Increase Website Traffic with Google SEO – Must Knows
Top Search Rankings = Increased Website Traffic
Google SEO – the Best Way to Increase Website Traffic. Period!
Search is here to stay. Every year there are more searches and more searchers. The numbers keeps going up. Google gets about 70% of searches and Yahoo/Bing around 30%. Search volume continues to climb and I just read that the number 1 search engine gets over 14 BILLION searches each month.
Google continues to be the number one resource to increase website traffic. A website report is a great method to quickly gain the necessary rankings needed to help increase traffic to your website (and of course enjoy the benefits associated with prominent positions on the search engines).
How SEO for Google can increase website traffic.
To understand how this can happen you first need to understand search.
This is a search page. A searcher enters “keywords†into a search field. When the searcher hits the search button, a page is displayed called the search results page. And here is a search results page.
Your website traffic will increase when it is found here.
There are 2 ways to get your website listed on a search results page.
1.) PPC – you place an ad with Google. You pay Google every time someone clicks on your listing.
2.) Organic results – your website is optimized using SEO best practices. You do not pay Google to be listed.
PPC ads are located on the top of the results page and on the right hand side of the page and organic results are listed below the top PPC ads and on the left hand side of the page.
Website Google Ranking Highlights
To get website traffic from Google, your website needs to be displayed on the results page so the searcher can click through to your website.
PPC or Pay Per Click VS SEO or Organic Listings – Pros and Cons
ORGANIC: takes time to optimize your website for competitive keyword search rankings
PPC: your website can instantly be displayed on a search result page as long as you are willing to pay higher then others
ORGANIC: because SEO comprises of numerous factors development is harder – SEO is constantly changing therefore you must continuously be optimizing
PPC: the development time mainly consists of writing an ad
ORGANIC: your website can rank and be displayed on a search results page for numerous related keyword phrases
PPC: your website listing is displayed for specific keyword phrases you bid on
ORGANIC: overtime you pay less for your search results rankings – most SEO consultants charge a flat monthly rate
PPC: overtime you pay more for your website listing – the amount you pay is determined by how much others are willing to pay for the keywords phrases you are bidding on
ORGANIC: once a top an organic ranking is accomplished it can last
PPC: once you have reached your budget, your ad or website listing is removed
Interesting Stats:
2010 PPC Spend $20 Billion – received about 15% of clicks
2010 SEO Spend $2 Billion – received about 85% of clicks
Now that you understand a search engine results page… next let’s learn what determines the results that are displayed.
Search engines crawl the web. The task of crawling is performed by software, called a bot or a spider . After a website page is crawled, it is indexed. The indexed pages are stored in a giant database, from where it can be retrieved later. However, just because your website has been crawled and indexed does NOT MEAN it will appear on a search results page.
When a keyword search is preformed, search engines process it – by comparing the keyword in the search request with the indexed pages in the database. Since it is likely the search engine has millions of pages containing the keyword phrase, they start calculating the relevancy of each of the pages in its index to the keyword search.
How Google and others determine your search ranking placement is based on their own proprietary algorithm. It is widely known that there are over 200 different factors an algorithm looks for. On top of that they are constantly change their algorithms.
The last step in the search engine activity is retrieving the results. Basically, this is displaying the endless pages that are sorted from the most worthy, to the least worthy. This process determines your websites search results ranking or placement.
So how can you improve your search ranking and thus your website traffic?
The first thing you need to know, is that search engines are not humans. Humans and search engines view website differently. And although technology advances rapidly, search engines do not see the look and feel of a website. This is SEOGoogleGuru.com’s home page. This is what a searcher will see when they land on this page.
This is the same page… but this is what Google sees when the Google spider visits SEOGoogleGuru.com. Because spiders read the coding behind the website, your website coding needs to be “search engine optimizedâ€Â to properly communicate with the spider. The good news? You do not need to be a website coder to communicate well with the spiders. Today website coding is created based on your content management system and resources within your system that finally generate the code on each and every page on your website. However, you did need to know SEO best practices.
Website Traffic – Insider Tips
When your website is properly optimized your ability to communicate is enhanced. You want your website and the Google spider to become best friends.
I do not know about you, but I am very selective with my friendships and relationships. The best friendships I have been fortunate in my life to have, have developed over time. Communication, trust, originality and personality are all traits that ultimately determine the level of my friendships.
There are many factors that will determine the strength of your websites relationship with Google. If you want the biggest reward… a prominent search engine ranking on it’s search results page, your website must communicate and deliver a level of trust as soon as possible.
How well your website communicates will ultimately determine:
When the spider visits your website… you have a limited amount of time to communicate and adopt an ongoing relationship.
Not only does Google provide a substantial vehicle for website traffic, they also provides tools to help you monitor and improve your search engine rankings.
Here are some extra tips to increase website traffic…
1.) Analytics – by adding some code to your website you can analyze your website traffic and make educated changes according to real data. Most people simply view the number of visitors in their analytics but buried in all of those numbers are powerful statistics and actionable information.
2.) Webmaster Tools –again, by adding some code to your website you can use these tools to set up specific site configurations, observe Google’s information it has about your website and view recommendations.
Other important website traffic info to help you communicate with the spiders:
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Page titles – each page needs its own – properly optimized
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Meta descriptions – unique and opportunity to increase click through rates
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Content – unique – relevant – fresh
And last but not least (drum roll please!)… the single most important way to increase website traffic is…
Keywords!
Increase website traffic by understanding how your prospects search aka keyword analysis and then optimize your website based on findings. How do they search? What search phrases do they use? To gain the most targeted traffic to your website… you need to know this.
If you do not know the exact keywords searched for… how can you optimize your page titles, meta descriptions, content etc.? Every piece of content you add online including the content on your website, blog posts, videos, slide shows, power points, press releases to name a few need to be optimized based on specific keyword terms or phrases.
Website Traffic – The Social Media Method
Facebook + Twitter + YouTube = SEO. Today, social media and search engine optimization are connected. The number of facebook links, facebook shares, re-tweets and brand mentions all impact your websites popularity and search ranking.
- it is “real timeâ€
- can now show up on a search results page
- requires involvement
- increase website traffic
One of the questions I am often asked is… which social media platforms should my company participate in? The answer is simple. You need to be where your prospects are.
FaceBook, Twitter and YouTube my top 3 recommendations in general, but each marketplace is different.
Good Social Media rules to follow:
1.) do not spread your social media efforts to thin. You cannot be everywhere and put in the time to be effective.
2.) Remember to provide value. Do not focus on you. Become transparent. Concentrate your efforts on solving problems and helping your prospects.
2.) Social Media is a great vehicle to generate traffic back to your website.
Social Media Advantages:
1.) Become the authority in your marketplace or industry
2.) become the go to resource
3.) have conversations!
4.) gain links to your website
5.) reach a massive amount of people
6.) drive traffic back to your website!
While search engines are complicated and constantly changing, there is no doubt they can drive a massive amount of traffic to your website. Social media will help with your SEO efforts.
There are no short cuts. To obtain a top search ranking for relevant keyword search phrases your website needs to be better optimized then any website that is ranked ahead of yours.
A website SEO audit is a great vehicle to uncover website search ranking problems you may not be aware of and can provide you with website traffic recommendations to increase and improve your profits.
Take action! Your website traffic will not increase unless you do something to make it happen.
Do you have website traffic questions? Go here to the site ranking FAQ section to get personal answers by the SEO Google Guru, Randi Thornton.
How have you increased website traffic? How did your company ROI improve? Did you decrease other expensive marketing dollars that no longer delivered an impact on our bottom line (old ones such as newspaper ads or phone book yellow page listings)?
