Use Search Engine Optimisation to direct traffic to your website when potential clients are looking for specific products or services that your business could provide.

Search Engine Optimisation enhances the visibility of your website or web page in a search engine.  Leading search engines use software called ‘crawlers’ that scour web pages to find information that matches their search results.  The importance of SEOs is that people searching the web want prompt immediate answers and generally click on the first results they see.  Being at the top of the results list will mean your business is the first port of call, not your competitors.

When you use search engines such as Google or Bing, the results listed at the top represent companies with good SEO skills, meaning they have been savvy in order to gain a higher search ranking.

There are some simple steps to help your website or company blog appear in a higher ranked position in web searches:

Keywords:  Include key phrases that are relevant to your business and that will direct people to your site.  If you want to find out what people have been searching for, Google provides a service where you can enter a particular word and they will give you statistics on how often it is researched on the web.  These results are also put into context in terms of what the search refers to, so you can streamline your key phrases and target prospective clients accordingly.  A key to remember is not to make your words too specific, or too broad.  They must always be relevant to be picked up in a search.

Cross-link:  Cross-linking is the process of linking two or more pages from your site together to increase visibility in search engines.  You can also cross link to other related websites that have agreed to be linked to yours in some way.  Do your research on cross-linking first.  Some search engines will penalise you for overdoing the linking within your site.

Up to date content:  When the search engines perform their regular crawl, they are always looking for new and updated content.  If your content is out of date, it may be missed and you automatically have decreased chances in gaining a higher ranking.  Remember to research, track and update keywords regularly.  If you feel overwhelmed or that your time is limited, there are many marketing and web professionals available to assist with driving traffic to your site.