The success of almost any business rests on the quality of its marketing efforts – and these days, their online presence can make or break a companies’ ambitions. With ecommerce quickly becoming one of the fastest growing niches, it’s no wonder that tools such as search engines are relied upon more and more as a result.

Working with Google is undoubtedly the most popular way for you to boost views and sales, with good rankings equalling not only more, but better quality traffic; sending the potential for sales through the roof.

Making the most of Google’s potential

SEO is a powerhouse of techniques that work to boost a website in a search engine’s eyes, giving a business the opportunity to enjoy a good standing in both their niche and local area. So, here are some basic tips to ensure the success of these endeavours.

Identify your website and show Google who you are

The first thing to do is to work out who you are and what you are offering – and then build your SEO to suit. After all, if you sell handmade items, make sure to focus on that appeal. Identifying a search phrase for each of your web pages can benefit your site.

Sometimes, a less-obvious keyword can spell the difference between success and failure; especially if it has a good volume of searches each month. Less competitive terms can also hone your website’s ability to get the visitors you really want.

After you have chosen the keyword or search phrase you are targeting for each page, feature these terms in both your Page Title and your URL to maximise impact for search engines. Be sure that every page possesses written content, so that Google understands what your page is really about.

Having a website that only has images can prove to be detrimental, as Google will have no information to work with to assess its niche (and therefore rank your site accordingly).

Make use of essential tools for ranking

When a website is secure, visitors are more likely to trust it, so making use of https can change the way that you are viewed by those who hope to purchase your goods.

Signing up to Google Webmaster Tools can offer you behind the scenes access to check your website for errors and to evaluate the performance – often making it far more tailored to the requirements of search engine algorithms.

Creating a sitemap through this platform can help Google to identify each page individually too, allowing for a more thorough investigation into relevance and quality for ranking.

Making use of Google My Business will enable you to create a business listing that will feature at the top of Googles results when business in your niche and area are searched for – and this can work to propel your website, even if your site doesn’t automatically feature on the first page.

And these are just a small selection of ideas that can help you to maximise the impact of your ecommerce efforts.

Additional ways to boost your ranking

Social networks can transform the way a website is evaluated by search engines, so creating business profiles and pages for all of the major social networks, as well as remaining active on each, can be a great way to enhance your online visibility. It’s also possible to create dedicated shop pages that can link back to your own site via platforms like Facebook.

In addition, having an active blog can make a huge difference to your SEO endeavours – and writing regular posts and sharing them across social networks can maximise reach in a way that is all but unrivalled.

It may be a good idea to write articles and reviews about your products, your business and your efforts to grow; as submitting these for other blogs to publish can add another layer of relevance and reliability for search engines to work with.

As the practices involved in SEO are competitive and ever-evolving, it can be difficult to keep up with all of the above on your own. If you would like help, why not speak to one of our SEO experts today, to ensure that you are getting the most up to date information and latest techniques to help with your initial, ongoing and continued success.

When it comes to online success for businesses, understanding search engine marketing is the key to thriving in the digital marketplace. While there are numerous strategies available to market your business online, a perennial debate exists between whether Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) or Pay Per Click (PPC) is more effective.

SEO involves the analysis of keywords that people use when searching online and optimising your website to target those keywords, which should result in higher rankings in the search engines. With PPC, a website owner will create their own ads and bid on desirable keywords whose appearance in a query will make their ad appear. It’s called ‘pay per click’ because every time your ad is clicked on, you pay the approved bid amount. Depending on your brand, web content, and marketing strategy, both SEO and PPC have their pros and cons.

Exploring SEO Uses

SEO is considered to be more of a long-term solution that organically increases web traffic by ranking your target keywords on search engines, but primarily Google. SEO is known to take more time than PPC to establish, which is why its results are consistent over longer periods of time. Approximately 80 percent of website traffic can be attributed to effective SEO strategies. Websites that are regularly posting fresh, oprimised content benefit the most from SEO. Over time, the site gets established as the go-to source on a given topic or service, thanks to its earned place on the search engine results pages (SERPs).

Exploring PPC Uses

When it comes to PPC, it is considered more of a short-term solution. If you are wanting to drive a lot of traffic to a site immediately, PPC is an effective means to that end. When the right search terms are targeted, PPC can generate quality clients. While SEO costs are fixed, PPC can be adjusted to suit your business growth; however, to ensure a site’s return on investment (ROI) is positive, PPC requires a fair amount of split testing. PPC is more about analysing the patterns of keywords, rather than the keywords themselves and choosing keywords to bid on that will give you a positive ROI. Statistically speaking, PPC is accountable for less than 25 percent of a website’s traffic. PPC also allows website owners to target a given demographic and penetrate their chosen niche.

When it comes time to establish an effective digital marketing campaign, deciding between SEO and PPC should be determined by your site’s goals. If your goal is a solid slowly-built reputation built on organically-generated web traffic, SEO will support your long-term goals. If you are looking for shorter-term results with time-sensitive launches, campaigns, or event pages, your needs will be better met by PPC strategies.

The 3 most important areas on a website that influence Google rankings are (in order):

1. Page Title

This tells Google what you site is about. The page title is created using the html title code (or with a plugin). The page title should contain your main target KW for that page, your Brand & a Call to Action eg ‘KW1 | Brand – Call to Action’.

2. URL

URL should contain the main KW you are targeting on that page, eg domain.com/acme-product/.

3. Text Above Fold

The top area of the page should contain at least 200 words of text, describing the niche of the page. On website homepages, this is often taken up with sliders and images which look nice, but are detrimental to SEO. Text on the top of an image is good, as long as it is not actually part of the image.

 

Other important ranking factors to consider:

4. H Tags

H1/H2/H3 tags help to tell Google what the most important themes of the page are.  They are a good opportunity to use variations of the main KW, plus add secondary KWs to the text. In general, they should not be exactly the same as your Page Title.

You should only use 1 H1 tag per page, but can use multiple H2/3 tags.

5. Content

On pages that you are wanting to rank well, at least a moderate amount of text is required. This is somewhat subjective, but a minimum of 450 words is suggested. Videos are also useful for content (especially if they are embedded via YouTube).

The structure of the content on each page should follow the following (paraphrased) advice:

A web page’s first paragraph should introduce its keywords. If a variation of the keyword is repeated in every paragraph (don’t use same KW too often), it’s a topic. If the website has multiple (we recommend six or more) interconnected pages related to the topic, we consider that a theme. Search engines consider a site with multiple pages of unique, informative content on a theme to be highly relevant.

6. Blog

Adding a blog to the website, and keeping it updated regularly is important. The blog posts allow you to target Long-Tail Keywords (LTKW), as well as keeping the website update with fresh information (a ranking factor). Ideally, the latest blog posts will be linked to from the homepage. These posts can then be curated out to the website’s social channels.

7. Keyword Research

In addition to standard KW research, the following points are worth considering:

-Targeting multiple KWs & search terms is a good way to increase overall traffic. The focus for your KW research is traffic, not rankings.

-Transactional or buyer search terms are more valuable than informational terms. However, both types can be targeted.

-Voice search phrases should be considered moving forward, eg ‘what is the best restaurant in Croydon’ etc.

8. User Metrics

Google measures how your visitors interact with your website, and this then forms part of your rank. A couple of the more important user metrics to consider are:

– Click Through Rate (CTR) is the percentage of people who click from the Google results to your website. If you generally have a higher CTR than your competitors (all other things being equal), you will rank higher than them. You should use your page title to attract clicks.

– Dwell Time or Bounce Rate is the amount of time a visitor spends on your website, and how much they interact with your website. Again, the aim is to be better your competitors by having visitors spend more time on your website.

9. Site Structure/Navigation

Having a strong site structure, that is easy to navigate will allows users to move around your website with ease.  This will help with the user metrics, and also your conversion rate.

10. Site Speed

A fast loading site will help with rankings, and also conversions, especially on mobile devices. The main ways to increase site speed are through a good web host, limiting the number and size of images, and efficient coding.

11. Mobile Friendly Design

A responsive website is a must-have these days. Responsive design should consider removing certain features that the desktop version may have, such as images, videos & contact forms. Consider the use of AMP technology.