I’m holding out for an S-E-ro til the morning light

I promise to try and reduce the number of SEO puns I'm squeezing into this one… But now that we've established that actually natural white hat SEO and ranking organically is difficult and identified the areas that may be negatively holding you back, you'll need some action points and things to do. Identifying problems is only half the battle, more importantly we need to address them and fix them. Below are five points that can really help your business online. They will help you engage better with your customers while attracting new ones and ensuring the conversion rate is consistent and grows.

Spend time on your website

  • It is often the only reflection you have of your business. Lots of people's first interaction with you will be through your website. We all know first impressions count, so why would you be happy to show your customers an unkempt website that doesn't show your company in the best light.
  • Think of it like a garden - you can always tell the gardens that are well cared for, regularly maintained and have been loved. They impress and people take notice. The ones that have been neglected are overgrown, get left behind and aren't welcoming. Of course, there's always hidden treasure under all that uncut grass but how many people are going to spend the time to dig through the dirt to find it?
  • Google recently updated its Google Webmaster Tools page on ranking with some advice on how to rank. Rather than advising website owners to build links, they've made the focus on creating fantastic websites.

Forget about the price tags

  • Caring for your website shouldn't cost anything. Whether you update the HTML yourself or use a CMS, updating your website doesn't need to be paid for. Of course it takes time, but even just an hour a week can make a huge difference over a longer period of time.
  • Set yourself goals of what you want to work on and then go about systematically working through them. Holding yourself accountable for them will mean nothing gets left behind.
  • Working on your website can be quite a significant time investment but you shouldn't see this as an albatross around your neck. Depending on your business goals and marketing strategy, the website might be the single most important part of your company.
Empower your agency to be your hero, work with them for the best results

No quick wins

  • There are no quick wins in SEO. Anyone that has told you this is probably not being completely transparent with you. Besides, the end goal should not just be rankings but conversions. All the Internet traffic isn't worth the tea in China if it doesn't ever convert.
  • Focus on your customers rather than your traffic and this will see you in good stead to grow your website and traffic naturally over time.

Build long-term relationships

  • This follows on from the previous point, try to build long-term, sustainable relationships with your customers and online influencers. You'd be surprised by how important influential bloggers are - especially in certain industries.
  • There's a reason why fashion bloggers are invited to the front row of the biggest catwalk shows - getting your product or service endorsed or reviewed by a leading blogger can lead to a much greater engaged audience and an active community you can leverage for all areas of your business.

Want a quick win? Nothing comes for free

  • If you do want a quick jump to the front page of search engines or in front of people on social media channels then paid for online advertising can be a great cost effective strategy.
  • All the major search engines have their own paid for advertising platforms - Bing's Ads and  AdWords services allow you to pay for presence in the search engines where you pay for each click you receive. This can be a great way to drive traffic to your website if time is of the essence.
  • You might also want to explore Facebook ads or promoted tweets on Twitter to generate social media engagement.
  • Carefully manage your budgets and costs so that you know how much it costs to convert and if this is something that you can sustain going forward.
Over the course of these three blog articles, I've hopefully demonstrated the importance in you taking responsibility for your own website. You may be working with a digital agency on marketing or with a design agency to support your website. However, at the end of the day you will know your customer and client base better than any external agency. The purpose of working with an agency is to harness their expertise but also to work with them. Too many times people take a step back from their website and expect the designer/developer/marketeer to do all the work for them. The truth is that you should want to be heavily involved in every step of the process from concept to marketing but also to openly listen to the agency you are working with. If you are constantly and/or regularly working on your website then it will naturally grow and will ensure you, your website and your business aren't left behind.

Read more of our 'How difficult is it to rank blog' series

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Alexis Pratsides