Do you ever wonder why you always see the same website links at the top of search engines like Google? How do certain websites end up getting the most prime real estate on the internet? Well, simply put, these websites are optimized for the internet through a digital marketing strategy called Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
Search engines such as Google provide users with the most relevant and user-friendly results by performing an algorithm to rank web pages on any given keyword. Search Engines do this in three steps: crawling, indexing, and ranking.
The first stage is crawling, otherwise known as the discovery stage. In this stage, search engines use crawlers (sometimes also called spiders or bots) to scan all the information from well-known web pages and follow the internal and external links to those pages to gather all the content they can find on the internet. As a result, search engines will understand what the site is about and how easily it can be navigated.
The second stage is indexing where the filing stage happens. Here, web pages and their content are sorted by keywords and stored on Google’s database. The web pages that offer the most unique, authentic, and valuable content are then indexed into Google search.
And lastly ranking, this stage is the most important stage for increasing high-quality traffic into a web page. Here, search engines use several signals to sort and rank web pages such as website reputation, the loading speed of web pages, and keyword presence in the title tags.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a digital marketing strategy aimed to improve a website’s or a web page’s ranking on search engines like Google, improving organic traffic through free and natural search engine results.
SEO involves many activities in order to attract a larger target audience. Some of these activities include technical optimization, on-page optimization and off-page optimization.
SEO Technical Optimization is a subcategory of SEO that is designed to improve the technical components and infrastructure of a website. Having a technically optimized website not only makes it more user friendly but it also helps search engines to easily crawl and index the website.
SEO On-Page Optimization involves the set of practices used to optimize a web page’s content for better search engine visibility and higher user traffic. On-Page Optimization practices include optimizing the web page elements for search engines and users such as title tags, content, headings, internal links, URLs.
SEO Off-Page Optimization includes all the measurements that need to be taken outside of the boundaries of the web page in order to enhance the search engine rankings. These are measures that help acquire high-quality backlinks (incoming links) from authority sites to the webpage—this helps maintain your site’s local search presence while search algorithms and ranking factors are continuously refreshed.
SEO is essential for several reasons:
Increases the accessibility, visibility and ranking of the web page.
SEO brings on better quality and quantity of targeted traffic for free.
SEO helps to establish a more user-friendly and trustworthy web page.
SEO helps your brand to grow over time.
Achieving one of the top five spots ranking in search engines by publishing high-quality content with the help of SEO does not only garner more visibility online but also attracts more traffic of potentially high-quality customers into your page, resulting in further sales.
With SEO’s help, you can achieve a higher ranking in search results and acquire more visibility online. The higher your web page is on the search engine result pages (SERP), the more likely it is for your website to receive clicks, as users are more likely to click the top five web pages that appear on search results. This is an excellent opportunity for your business to gain more visibility online. To put it simply, sales opportunities will be unexploited if your web page is not accessible to your potential customers.
When you appear at the top of the list on search engines, your page brings a sense of credibility and trustworthiness to potential customers. It solidifies your services or products as a reputable option.
The UXD (User Experience Design) is designed efficiently to present engaging content while still marketing a business’s services/product offerings on a well-optimized website.
UXD focuses on accessibility, organizing and formatting content, using clear links, adding relatable links, etc. If a user struggles to navigate your web page, chances are that search engines do as well.
SEO allows your business to grow exponentially as it increases your online visibility in the most viable and cost-effective way. A well-optimized web page is more likely to have a higher ranking in search engines and is more likely to acquire potential customers. In addition, as people start to trust your product as a credible resource, your business will grow proportionately.
In conclusion, SEO plays an essential role in establishing brand visibility and bringing future-proof success for any business, e-commerce or other. However, it’s important to note that SEO is a continuous process, not a one-time event. If you want your business to survive in the online marketplace, SEO requires constant attention due to the evolving nature of the digital world:
search engines are continuously changing their algorithms, the online marketplace is constantly evolving with new products, and users’ behaviours change as often as the latest trends.
That’s why it’s ever more important to trust your SEO operation with an expert digital marketing agency.
Need help? Contact us at Digitality to see how we can help grow your business!