At least once in a week, I get a request to help someone with Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Rob, can you send more people to my website? Rob, I need more traffic. Rob, why is no one visiting my website?
They want me to be a magician. I am not a magician. No web developer is.
There are some basic measures you need to take for SEO. They are as follows:
- You need good, fresh content. In other words, update your website once in a while!
- Each page needs to have a good title and a description meta tag. Keyword meta tags are no longer necessary.
- Your site needs to be mobile friendly.
- Your site needs to be running SSL (https).
If you’ve done all of this, then relax! There is another important factor which is out of your control.
The age of your domain!
That’s right. Brand new domains are not going to rank very high on Google. The older your website gets, the more Google will trust it.
So what can you do in the meantime to drive content to your site?
If you are selling products, I would suggest using Google Adwords to bring customers to your site. Yes, you have to pay-per-click but if you use Adwords correctly, you can very finely tune the people visiting your site. No other ad service rivals Google in terms of traffic quality.
Sure, perhaps your website will make it to the first page of Google someday but it’s never a good idea to stake your whole business model on SEO. SEO can change very quickly. You want to make sure you have another way to bring in visitors.
If you are not selling products and don’t want to spend money on advertising then you need to look to social media to get the word out. Start with your own social media accounts. Ask your friends to spread the word. You can also join forums and post on other people’s blogs.
Become the expert in your field. People will visit your website to learn from you. Then hopefully they will share your website with others.
Do you need help with the basics? Or do you want to set up a Google Adwords campaign? Contact me here. I am standing by to help!