Google is the most visited site on the web. In January 2022, 2.6 billion people visited Google every day and they conducted an average of 8.5 billion daily searches. That’s 99,000 searches every second.
Businesses that want to connect with Google visitors have two options. Paying for Google ads is the first option. While ads can be very effective, they can also be very expensive. The average small business reportedly spends between $60,000 and $150,000 per year on Google ads.
If you don’t have that kind of money in your advertising budget, don’t worry. There is another option. It is known as Search Engine Optimization, or SEO. It is the route that many successful companies take to attracting new customers via Google or other search engines. Anyone can learn how to leverage SEO. And you do not need to pay Google anything to use it.
For those who are new to SEO, here are three tips that can start you on your journey to ranking Number 1 on Google in 2022.
Tip One: Get To Know Your Customers
Commonly, websites are designed to provide an engaging and informative presentation of the products that a company offers. They detail the benefits of the products, explain why the products are better than its competition, and share testimonials from satisfied customers. Websites map out the simple process for ordering. They might even offer a “no questions asked money back guarantee.” While this is helpful, it is not optimal if the goal is to attract the attention of a search engine.
To optimize websites for search engines, content must be crafted to answer the questions that potential customers are asking. When someone conducts a Google search, they are leveraging a sophisticated artificial intelligence (AI) engine to solve a problem. Google uses the data that it finds on websites to provide helpful solutions. If your website does not provide the right data in the preferred format in the correct place, then you will not rank anywhere close to number 1 on Google.
Putting Google to work for you demands that you understand not just your products or services. You also must know who your potential customers are and what their search activity is like. By crafting content to be responsive to searches, you ensure that Google returns your site as a recommended site.
Consider this: 69.7 percent of search queries contain four words or more. In other words, searches for “cheap sunglasses” usually involve searches that include more than those two words. Answer the Public is a website that gathers data on the questions that people ask on Google. According to Answer The Public, when people search for cheap sunglasses, top searches include:
- What are cheap sunglasses made of?
- Can cheap sunglasses damage your eyes?
- Cheap sunglasses for wedding favors
- Cheap sunglasses and UV protection
By utilizing tools like Answer the Public, SpyFu, or Semrush, you can understand the search habits or your target market. You can also discern the path that gets them to your products and the solutions they are seeking.
Tip Two: Ensure That Your Pages Answers Their Questions
With a firm grip on what is driving your customer base to Google and other search engines, it is time to update your site. You want it to contain the content shoppers want structured in a way that makes that content easy to find.
This may involve restructuring pages to make a stronger connection between the product and the purpose that it serves. For example, you may have a great blog post on your cheap sunglasses website on UV protection. You may also have pages where people can buy cheap sunglasses with UV protection. To optimize for search engines, you want to include your information on UV protection as content on the page where you are selling your glasses.
Restructuring content is a great first SEO step to take. Other SEO enhancements include adding internal links, tweaking page components like titles and descriptions, and developing inbound links.
Tip Three: Evaluate Your Progress By Tracking Conversions
Once you start attracting site visitors with SEO, the next step is converting them to customers. An increase in site visits without an increase in conversions could hurt your SEO rankings.
A “bounce” occurs when someone clicks through from search engine to website then clicks back to search results. Google and other search engines do not like bounces. It typically means that the result they provided was not helpful. When your site is found to be too “bouncy,” it will not continue to rank on search engine results pages. That is why it is so important to convert visitors to customers. If your conversion numbers are not growing at the same pace as your inbound traffic, keep tweaking. You want to see those numbers even out.
There is always more to learn about search engine optimization. Some of the steps that can increase traffic are more complicated than restructuring content. Ultimately, you may require the help of a professional who focuses on SEO. But there is a lot you can do on your own.
If you are just starting out, do not overlook the power of content. Nothing attracts search engine traffic like new pages, new ideas, and helpful content on blogs and product pages. Your primary goal should be providing content that is timely, original, and relevant to your target audience. Starting there will put you on the road to ranking number 1 on Google in 2022.
