Ten years ago it was possible for a small business to thrive online by simply using on-site search engine optimization. Done right, you really needed little else. A few good links, a Yahoo directory listing, maybe some pay-per-click for competitive terms. For many successful online businesses, SEO was their entire marketing budget. It was pretty amazing. But those days are absolutely over. Onsite SEO is now one part of a large array of essential components that make up internet marketing.
Unfortunately there are small businesses who were around ten years ago who are reluctant to embrace these new necessary efforts. To compete online in this decade you definitely need SEO – but you won’t thrive with just SEO. There are things SEO CAN’T do for you! Like the following…
Link Building
If you’re not actively seeking possible back links all the time, you’re hampering your success. If your competitors have substantially more high quality backlinks than you, it doesn’t matter how spectacular your site’s content and SEO efforts are.
If you ignore link building, they’re going to keep beating you in the search results. SEO can’t fix this – links can.
Conversions
SEO does not make sales. It’s your content, your design, and your pitch that are going to make conversions happen on your web site.
Some SEOs will want to share in the process of improving your site’s conversions, if you’re willing, and work with you to determine what targeted keywords are going to bring the most convertible visitors to different pages. But at the end of the day, it is your responsibility to ensure that the actual conversions take place.
Networking
Networking and marketing are not the same thing. Networking is YOU making connections and engaging while representing your business – with other professionals in your field and with potential customers.
If you don’t have the time or desire to do this, hiring someone to do it for you is certainly an option. Pretending it’s not important is not. With many businesses now reporting that they receive more traffic from Facebook than Google, it’s simply absurd to take a stand that networking and social media presences aren’t important for your particular business. No amount of onsite SEO can make up for a lack of it.
Like it or not, you need to network.
Content Creation
The O in SEO stands for optimization. The problem with SEO is that you actually need a decent quantity of quality website content to optimize. If your site is 5 pages in total, and contains more images than text, your web site optimization potential is limited. The more content you have, the more chances you have for useful traffic. Adding a few articles on related topics can work surprisingly well. Or commit more fully to content creation and add a blog to your site, featuring posts relating to your field and your business.
I know – you’re an electrician/caterer/jewelry maker – not a writer and you don’t want to do this. Lucky for you, content creation is easily outsourced. Copywriters, guest bloggers, and other writers for hire aren’t hard to find. It sounds like a lot, but if you don’t have any relevant text content on your site, your potential for search engine success is severely handicapped.
Even a small amount of effort in these areas will increase your traffic and the success of your onsite SEO. Period. If you want the car to go you have to put some gas in the tank. Remember what SEO can’t do for you, and then reap the rewards of what it CAN.
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