Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is a very powerful digital marketing strategy that can help increase the quantity and quality of traffic to your website through organic search. In this article, we will be exploring what SEO is and why it's important in your business strategy.
Search engines are software programs that use keywords and phrases to assist people with finding the right information they are looking for. Search engines return results quickly by scanning the internet continuously and indexing every page they can find, even with millions of websites.
The top 6 search engines include:
- Youtube
- Tiktok
- Bing
- Yahoo
What Is Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)?
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process of improving the quality and quantity of the website traffic to your website. SEO aims to improve your website's position in search results pages through keywords and phrases. Successful SEO requires you to understand the wants and needs of your target market.
Why is SEO Important?
SEO is very important because it helps to make your website visible and increase your website traffic organically, which means more business opportunities for your clinic.
Benefits of SEO:
- 24/7 Promotion
- Gains More Clicks than PPC
- Improves Your Site's User Experience
- Helps You Generate Quality Leads
- Increases Brand Visibility
- Builds Brand Credibility & Trust
- Attracts Local Clients
Why is SEO a Long Term Strategy?
Unless your going to pay for a PPC campaign then you won't be at the top of the search results within the afternoon. To achieve the SEO results you want then you should work on achieving steady progress, If your website has no SEO strategy, you should expect your website to start crawling in a couple of months, but it takes time. With continuous effort, you can climb to the top of the search results and secure a spot for the long term.
You can't just do SEO once and expect to stay at the top of search results. SEO requires your content to stay relevant by consistently adding new content to maintain the relevance of your website.
The Three Pillars of SEO
1. Technical Optimisation: Technical Optimisation is the process of completing activities on your site designed to improve your SEO that is not related to your content.
2. On-Page Optimisation: On-Page Optimisation is the process of completing activities on the page to improve its position in the search rankings.
3. Off-Page Optimisation: Off-Page Optimisation is the process of completing activities that are taken outside of the actual website in order to improve its position in the search rankings.
How Do Search Engines Work?
As previously mentioned, search engines allow users to search the internet for content using keywords. Experts have estimated that Google changes its search algorithm around 500 to 600 times per year, this is done to improve the user experience, aiming to understand how a user searches and how to give them the best answer to their query. High-Quality results = More relevant pages.
Crawling
The first step is Crawling. Crawling is the process of finding new or updated pages to add to Google. Search engines send out web crawlers (spiders or robots) to find new pages and record information about them, they check the pages that already exist and then check the content that has been previously visited to see if they have changed or been updated.
Indexing
The second step is Indexing. Indexing is when a search engine decides whether or not it is going to use the content that has been crawled. If your webpage is seen as valuable, it will be indexed.
Why your webpage might not have been indexed:
- Your content is duplicated from another website.
- Your content does not provide value and is seen as spam.
- Your webpage couldn't be crawled.
Ranking
The third and most important step is Ranking. Once a search engine has crawled and indexed your page, your site can now begin to rank. There are more than 200 ranking signals that are used by search engines to sort and rank content.
Signals used by search engines:
- Page Loading Speed
- Keyword Presence in Title Tag
- Website Reputation
- Backlinks
- Relevance
- Mobile-friendliness.