one, singular website in front of the eyeballs of a very select audience following what is known as an organic (without any paid influence) search. The only way that this goal becomes achievable is by making a concentrated effort into the targeting, planning, and optimization of your online presence. SEO allows widely used search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing to pick out which audiences you’re trying to magnetize, and steer those audiences towards your website.
SEARCHABILITY
As any business owner or marketing professional knows, a referral or two is the targeted outcome of every client relationship. To know that somebody values your product or service highly enough to recommend it to their peer, their family, or their employer (in the process, doing half of your sales work for you) is a wonderful feeling, and to know that your business is making more money with less effort is an even better feeling. In today’s heavily-connected society, the first thing that somebody does when hearing a new name or concept presented is to break out their smartphone or iPad/tablet to look it up on the internet. So, if your name comes up via referral, you’re going to want this new lead to be able to find you right away! SEO improves searchability. If your company is not listed on the first two pages of results for a targeted Google search with your company name, you are basically allowing the client, the business, and the money to walk away.
TRAFFIC
On Interstate 95, a high volume of traffic can mean missing dinner with your family. On your website, however, a high volume of traffic can mean being able to take your family out to one of the most expensive restaurants in town. Though there is no specific numerical equation for conversion based on traffic volume, it is a fairly simple game of odds. The more searchable and discoverable you are, the more traffic you will get; the more traffic you get, the more conversions you can facilitate.
CONTENT IMPROVEMENT
In owning and operating a discoverable website and guiding traffic to that website via SEO, you’ll find your content constantly under review. This may seem intimidating, but it’s actually a good thing! Engagement and interaction with your clients helps you formulate, strategize, and re-structure your online presence to do an even better job of targeting your intended audience. This leads to better searchability & discoverability, more traffic, and even more restructuring to start the cycle all over again. It goes on and on forever, with your content and your business continually improving with absolutely NO downside….but it all starts with SEO!
Now that you know a little bit about why SEO is important, we’d love to start talking to you about how you can start using customized SEO on your own website. Contact us at 410.853.7892 or visit our website at myrender.com to get us involved, and make sure to sign up for our monthly newsletter for shareable SEO tips and tricks to come!
604 E Joppa Road