The Best Affordable Seach Engine Optimization Begins At Home

Want to know what the best affordable search engine optimization is? The do-it-yourself kind. I know, that sounds strange coming from me because I offer search engine optimization consulting and services, right? But truth is truth. There are a couple of hurdles however.

The technical difficulties. Not everyone knows how to do that "computer stuff," nor do they want to know. If this is you I would consider my service. :-)

There are time restraints. SEO takes time and research. And to make things more frustrating it is like trying to hit a moving target because the search engine algorithms are constantly changing. What worked a year ago doesn't work today. So, not only is there time involved to learn how to do it yourself, you have to keep investing the time to keep up with what it takes today, and tomorrow, etc. And it takes time. You have to write content, or order it, research keywords, write meta tags, write more content like guest blog posts and build links, do social media and "I don't know what all!" (Well, actually, I do!) But it is a full time occupation. If you don't just love it, hire someone. (Not a plug, though I would love the business. Again, just the truth.)

Whatever is holding you back in your business needs to be really scrutinized. If it's a twenty dollar problem, or a hundred dollar problem, just pay for it and get back to business. In other words, don't let not knowing how to do something or not having something hold you back. There's no reason, for example, to spend hours and hours learning how to build a website. Do what you do best. Hire someone to get that baby up and keep selling shoes, or drilling teeth or fixing air conditioners. As a business owner you don't need to know how to do everything, but you do need to know the jest. (So read my blog and only tackle what you really want to do.)

Am I making a case for NOT doing your own affordable small business search engine optimization? Nope. No guts; no glory is true too. All I'm saying is even the do-it-yourselfer might outsource the part of the job he hates or isn't interested in. If you 'are interested, roll up your sleeves and let's get busy.

So if you are ready and willing to get your hands dirty, maybe hit your thumb with a hammer and perhaps scratch your knee, the first thing you will want to look at is your keywords.

Keywords

Lots of times I talk to business owners and they think they are trying to rank their site for say a single word, like crochet for example. They want their little craft shop to show up on the front page of Google for the word, crochet. Ain't going to happen. I hate to break it to them, but it's just not. And quite frankly, they don't really want it to.

Keywords indicate what's going on in searchers mind. Someone who put the word "crochet" into a search engine and hit Google is not looking for a craft shop that sells crochet yarn, needles, patterns or lessons. They don't know what crochet is!

Think about what that shop owner should really be trying to rank for. They should be more like these types of phrases:

• crochet yarn fayetteville ar
• crochet needles fort smith arkansas
• crochet patterns pine bluff ark
• crochet lessons sherwood ar
• crochet classes cabot arkansas

We call this targeting the "intent" of the user. Someone who types in these types of phrases in a search engine are looking for something this local craft store might be able to provide. As a business you basically are offering your products and services to those who are actually looking for them. So when someone says, hey, I want some crochet lessons near my home in Fayetteville Arkansas, Google wants to say, hey, here are the best pages we have found so far for crochet lessons near Fayetteville Arkansas. I mean, that's what Google does, right? They are in the business of dishing up pages that answer the query or question someone searched for. And you want your pages to show up. You make money selling yarn, needles, patterns, lessons and classes, not being a dictionary!

You don't care if Google thinks you are about "crochet" because that won't make your cash register, your banker or your spouse sing. But, if Google thinks you are about "crochet classes in Cabot Arkansas" and people in Cabot, Arkansas, are looking for crochet classes, you'll have it going on.

This is the most important aspect of doing your own search engine optimization. Without it you might even rank for something, but you still won't get traffic if no one is searching for it. So, don't try to rank for something like "blue crochet yarn with pink polka dots in cabot arkansas in a building with a yellow door." I'm pretty sure you will rank for that, because there is NO competition for that. But no one will ever search for it and come to your site.

Don't lose site of the goal. You want to rank for something people are searching for in large enough quantities to get you some traffic and make some sales. People have to want it and be able to find you for this search engine thing to work for you. And the competition has to be reasonable enough that you could rank for it if you decided to put the effort into trying to do it.

And, if you've done your keyword research correctly, you will have decided to put the effort in BEFORE you create the page on your site you will be trying to rank. So, start with keyword research. Then:

• Optimize the pages you already have on your site as well.
• Add pictures. (You do have pictures on your pages, right?)
• Add video. (You're using them, too, aren't you?)

Look for ways to silo the navigation for your pages, or at least build some links from pages to other pages on your site. This should be done thoughtfully and is related to keyword research. I could write a lot on this, but for now think of it like this. The pages you want to rank the most need the most links. Some of those links can come from pages on your own site. Don't go crazy. Just let the links speak the loudest about what you think is most important and Google will get it.

These are some of the things a good and affordable search engine optimization company will start with. Why can't you do them yourself? Sure it can take some time. So? You can't get any more affordable than free!

Another thing you can do yourself is add new content. Add it to the pages you want to beef up and add new pages. You can use the new pages to build links to the pages you want to rank the most, or you can just use it to add more content your users might like to read. Why? Google loves new content. Give it to them. Give it to them regularly. No, I don't mean 10 times a day. Pick a schedule you can live with and do it. Just do it. A new post once a week? twice a week? These can be blog posts, too. I think every site should have a blog if they can. Curated content can work great for this. It doesn't have to be a huge time suck.



You can also ping those new or newly updated pages. Pingler is a great site for this if you are only doing a few pages on a given day. (It's free for low level usage like we are discussing.)

You can also add some links to your pages that go to other authority sites. These are sites that DO and SHOULD rank for crochet, for example. These are helpful for readers and Google loves them.

In any link building you do don't forget to link to the inner pages of your site as well as your home page. All the pages on your site should serve some purpose. Most of them will target keywords. Build links to them.

And get some social media going. In today's search engine landscape it is a must.

Take these search engine optimization tips into consideration and you will have made a huge step towards ranking your pages in an affordable manner. But, if you are overwhelmed and just want someone to swoop in and make everything better for you, then you will find that we offer affordable search engine optimization services you can trust and rely to grow your business while you get back to doing what you do best. Deal?