SEO

Did you know that 93% of all online experiences start with a search engine? Think about the countless times you’ve used Google or other search engines in the past.

But what do users do with the results? They typically don’t scroll down to the bottom of the page, that’s for sure. The reality is, your customers, prospects, and possibly you will mostly click on the results listed at positions one, two, or three on the first page. We rarely venture to the second.

Getting your business to the top of the results is a complicated task. Search engines have billions of active websites to index, and only the ones that meet most of their requirements will make it. When SEO is done right, your business can rank in the top positions – and stay there.

For businesses operating in London, working with top, reputable, SEO agencies. London-based team can really help your business. In this article, we’ll discuss some of the services offered by professional SEO agencies to increase your bottom line.

• 15+ SEO Statistics From This Year That’ll Transform Your Strategy

Why Is SEO So Important?

In a nutshell, SEO makes your business easier to find online. Your position on the results page is one of the most important elements of your online presence.

The Benefits of a Robust SEO Strategy

Here are some of the reasons why your competitors invest heavily in their SEO marketing strategy:

For an Increase in Website Traffic

Increased visibility equates to an increase in traffic to your website. If you’re always listed as one of the top positions in your industry, you’ll likely have more visitors.

For Brand Awareness

If your existing customers are reminded of what a great company you are, they’re likely to stay loyal. By the same token, when your new customer(s) tell a friend to tell a friend about you after being impressed by your offerings, this creates brand awareness.

The more traffic Google sees on your website, the more it’ll be aware of your brand and keep positioning you at the top of the list of results. Thus, increasing your brand awareness.

Building Trust

Organic results at the top of the results page are considered more popular, legitimate, and trustworthy. Establishing trust from the start is especially important for those less familiar with your brand.

A Positive ROI

All that extra traffic coming your way increases opportunities for conversion. The goal is to direct more people to your website in the first place, with the help of professional SEO.

How a Professional SEO Agency Can Help

First-class SEO agencies use their in-depth knowledge and experience working with businesses like yours to reposition and or secure a top spot on search engines. You’ll see a gradual and significant increase in your bottom line as you focus on different areas of your business.

SEO Services

London-based SEO Agencies that are a cut-above-the-rest will use a customized approach to SEO and digital marketing, developing a strategy that fits your business and web presence. For an idea of how a professional team can help you to get the desired results, here are some of the services offered by the best agencies:

• In-house AI SEO technology for quicker results and a stronger ROI
• Finding the SEO opportunities missed by your competitors using in-house AI technology
• Advanced SEO audits to fully optimize your current campaigns
• Migration support and technical SEO guidance
• Support and guidance for your in-house development teams

Their team should be available when needed to help you in any way they can.

With Increased Visibility Comes Increased Profits

If you’re existing, new, and potential customers have problems finding you online, they’re likely to go to your competitors. A strong SEO strategy is essential to your visibility. If people can find your website easily, they’re more likely to spend money. In that respect, SEO is becoming increasingly important to stand out from the online crowd.

Professional SEO agencies keep on top of search criteria, and all things SEO-related, to help keep Google Sweet and you at the top spot.

For an SEO strategy that fits your business, work with reputable, SEO Trench based firms with a friendly team that will know exactly what they’re talking about and be happy to pass on their knowledge.

Every eCommerce business requires effective marketing to grow. From paid ads to SEO, you have to attract customers from different channels. That means you have your work cut out for you.

Aside from coming up with ideas, you’re also managing a team and dealing with different moving parts. As a result, you must do things right at every stage. For example, one of the critical decisions you’ll face is choosing between an in-house marketing team and outsourcing to freelancers or agencies.

Since most companies are outsourcing, you might be wondering if you should also lean that way. While such a move has its perks, it would be best to confirm that it suits your business model.

Many businesses get it wrong and lose a lot before they retrace their steps. If you’re facing this dilemma, you can use this guide to determine what’s best for your brand.

In this article, I’ll help you navigate choosing between outsourcing your eCommerce marketing and using an in-house team. We’ll also show you how best to manage your remote employees.

In-House vs. Outsourced eCommerce Marketing

We can’t just dish out a verdict on which is generally better. Hiring remote workers for the job comes with its ups and downs, but so does using a dedicated in-house team. Now, let’s go over the benefits of using each.

The Advantages of Using an In-House Team

With a dedicated marketing team, you won’t have issues aligning your strategy with your company’s mission, vision, and culture. Your staff’s intimate understanding of your brand and business is one of the most significant benefits of having an in-house team.

However, it doesn’t end at understanding your core business. Let’s look at other pros:

100% Focused on Your Business

Unlike freelancers and marketing agencies, your in-house team won’t have divided. Instead, they’re entirely focused on your brand’s marketing campaign, dedicating their entire schedule to getting the project done.

Independent marketers often work with multiple clients at once. That means you may experience gaps in specific processes, and deadlines could be delayed.

Communication

Communication is another critical part. Sharing ideas with team members is different from brainstorming with external marketers. You can easily carry out daily face-to-face meetings and receive more frequent updates on each campaign’s progress. Whereas with a freelancer, you’ll have to schedule appointments ahead of time, and daily briefings could very well be off the table.

Flexible Job Priorities

This is another huge plus when it comes to in-house teams. Your staff can quickly adjust based on real-time needs. You can rearrange or redelegate tasks to implement new ideas fast. For example, if one channel or sales funnel is underperforming, you can brainstorm and start working on new ideas or entirely shift to a new medium.

Making such changes with an agency or external marketer can be time-consuming and riddled with complex processes. You’ll have to set up a meeting and hope they can implement the adjustments in time.

The Advantages of Outsourcing Marketing Services

Digital marketing is a competitive field, and sometimes, you need experts to promote your brand. Dedicated agencies and freelancers always follow new trends in the industry, learning the latest strategies for successful brand building. As a result, they’re equipped with practical content marketing tools and resources that you can’t manage independently.

Let’s go over the pros of using these firms one after the other.

Experience and Exposure

Marketing experts have worked with multiple agencies and multiple brands. So, they come with all the experience needed to implement your marketing campaign, no matter how complex. They also spend a lot of resources and time to upskill and train. Since your in-house team is focused on your brand, they don’t have the required experience to incorporate novel strategies.

Versatile with Different Channels

In-house employees will have to familiarize themselves with your brand and new marketing channels. For example, if you don’t have a LinkedIn expert on your team, someone has to take up a course on the channel. However, marketing agencies are packed with all the experts they need to get the job done.

You Don’t Have to Worry About Employee Turnover

Everyone wants to grow. Your in-house team members could reach a point where they feel stagnant and try to pursue their careers elsewhere. When this happens, it’ll be challenging to train new employees and intimate them with your strategies.

You won’t have to worry about training and inducting new employees when you go for freelance workers. They can easily understand your company’s goals, objectives, and culture. They’ll maintain your style and stay on message throughout your collaboration.

Cost Reduction

According to Deloitte’s 2016 Global Outsourcing Survey, 59% of respondents farmed out jobs to save costs.

Contractors charge you for the services they render. This means you won’t have to worry about the extra costs of employee welfare, pension, and health insurance. You also get to save on the cost of training to upskill new and existing staff.

What’s more, you’ll be getting access to the expensive resources and tools that external marketers use without having to acquire them yourself.

Should You Outsource?

Now that you know the pros and cons of using an in-house team and outsourcing to remote workers, you’re gradually coming to a final decision.

That said, the right choice still depends on your business and its needs. Both decisions are suited to different situations, and you just have to know which one ticks the correct boxes.

We’ll go over the factors that determine whether you should go for one or the other. Note that you have to weigh all these factors together before making a decision. One consideration shouldn’t sway you as other issues could end up causing problems if ignored.

Your Company’s Current Size

To a large extent, your brand’s current stage determines your marketing strategies and execution.

You might have to think about a small in-house team or do things yourself if you’re starting a small business. If you’re at the stage where you’re fleshing out other things like legal compliance and bringing investors on board, then consider going internal. What’s more, you have to keep a tight budget to ensure you don’t rack up too many costs that will swallow your startup’s income.

The story is quite different for medium-sized businesses. They can consider outsourcing since their business can handle the expenses. It all boils down to other factors, including marketing goals, cost optimization, and results.

Most large-scale businesses outsource to remote agencies because it makes sense for their marketing strategy. Marketing agencies specialize in brand-building and know precisely how to generate and convert leads for big businesses. In addition, since big brands have deep pockets, they usually don’t have to worry about spending a few bucks on getting the job done.

Your Goals

Whether you’re a startup, mid-sized business, or big brand, you have to look at what you want to achieve. For example, does your business need customers in a short period? Are you looking to build gradually? Do you want to go through multiple channels at once? So, depending on what you’re gunning for, you need the right team to do the job.

If you’re building gradually and want a small customer base, for now, you can manage things in-house. One or two team members can cover the immediate tasks. You can post regular social media and blog posts, reach out to your leads via email, and organize marketing sessions with your growing community.

Building a multi-pronged sales funnel is a different ball game. It would be best to allow experts to handle things. SEO, pay-per-click, and social media lead generation are highly competitive spaces. Chances are, other top brands are already wooing your ideal customers through these channels. To reach them, you need people who’ve been in the business. So, you either have to employ a highly-experienced in-house team or outsource.

Aggressive marketing campaigns are best handled by powerhouse digital marketing experts with experience in the field. They already work with top brands and have the portfolio to show for it. You’ll even find experts that have run similar campaigns to yours in the past. An in-house team alone won’t have the depth to manage such an undertaking.

Your Current Strategy

If your current team isn’t delivering, it’s time to look elsewhere. However, it would help if you tried reshuffling a few things before making a move. If you’re using an in-house team, consider training your staff and assigning tasks that suit each team member’s talent better.

You can outsource if the job is too overwhelming. If you’re currently outsourcing without results, check out other agencies or remote workers before going for an in-house team.

Cost of business operation including your marketing initiatives

You always have to look at the cost of running any business operation including your marketing initiatives. After all, you want to remain in business after building a customer base. After combining other factors and coming to a decision, check the impact on your budget.

In most cases, going remote will help cut a few expenses. For example, you won’t have to shoulder the cost of employee remunerations like housing and health insurance. In addition, you can choose to go for individual freelancers if agency fees are on the high side. However, you have to look out for proven professionals who’ll deliver.

Consider a Hybrid Option

Sometimes, you should consider a hybrid solution where you’ll enjoy the best of both worlds. For example, you can hire remote workers while keeping your in-house team to manage some aspects of your marketing.

The work-from-home model did not just become popular due to the pandemic. Instead, it has been a growing trend among employees and employers. You can leverage a deeper talent pool, save costs, and retain workers who understand the core of your business processes.

Since a study carried out over two years found that productivity increased with remote work, you can hardly go wrong with the model.

What Aspects of Your Marketing Should You Outsource to Remote Workers?

While remote workers might be located elsewhere, you can make them part of your team and teach them your company’s culture. This way, they’re more familiar with your products and ideal clients and can excel in specific areas. Some marketing strategies are best suited to freelancers who focus on particular channels.

Going remote allows you to hire the right people for the role. In addition, you can use the best apps for remote workers to communicate and collaborate with your recruits. This way, there are no communication gaps, and projects can be executed with ease.

Here are marketing areas you should delegate to remote workers.

Content Writing

Content writing involves using storytelling to increase brand awareness. It’s mainly used to convert prospects into dedicated customers. According to GE Capital Retail Bank’s Annual Shopper Study, 81% of customers research before purchasing any product. That means your ecommerce website development has to be there to furnish them with info.

Alongside your brand’s journey, you’re constantly sharing new products, guides, and valuable insights your consumers find helpful. This way, you’re establishing yourself as an authority, and they’ll rely on you and your products when the need arises.

eCommerce businesses require a formidable content team skilled in storytelling. You can find the best content writers for the job since you’re not limited by location.

Social Media Marketing

Getting a social media marketing whiz is all you need to fill this role. Your social media posts should reflect a high understanding of your business processes. With a remote worker, you’ll spend less time communicating new product offerings and other fine details, as is the case with external agencies. All you have to do is bring them in and show them how things work in your firm.

It would be best to go for social media specialists rather than content marketing generalists in this case. For example, strategies that work for Facebook would be ineffective on LinkedIn and Twitter since they use different algorithms. So, your expert has to know the best way to drive traffic through each platform.

Search Engine Optimization

70-80% of search engine users go for organic search listings instead of ads. According to BrightEdge research, websites enjoy 1000% more traffic from SEO than organic social media. What’s more, HubSpot reports that 60% of marketers agree that SEO is among their highest sources of quality prospects.

This shows why SEO is essential. You can’t just hand it over to someone still learning the ropes. Going for a remote worker with vast experience is the best thing you can do for your brand.

Conclusion

Handling remote workers is now easy. With a time tracking app, tools like Slack, and other productivity solutions, you can collaborate and communicate without fuss. What’s more, you can take advantage of the perks of eCommerce outsourcing and an in-house team to meet your marketing goals.

When you’re trying to find some information online, do you ever look past the third page of results of Google or Yahoo? – Thought not!  It’s not just you; the majority of searchers feel the same way too, which is why search engine optimization is so important. In a nutshell, SEO is the process of increasing the exposure of your website.

Being on the first page of the search engine results indicates that a business, brand, or organization has a distinct advantage over its competitors. Internet searches are conducted by more than 40,000 people every second, corresponding to around 3.55 billion searches every day! – This amounts to nearly 1.2 trillion searches per year (on average). Google has had more than a trillion page views since its inception. Think about it: how often do you use a search engine yourself?

Since 1997, Google has been the go-to resource for everyone trying to learn more about, and/ or acquire a product or service. That being said, the most popular results are only displayed on the first page of the search results. Ask any of your colleagues or your friends, and you will learn that only a handful of people actually go beyond page one.

If you run a business as I do, and your clients can’t find you on the first page of results, you’re going to lose sales. That is all there is to it. This is why, after much deliberation, I contracted the services of an SEO company. At first, I was a bit skeptical about partnering with a digital marketing agency; however, I’m so glad I did! 

To begin with, I had no clue of the intricacies involved with creating a profitable digital presence. Moreover, I used to believe that SEO could be mastered by myself, using resources such as YouTube, but BOY was I wrong! What I learned is that an understanding of the true nature of SEO and the methodologies required to create a winning online presence only come to fruition with a great deal of experience. Working with an SEO agency helped my business immensely.

Enhance the experience 

In order for SEO methods to be effective, your website must optimize content, making it easier for them to navigate. Improving the user experience will help you retain people on your page. If visitors spend a significant amount of time on your website, Google’s bots will consider your page to be more relevant, resulting in an increase in your overall ranking. 

Crucially, all this may lead to a greater number of purchases on your website and that’s exactly what happened to me and my website after a few months of implementing a more professionally structured SEO strategy. 

Increased offline purchases

Business is extremely people-centric and relies a great deal on customers coming to our physical locations, trying out our products, and making informed decisions. I’m not exaggerating when I say this – the number of walk-ins tripled in a few months.

Cities including London, Manchester, Bristol, etc., operate extremely competitive markets. Local SEO can significantly increase the visibility of your business. Search engine optimization in a given location is referred to as local optimization. Search engines consider a user’s geographic location when deciding which results to display. Local SEO increases your chances of appearing on the first page of search results if customers are looking for takeaway in a specific region, for example. It facilitates highly filtered targeting by learning audience habits and preferences. 

More organic traffic

The goal of every online business is to get customers to your website. More people viewing your page means more new consumers buying your products and services. Achieving new clients is easier with SEO, as it generates a major stream of your overall website traffic. Most companies, however, unwisely invest much of their budget on digital advertising, which may yield some short-term gain. However, if you’re in it for the long haul – think beyond buying views and likes. Think about creating mesmerizing content rich with search keywords that will bring potential customers to your website without having to pay for them. 

Organic traffic is the best kind of traffic for a business. It’s the kind of traffic that will build your brand. The term ‘organic’ refers to the way traffic can be harvested. Whilst paid traffic is purchased, organic traffic visits your website after performing a search, in order to learn more about your brand and what you have to offer.

This is why websites that experience a healthy percentage of organic traffic often also experience higher sales, conversions, and subscriptions. If you want your business to grow steadily, work with strategists that can help you put together a campaign directed to increase organic viewership. 

An affordable solution

One of the reasons why business owners don’t want to work on SEO is that they don’t want to spend a lot. However, the good thing about SEO is that you don’t have to make a dent in your pocket while working on SEO strategies. There’s no need to set up your In-house team to benefit from SEO. If you don’t have the resources to hire employees, you can get Affordable SEO Packages to fulfill your SEO needs without managing a team yourself. Another reason why you should never ignore SEO is that you can see how much progress you have made with your SEO efforts. You will not have to shoot darts in the dark, and in case you fail to make any progress with SEO, you can focus on something else. 

Higher conversion rates

Digital agencies across the world have provided substantial evidence to support the efficacy of SEO in generating high amounts of regulated and qualified leads. This is made possible by creating and circulating attention-grabbing content in unison with other strategies that engage and encourage prospective customers to take positive actions. In addition, SEO will also prove your website and business to be credible enough to be trusted by search engines like Google, etc. This instantly builds trust among first-time customers and increases the likelihood of conversion. If your company website is able to consistently and diligently maintain a top position on SERPs, you can be sure that the demographic you are targeting will access the products or services you provide much more.

Increased credibility

Staying on the same line of thought, SEO is known to boost site and brand credibility immensely. When brands implement optimization strategies, the amount of digital engagement, or in other words, “buzz” surrounding the brand increases drastically. Users begin to interact with content concerning the brand more which results in higher site visits.

Increasing user interaction through various mediums is the primary objective of the optimization. When users are highly engaged, it is a positive indication for search engines. As a result, the system will consider your brand as trustworthy. Credible brands are often given high positions on the search engine results page which further increases site traffic and consequently conversions.  

Competitive edge

The value that SEO brings is not a secret anymore. If you are considering optimization for your business, you can be sure that your competition is doing the same, if they haven’t already. This is especially true if your competitors use PPC (pay per click) advertising. PPC is a paid form of advertising companies use to gain higher search engine rankings. While this may seem like a good short-term solution to increasing business, it’s not sustainable in the long term.

As mentioned above, SEO encourages organic traffic. This not only leads to a higher number of conversions but is also a sustainable long-term strategy to consistently increase business over a period of time. When paired with PPC advertising, your brand can feature on on the top of result pages without having to worry about the competition. This dual-edge sword strategy will keep you in the top position while your competitors will only be visible so long as their marketing budgeting allows them to.

Progressive cost reduction

The primary reason PPC advertising alone can’t help companies, in the long run, is the cost involved with it. This is why profitable companies invest smartly into optimization strategies. It’s true that SEO needs some time to take effect before you will see tangible increments. However, this factor should not be an impediment to companies from exploring the opportunity. Think of it this way – low profitability is a sickness that is easily remedied through consistent doses of SEO treatment and observation.

Just like with flu medication, optimization needs time to its effect over the ailment. It can’t be supplemented with short-term remedies that address only the symptoms but do nothing to combat the illness-causing virus.

Additionally, the major cost associated with the ‘treatment’ occurs in the early stages of your journey to recovery. Organic traffic is the kind of viewership that not only sticks but does wonders for referral programs. This makes customer acquisition easier and cheaper in the long run. As time passes, your keywords will have to stay relevant to searches, and your set.

International recognition 

A few months after establishing my partnership with WebChoice, one of the best SEO companies in London, to my surprise, I began receiving inquiries and orders from outside of the UK. Personally, I never even planned for international expansion, but since the opportunity presented itself, I jumped at it! Our products are now shipped to countries in the EU and the Middle East.

Will it stay relevant? 

Technology is constantly changing. Truly, today’s tech has become tomorrow’s trash. There was a time when I was hesitant and questioned the relevance of SEO in the year to come. However, what I learned is that most businesses that propagate the notion of SEO being dead have been burned by substandard agencies looking to make a quick buck. Inversely, I have been able to interact with a number of profitable small-scale businesses that swear by it, and rightly so. SEO is very much relevant today, as it was 5 years ago. So long as there are search engines, there will be the need to optimize.  

SEO has helped me widen the scope of my business and open avenues I never thought of exploring. It has taught me to pay close attention to the needs of my clientele and respond to those needs precisely and sufficiently. Moreover, what I’ve understood is that building a brand is a lot more than just throwing away money on misdirected paid adverts. There’s a science and structure to the madness, almost art-like. It’s an intricate process that should complement every digital marketing strategy and resonate the voice of the brand through as many mediums as possible.

Creating and executing well-structured strategies have brought my website the first SERP in more countries than just one ever could. This has worked wonders for the credibility and trustworthiness of our services and products. Moreover, we’ve been able to branch out into a number of supplementary services and offer a broader range of products to meet the needs of diverse demographics. I’ve been able to increase profitability and scale operations.

Working with WebChoice has been one of the best business decisions I have ever made. My company has tripled its production capacity and entered 10 new geographies. They are a renowned SEO company in London offering a wide range of web solutions for companies big and small. They are known to offer tailor-made services that address the client’s precise needs – a stark contrast to the ‘one size fits all’ formula adopted by some today. Give your business the thrust it needs by teaming up with the finest SEO company in London – WebChoice.

With the influence of the internet, a lot of changes are happening in current-day businesses. A major change is being identified in the marketing processes ever since all the technological advancements started taking place due to the involvement of the Internet.

Online marketing has become an indispensable requirement for companies now as they thrive on making profits in the industries. And to do that effectively, making a website is a must. Websites are a comprehensive channel between the virtual world’s audience and your business and portray your business protocols effectively, thereby turning your potential customers into your long-term clients and enhancing your profit rates.

A website is definitely a lot more than just a channel between your targeted audience and your business, and a lot of intricate hard work goes behind creating one as well. Web designing is a compilation of multiple skills and disciplines which work behind the creation and maintenance of websites. So the key to creating an effective website ultimately lies in the techniques of web designing. 

What are the key features of web designing which make a website effective?

Easy navigation. The website should have all its elements on display and not somewhere under a hidden tab. This not only annoys the viewer but also becomes a major con for your business. Not everyone is going to be a pro with technical aspects, so keeping your website easily navigable and user-friendly is extremely important.

Interactive. The website is supposed to be effectively convincing your targeted audience to further invest their time into looking at your services, so keeping your website interactive is a must. But you cannot add too many elements and make it annoying at the same time. Make sure it is engaging enough but not negatively bothering your clients.

Ample visual designs. Some of the interesting visual designs like scroll texts, animations, and flash banners should be included on the website to make it visually appealing and interesting. You definitely want to adhere the attention of your targeted audience to your website, and these tiny elements will help in doing that. An important factor is not to include these excessively, as that will take away the main purpose of your website.

Engaging content. Content is one of the main aspects of your website. It has to be informative and definitely relevant to your business as well. Content optimization will help in bringing your website to the top search results. Make sure the content is crisp and rich in information relevant to your targeted audience. 

Multiple devices are friendly. Not everyone is going to navigate your website from a laptop, so it is important that the web design is done to make the website compatible with multiple devices, be it smartphones, laptops, or tablets. Other than that, the website should also be compatible with both iOS and Android devices. All these small aspects in web designing will help your company gain a diverse client base.

Why is it important to invest in good web designing?

Web designing is an intricate job that requires professional touches in order to bring the desired outcome from your website. A lot of people often go for readymade templates for designing their website, but that will never bring the kind of customization your website will need to function effectively. No matter how much variety it provides, web designing services hired by professional web designers will give you a lot more precision and features as well.

Taking professional assistance from web developers will also provide you with better insights into the expectations of your website. If they are assisting you from the beginning, then they will help you in understanding the process and also incorporate the aspects needed for the better functioning of your website. Web designers will create your design from scratch, so whatever feature you need for your requirements it will be made effortlessly.

Investing in good web design is important!

Because you need your website to function effectively. It should help in bringing out the best aspects of your business and effectively channel your targeted audience’s attention to your business.

Good quality web designing ensures that your website is made absolutely device-friendly with ready-made templates that are not going to happen. Making sure your website is compatible with every device is important, as it will ensure you get more clients over time. A professional web designer will create different templates of your website which will effectively work for any device, be it a phone or a computer.

If you ever wish to re-design your old website, it can be done effectively by a professional web designer. Often websites don’t perform according to your expectations, and those are the times when you need to focus on re-designing, adding new elements, and giving a new dimension to your website. Ready made templates will not help in doing that, but if you hire good web designers, they will listen to your requirements, analyze the previous features and the performance of your website as well, and will accordingly suggest changes for your website’s betterment. This extra guidance is extremely important, and that is why investing in good web design is an utmost necessity.

Why is a website important for small businesses?

For any small business, it is quite difficult to stay in the limelight in the initial days considering so much competition is already existing. That is why online marketing and having a website is an indispensable requirement for them.

For a small business, it is extremely important to connect with the targeted audience in order to gain profits and to do that effectively as well as maintain the client base for an extensive period of time a website is needed.

Every day, digital content creators publish around 7.5 million blogs. But not all blog posts rank high on Google’s search results page. In fact, a lot of them fail to even reach the first or second page of the search results.

This is the reason why optimizing your content for search engines is so crucial as a business or marketer. Now, as a part of your content marketing strategy, you need to follow a few steps to get the desired results. They are explained below.

 Begin with keyword research

A keyword is a common phrase or word that you use to get relevant information from search engines. It could be something as short as “Life” or as long as “How to get more followers on social media on a budget.”

You need to find keywords that are relevant to your industry or the topic you are writing about. Many keyword research tools will help you in this process. Some free online tools include:

• SEMrush
• Google Keyword Planner
• Keyword Generator

Go for keywords with less competition and high search volume. Insert 2–3 keywords in your content for the best results. All your content marketing strategies are useless without this first step.

 Optimize Your Headline

A headline serves two purposes. First, it convinces readers to go through your content. Second, it tells the search engines what the content is about. Naturally, every SEO expert gives extra attention to headlines.

Insert the keyword you are targeting in the heading. Make it look natural. For example, if you are targeting the keyword “Weight loss program,” you can create these headings:

• Weight Loss Programs: Do they really work?
• 5 mistakes to avoid while searching for a weight loss program
• Everything you need to know about weight loss programs

It is equally vital to make your heading attractive with a combination of emotional, power, and spiritual words. Some examples of emotional words include Discover, Huge, Because, Guaranteed, and Today.

That said, avoid misleading people. Don’t promise something in the headline that you can’t deliver in the content. Doing so hampers your reputation as a business. And it increases the bounce rate, something that damages your SEO efforts.

Pro Tip: Write headlines at the end. You will get enough ideas from your content.

Keep the Number of Words Optimal

Yes, the number of words matters when you are crafting an SEO-friendly content marketing strategy. You need to create a blog post of more than 300 words for sure. Also, blog posts with more than 1000 words have better chances of ranking higher. As per the experts at CoSchedule, a headline optimizer tool, posts with around 2,500 words usually rank the best.

Here are a few tips to help you increase the length of your content:

• Do extensive research to get enough material to write about.
• Explain a point or word wherever possible (This also increases the readability).
• Create an outline of your post before writing.
• Include enough stats and facts to increase the length and make your content credible.

Avoid stuffing your content with fluff, though. Neither Google nor online readers will like it!

Optimize the Images

Make sure you have adequate images that complement the content you have written. The next vital step is optimizing each image for SEO. To do so, give proper alt text to the images. Alt text tells the search engines what the image is about. Here’s the code used for doing so.

SEO Statistics

In the above example, “abc.gif” is the image file with file type GIF. And “SEO statistics” is the image name that Google or Bing will read.

Resizing is also crucial to make your images SEO-friendly. Resizing in terms of pixels and file size will speed up the loading time of the web pages too. You can use these free online tools for resizing:

• BeFunky
• COMPRESS JPEG: RECOMMENDATION 92% of compression
• I Love IMG
• Tiny PNG

Focus on Internal Linking

Internal linking is when you add links to your existing web pages to a new page. For example, if you have written a blog post about “How to keep your laptop in good shape,” you can add a link to your page about laptop repairs.

The links to your previous blog posts can also be added to the new posts. Just make sure the links are relevant to the content. Avoid adding too many links, though, as it makes the page look spammy and less readable.

So, What is the Bottom Line?

It is crucial to read the latest updates regarding SEO content, as search engine optimization regulations keep changing. Or you can hire an experienced agency that can prepare a robust content marketing strategy on your behalf. Check the agency’s past projects to gauge the quality of their work.

How to Create Content that Ranks in Google

With these objectives in mind, here’s a simple process to achieve both of these goals.

The first step is to write about topics people are searching for. Most people like to write about topics that excite them. But these posts often have a short shelf life.

When you create content around topics that people are searching for, then you get the opposite effect: free, passive, and consistent traffic that usually grows over time. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll have more content ideas than you know what to do with. How do you do this? This video will show you how.

The second step is to assess the type of content Google wants you to create. Google’s job is to deliver the most relevant results for any given search query. And they do a pretty good job at this.

So naturally, if you want to rank for your target topic, then you need to know the type of content Google will rank for that query. This is called search intent. Watch the video to find out how to determine search intent from any query.

Step three is to create a data-driven outline, Content is like a puzzle. There are a lot of different pieces, and it’s tough to assemble without some kind of framework. Outlines are like the edge pieces of the puzzle. They help to form the base, and all you need to do is fill in the missing pieces.

They also help make sure you’re including all critical points worth communicating on the topic. This video will show you how to easily create a blog post outline.

Step four is to create a click-worthy headline. A headline is important because it’s what stands between you and a visitor. Its main job is to convince people to actually click on your result. Then it’s your content’s job to keep them reading. Watch the video to learn how to write good headlines. Step five is to write a killer intro using the AIDA formula.

The introduction is arguably the most important part of your content. Its job is to hook your reader, tell them they’re in the right place, and convince them to keep reading.

Fortunately, there’s a tried and tested formula you can use called AIDA, which you can use. What does it stand for and how do you use it? Watch the video.

Step six is to make your content actionable and easy to digest.