Who doesn’t want to be the very first result on a Google search? With 91.66% of the search engine market share, the red, green, blue, and yellow giant can help you increase traffic to your website, generate trust for potential customers, and improve SEO on your sales enablement strategy.
But, how exactly can you become one of the top contenders in search results? Easy: through SEO.
What Does SEO Stand For?
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It’s the process of increasing website traffic and visibility to a web page from search engines. Say what?! What this means is that SEO is what allows your website to show up in any kind of search engine result. Let’s say that you run a shoe store online. If a user searches for “how to wear white sneakers”, you are one of the first possible search results that could appear in their query. This is a completely organic (meaning, free) way to get more traffic.
What Can SEO Do For Your Business? / How Can SEO Help Your Business?
“One of the other top search engines after Google, Bing, reports that websites on the top get 42% of the traffic; the second gets 11%, and the third, only gets 8%.” – Impact
SEO is a key part of any online marketing strategy. Here are some of the key benefits it can bring to the table are:
- Increased organic traffic with user intent
- Improve your organic ranking on search results (like Google, Bing, or Yahoo)
- Boost your E-A-T (Expertise, Authority, Trust)
- Connect with potential customers
All search queries are based on keywords. Users look for a certain term, and that translates to certain search results. When you target the right keywords for your business, you’re taking advantage of the fact that people are already searching for what you have to offer. This means that you can increase the organic traffic sent to your website and that this traffic will have a clear user intent according to the query (i.e., for the query “how to wear white sneakers”, you could have an article on different styling choices). Implementing this strategy will help position your business as an expert, raise your domain authority, and boost the trust your potential customers can have with your brand (E-A-T). This type of strategy also allows you to connect with potential and existing customers in a way that is unique to your business only.
Everything we’ve mentioned above explains the importance of SEO. It can bring in qualified, organic traffic, boost client trust, and ultimately skyrocket your sales. All this, for free.
What’s The Difference Between SEO and SEM?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM) are two different approaches to gaining visibility on the search engine results pages. The biggest difference between these two is that SEM is a paid tool you can implement to your marketing strategy, and SEO is free. We explain more below:
- SEO: 100% organic & free. It takes time to work but yields long-term benefits.
- SEM: Paid strategy. Provides immediate results but yields short-term benefits.
For example, when you look for “white sneakers” on Google, the first results you will get are these two:
The first one says “ad” in the left corner, meaning it’s a paid advertisement that falls under the SEM category. The second doesn’t have any “ad” tag, so it is totally organic and falls under SEO. They are both an important part of any online marketing strategy. Their main focus is generating traffic to a webpage and increasing sales. They just have slightly different ways of making it happen.
How Could Optimizing Your Website Affect Sales?
“SEO isn’t about gaming the system anymore; it’s about learning how to play by the rules”. – Jordan Teicher
Basically, ranking high on search engines helps you boost your sales because of the traffic increase. The more traffic you have on your website, the more opportunities you get to convert those leads into customers. Also, like we already mentioned, when you optimize your website you become a more trustworthy webpage. This can become a critical differentiator between a customer choosing to buy your products instead of your competitors.
Being on the top results of Google is also greatly convenient for your clients. If your webpage is not on the first page of the search results (meaning, it’s “hard” to find), you can say goodbye to those traffic and sales increases. As Huffington Post stated, “The best place to hide a dead body is page two of Google”. This is because 75% of people never scroll past the first page of search engines.
How to Implement SEO On Your Sales Enablement Strategy?
The search engine algorithm analyzes your web page and decides what page of the search results from your page will be. You can not pay Google (or any other search engine) to be on the top organic results. The only way to be up there is with a good SEO strategy.
The search engine algorithms are computer programs that look for keywords on your website that are similar to what searchers are looking for to give them the best results to their search.
In order to collect information from all the web pages, search engine bots “crawl” every site to create an index. There are hundreds of ranking factors to determine which pages should be on the top engine results and which ones are going to the last results. Below, we talk about a few of the most important ones.
Boldr’s Top Five Ways To Improve Your SEO Ranking
Here are our best tips to help any beginner improve their website’s SEO ranking. The cherry on top? They’re all completely free!
1. Don’t Forget To Post, Post, Post
Did you know that websites that post content consistently have, on average, 434% more indexed pages than blogs that don’t post regularly? Having more pages and more original content on your website makes it more likely that search engines will select your website for the top results. So, for SEO to work, you need to update your content regularly. Google’s algorithm favors web pages that are constantly updated.
2. Use The Correct Keywords
When we talk about keywords, we are talking about search terms, which means the combination of words people use to search online. Depending on who you want to attract to your webpage, you should consider what your clients will be looking for and how they will do that search on Google.
So you need to ask yourself: What are your customers trying to find? How will they search for it? Look out for these words to understand a person’s search intent:
- Informational intent: what, when, where, how, why, news, etc. Let’s go back to the white sneaker example. This is how this would look like:
- What are white sneakers
- When were white sneakers invented
- Why are white sneakers popular
- Commercial intent: buy, purchase, cheap, prices, pricing, etc. Following the previous example, this is how this intent looks like:
- Where can I buy white sneakers?
- White sneakers cheap
- White sneakers price comparison
- Location intent: near, near me, nearby, from, directions, route, maps, etc. For example:
- White sneakers store near me
- Nike store address
- How to get to Adidas google maps
- Specific intent: the sum of the keywords with all three previous intents. This customer is ready to make a purchase, pronto.
- Where can I buy cheap white sneakers near me?
All of the intents displayed above refer to a different part of the customer journey. First, they explore and discover. Then, they look at potential buying places. And lastly, they run a search that rounds up all three. A customer with specific intent is ready to make a purchase, pronto. This is why using the right keywords at the right time can help you improve your conversions.
3. Originality Is King
But remember, keywords are nothing without great content. To stay relevant, you always need to provide valuable and original content for your customers on every blog post, page, and product description. Tie that in with the right keywords and you have a recipe for success. Google and other search engines give a lot of importance to creativity. They will scan your website and compare it to other ones to decide which one is more relevant. Having informative, engaging, and most of all, unique content will set you apart from other websites!
4. Write An Engaging Meta Description
Have you noticed the text that shows under the titles on the search results? That is the meta description! A meta description should always be between 125-160 characters and must include your focus keywords. Although this isn’t that important for your page ranking, it’s a great way to improve your click-through rates.
For example, imagine you are looking for cookie recipes and you encounter two search results.
The first one looks like this:
Random Site | Cookie Recipe
Vanilla cookie recipe. Bake cookies today.
The second one looks like this:
#1 Cookie Recipe In The World | Just Like Grandma Used To Make!
Our easy, 3-step cookie recipe will have everyone wondering if you have suddenly become a master chef. Follow these simple steps to bake the world’s best cookies – just like Grandma’s!
Which one would you click on? The engaging one, obviously! Try changing your meta descriptions to something that will catch the attention of your target audience and you are good to go.
5. Add Links To Your Article
Link building can become your best SEO ally because it can improve your website’s legitimacy while also boosting your ranking. Doing it is easy, all you need to do is add links to your articles! There are two types of links you can add: external and internal.
- External links are the ones that lead to another website, normally a reputable source. They help raise your authority and expertise.
- Internal links are the ones that lead to other posts within your website (interlinking). These help increase user interaction and engagement (more time spent on your pages, and more visits to other products or articles). These are also helpful for improving sales.
So, when you write your next product page copy or article, don’t forget to add a few links here and there!
6. Optimize Your Images
Believe it or not, the name of your images also counts when it comes to SEO rankings. Image keywords are the descriptive text that goes on the image (also known as ALT text). This text helps Google identify what your image is portraying. For example: if you are writing an article about traveling to Paris and you need to upload a picture of the Eiffel tower, the name on the image should not be something like Image1.jpg or PI1001242.jpg. The title should be something like Paris-Eiffel-Tower.jpg, with all the target keywords included. In short, it’s important to have the correct name for your image file so that search engines can classify it properly.
Also, an SEO best practice is to use a relevant image that matches your text. For example, an infographic that illustrates different points in your article can help improve readability for your users while also improving your SEO ranking.
We’re going to be brutally honest: SEO doesn’t work overnight. It’s a long-term strategy, and you need to wait before you start seeing results. Normally, about 6 months to 1 year. But trust us – it’s definitely worth it!
Is Outsourced SEO Good For Sales Enablement?
Standing out in search engines can be extremely difficult if you have no previous knowledge. You can certainly perform some basic SEO tasks yourself, but the success rate will depend on your willingness to learn and how complex your plan is. Outsourcing your SEO strategy could be a great option, especially if you partner up with a team that adapts to your company values and delivers your desired results.
“Many businesses understand they need SEO but outsource it in the wrong way. It’s not uncommon for businesses to treat SEO as a project, where someone optimizes a website, and then it’s considered finished. If this is the service, an agency is promising you, run! While it would be nice if SEO were a short-term project, it’s not the case.” – Michael Fox for Forbes
If you need some help with your SEO, we are here for you. Get a free consultation!
