Competing in the small business landscape is hard enough, but to do it using an un-optimized website is like choosing to come to the fight unarmed.
Fortunately for us, there are clear guidelines that can help you rank your pages better, and most of them are doable without being the head geek at Google.
To help get you started here are 10 tips for small business SEO that will help.
10 Small business SEO tips
Create compelling, rich content – Longer, highly relevant content is prized by Google and is part of their ranking algorithm. Write for your readers, not for SEO!
Simplify your URLs – Crafting simple and descriptive URLs make it possible for people to understand the content of your page by merely looking at the URL. Consider using primary page keyword in there too.
Know your keywords – Make each page focus upon one primary keyword, and having said that, don’t overdo the use of that phrase. Aim for a 1-3% keyword density on the page.
Make a Google My Business account – This is Google’s most recent local business initiative. It involves things like Google+, Maps and much more. If you want to do well in your local rankings, you’ll need to make sure this is optimized and complete.
Optimize for mobile – Never more vital than now, as Google announced that beginning April 21st, 2015, they will penalize non-mobile friendly sites on all mobile search results, which is about 50% of total web traffic today. Don’t be left out!
Optimize visual content – Another search rank signal important to Google is that your visual content, especially images are optimized for search. This involves image size, ALT tags and a few other items.
Have consistent NAP data – Be certain that you’re using consistent NAP data, (name, address, phones) across all your web platforms.
Generate user reviews – Encourage your customers and users to leave a positive review for you, especially on Google+, as this will have a significant effect on where you rank.
Meta data – Ensure that each web page has optimized Meta data, in particular title tags, description, along with only 1 H1 tag per page.
Take advantage of Google Analytics – As well as Google Webmaster Tools! They are a great way to get intelligence on how your site is performing and where you can do better.
