What is SEO? | A Guide to Optimizing Your Online Presence

In today’s digital world, having a strong online presence is more critical than ever for businesses of all sizes and industries. With millions of websites competing for attention, getting your business to stand out in the crowd and attract the right audience can seem like an impossible task. By optimizing both your website and social media, you can increase visibility, drive targeted traffic, build credibility, and ultimately grow your business. In this post, we will explore what SEO is, why it is essential for businesses, and how it can transform your online presence into a powerful tool for growth. Whether you are a small business owner or a marketing professional, understanding the importance of SEO is the first step towards achieving your digital marketing goals.

What is SEO?

SEO stands for “search engine optimization”, which is a digital marketing strategy focused on improving a website’s visibility and where it appears in the search engine results pages (SERPs). The ultimate goal of SEO is to increase organic (non-paid) traffic to a website by making it more relevant and trustworthy in the eyes of search engines. By doing so, businesses can attract more targeted visitors, and convert those visitors into leads, sales, and revenue. There are three types of SEO that can be used to accomplish this:

1. Technical SEO: Technical aspects of your website
2. On-page SEO: The content on your website
3. Off-page SEO: Content that is not on your website that creates brand awareness or drives traffic to your site

Technical SEO refers to optimizing the infrastructure and backend elements of your website, like site speed, mobile-friendliness, and site security. It also involves fixing issues such as broken links, crawl errors, and other problems that would hinder search engines from indexing your site and showing it in the search engine results. If you’ve already done a website redesign project with me, we tackled this part during the project, however there are always opportunities for refinement. Think of technical SEO like the foundation of a house; while you may not be able to see if from the outside, it is a vital part of having a strong, structurally sound website that provides a good user experience.

On-page SEO is all about making sure the content on your website is set up and written to be easily found and understood by search engines. It involves using targeted words and phrases (referred to as keywords) that people are searching for in your titles, headers, and throughout your site’s content. You also want to make sure your content is high-quality, useful, and answers what people are looking for. You want to avoid using content that feels inauthentic, or like it was written for search engines instead of people. Additionally, adding internal links to other pages on your site helps search engines see how your pages are connected. By doing these things, you make your website more attractive to search engines and provide a good user experience which helps you get better rankings and more visitors.

Off-page SEO refers to the things done outside your website to increase visibility in the SERPs and build brand awareness. Social media has become one of the biggest aspects of off-page SEO. It’s estimated that 31% of consumers use social media to find answers to questions (Hubspot, 2024). With social channels working as search engines, it’s almost (if not equally important) to ensure that they are optimized to attract the right audience and deliver relevant, high quality content. There are other off-site methods, like online reviews, local SEO, and link building with other credible websites that help build brand awareness. By building brand awareness, you give your business credibility and authority, and help build trust with users. The more credible and trustworthy your brand is, the more likely it is that users will convert into leads, sales, and revenue.

While each type of SEO is uniquely important, a good SEO strategy is well rounded, and incorporates all three categories in order to put your best foot forward in the ever changing digital world.

Why is SEO important?

Google processes 5.9 million searches every minute, which is approximately 8.5 billion searches per day. (Statista, 2023) In order to be found amongst all these searches, business owners of all sizes and industries need to understand how to optimize their website appropriately. Here are five key reasons why SEO is important for businesses:

• Increased Visibility and Traffic: SEO helps improve a website’s visibility in the search engine results, which leads to more clicks and organic traffic.
• Credibility and Trustworthiness: Effective SEO can help build trust, credibility, and authority which will help your website rank higher in the search results, and potentially convert more visitors into customers.
• Cost Effectiveness: Compared to paid advertising, SEO is relatively cost-effective. While it requires an initial investment of time and resources, the long-term benefits of an SEO campaign can far outweigh the costs. Paid advertising campaigns can be a useful tool, however when the campaign ends, the clicks it was bringing in end as well. SEO campaigns can continue to provide benefits long after the campaign is over.
• Competitive Advantage: Understanding and implementing SEO strategies can give businesses a competitive edge. By ranking higher than competitors in search engine results, businesses can attract more traffic than their competitors, and turn that traffic into revenue.
• Adaptability to Market Changes: SEO helps businesses stay adaptable to changes in the market and search engine algorithms. Staying updated with SEO trends ensures that businesses can quickly adjust their strategies to maintain or improve their rankings.

SEO has become a vital part of an effective digital marketing strategy for a business. It can increase your business’s visibility, provide credibility and help you build trust, give you a leg up on your competitors, and allow you to easily adapt to market changes. SEO can be very cost-effective and provide long-term benefits that paid advertising can’t.

How can SEO actually be implemented into your business?

SEO might seem like a daunting task, however there are things you can do to earn “quick wins” in each category of SEO and boost your website’s traffic that are cost effective and timely.

• Keyword Research: What words do you want users to search to find your business? Include these words in your website’s headers, meta tags, descriptions, and naturally throughout your site content.
• Technical Site Audit: Find and fix the technical issues your site is having, like broken links or slow loading pages by running desktop and mobile audits. It’s important to run both because results can vary widely across the two devices. Most searches happen on mobile, so Google prioritizes that first.
• Disavow Toxic Backlinks: Get rid of links to your site that come from low-quality, spammy websites.
• Google My Business Cleanup: Evaluate your Google listing and update it to accurately reflect your business description, address, contact information, and links to social channels.

While “quick wins” are a good way to start diving into the world of SEO, a highly effective strategy includes more long term tactics that take time to see results. However, once they are implemented, they can have significant impacts on your business.

1. Social Media Marketing: Creating a social media strategy that increases brand awareness and targets keywords.
2. Website Content Creation: Adding or changing content on your website (like blog posts) to naturally incorporate keywords, answer user’s search queries, or shift the focus of your site.
3. Email Marketing: Sending out a client newsletter to educate, inform, and maintain relationships.
4. Backlink Creation: Finding ways to link with other credible websites which increases your website’s authority and expands your brand awareness.
5. Reviews and Testimonials: Collecting client feedback through reviews and testimonials that can be featured on your website or social media.

These are just a few of the many strategies that can be implemented in a holistic SEO campaign. Every business is unique and has different needs and goals, so while there are effective tools to implement SEO, there isn’t a “one size fits all” solution. An individualized action plan that outlines the business goals and how they can be achieved is necessary before beginning an SEO campaign.

Key Takeaways

SEO is a crucial element of any effective digital marketing strategy, offering numerous benefits that can significantly impact your business’s success. By enhancing visibility, building credibility, and driving targeted traffic, SEO can transform your website into a powerful tool for growth, not just something to give your business legitimacy. Whether through technical, on-page, or off-page SEO, a well-rounded approach ensures that your business remains competitive and adaptable in the ever-evolving digital landscape. By implementing both quick wins and long-term strategies, you can achieve sustainable results that boost your online presence and drive revenue. Embracing SEO is not just an option but a necessity for businesses looking to grow in today’s fast-paced, search-driven world.

If you’re interested in discussing how any of this could fit into your business, schedule a discovery call to discuss your business goals and how SEO can help push your website to the next level.