3 SEO Tips For Small Business Owners To Increase Targeted Website Traffic

While there are a variety of ways to increase targeted website traffic, every business owner should consider optimizing their website for the search engines.

Instead of putting all of your eggs in one basket, it’s best to drive website traffic through several sources.   This way, you can cast a wider net, resulting in more traffic, and track the efficacy of each source.

Before you begin, you should understand the core concepts of Search Engine Optimization.  In order to increase targeted website traffic and attract qualified prospects, you need to understand three things:

1. Everything related to SEO starts with an understanding of what a “keyword phrase” is.

Anytime someone conducts a search on Google, or another search engine, they enter some text to start their search.  In SEO terms, the entered text is called a “keyword” or “keyword phrase.”

If you know what keyword phrases your prospects are entering when looking for the type of information, products or services you offer, you will know what phrases to optimize your web pages for.

2. Websites are not indexed or ranked by the search engines… each web page is indexed and ranked independent of any other.

This is commonly misunderstood but so vital to understand.  Just because you have one web page that ranks really well in the search engines, that doesn’t mean that your others will also rank well.

Each page of your website must be uniquely optimized for a handful of keyword phrases… keyword phrases that are searched upon and those likely to attract your targeted audience.

If you pay close attention to the optimization of each page, you should see a dramatic improvement in terms of search engine placement.

3. Like it or not, you’re competing against others.

Some have a harder time with this concept than others but the truth remains the truth… in order to get your web page listed on page one of Google, you have to kick one of the currently listed web page’s off.

This is valuable information because it will help you understand what you must do to achieve the ranking you’re after.  Thorough analysis of the web pages currently listed for a particular keyword phrase will tell you how hard it will be to overtake one of them.  You need to pay close attention to a number of elements including:

How well is their page optimized for the keyword phrase?

How old is their domain (the older the better)?

How many links with high page rank can be found pointing to the page (the more the better)?

While there are other elements involved, these three are of primary concern.  If you find you can outdo your competitor’s web page in at least two of the three areas mentioned, you can probably kick them off the page and take their place.

After ensuring you are optimizing for a keyword phrase (or phrases) that are likely to bring you the kind of traffic you want, you’ll often find it is the quality and quantity of backlinks that make the real difference.  Ensure your text links use the keyword phrases you are optimizing for and you’ll find you quickly climb the ranks of the search engines.

5 Simple Questions to Ask When Evaluating Your Social Media Campaign

“Frustration” – a word frequently used to describe companies new to social media and those who have been involved in a social media campaign but have yet to enjoy a return.

The problem is two-fold.  First, establishing a social media presence takes time and continued effort.  You have to be consistent in your involvement with the social media medium and remember that returns will not be overnight.  Second, you have to make sure that you are using social media in a way that makes sense for your business.

If you are not sure, ask yourself these 5 simple questions:

Are you using the right platform?

First, remember that there are a variety of social media platforms for you to consider – most notably Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and YouTube.  Further, within these platforms, there are variations of the theme.  For example, in Facebook, you can have a “Page,” a “Group,” or a “Community.”  Each variation has its own set of tools, purposes, and capabilities.  In addition, you may decide to participate in several social media platforms at the same time.  For example, if you have a fitness center, you may want to use your YouTube channel to publish videos on how to perform certain exercises or tapings of classes you offer there while using Facebook to build a sense of community through candid photos, listings of hours, available classes, and upcoming events.

Have you scrapped past attempts?

However, you also need to remember that whatever you take on has to be maintained and updated regularly.  This can take up valuable time and people resources.  While it can certainly be worth it in the long run, remember that consistency is key.  If you do not think you will be able to maintain various platforms (or you have already started and stopped using a platform) be sure to erase or delete those accounts.  Otherwise, you stand the risk of eroding your brand value when a customer (current or potential) stumbles across your forgotten Bebo account.  Instead, make sure that what you have is the best it can be and do away with anything that you are not actively using.

Are you providing the type of information and interaction that your audience wants?

Ask yourself what it is that your audience would want to read, not what you want to tell them.  Providing discounts or having giveaways can be useful, but you have to have more substance than that.  Consider posting facts about your company, the brand, or its products.  Think about the top questions you think your customers should be asking.  Think of the tidbits of information you encounter everyday that make you stop and say, “Really?” Examples include fun facts about how long you have been in business, what happens “behind the scenes”, why your business operates as it does (why Yoga class was cancelled on Tuesdays, why you do not serve poppyseed bagels, why you buy local, why legal documents are presented in blue card stock), etc.

Are you listening to your audience?

Likewise, are you listening to your audience?  When they make a post, do you respond?  Do you stay on top of when your company is mentioned on other sites, blogs, social media, etc., and make relevant comments to that affect (on that site and yours)?  Remember that social media has developed because of the continued interaction it affords.  Its purpose is not to simply broadcast, but rather give people a voice in things they would otherwise not be privy to.

Do you allow them a voice?

Similarly, make sure that you give your audience a voice.  Ask open-ended questions, run surveys and polls, include them in new product decisions, etc. – the more things like this you do, the more valued your audience will feel.  Remember that interaction is a large part of a successful social media campaign.  If miss out on this, you may already be out of the game.

Your Social Media Campaign can be a key part of growing your business and brand to attract local consumers.

4 Important Steps to Creating a Lucrative Geo-Location Marketing Campaign

Marketing is essentially communicating your business and its product or service offerings to potential customers. It is a way of inciting interest and describing the advantages and features uniquely presented by your company.  However, as valuable as marketing can be, it presents serious issues when it comes to reaching the intended consumer.

Traditional marketing broadcasts or prints the message where many potential consumers will receive it, but it will be applicable to very few.  As such, marketing slowly has become more centered on specific demographics, enabled largely by improvements in communication.

For example, it is relatively easy to develop marketing campaigns that focus on certain locations, such as advertising in a neighborhood paper, or to target a specific demographic, such as advertising your fitness center on a healthy living website.  However, it can still be very difficult to reach viable consumers, consumers that turn into sales, mainly because of the constraints posed by location.

Location-based marketing is the missing element.  Without it, over 90 percent of ad impressions are wasted on consumers who are outside your geographic area.  Fortunately, technology has advanced to allow geo-location marketing.  For instance, smartphones allow marketers to obtain device-location data and modern search engines, such as Google, enable consumers to find what they need based entirely on what is near them.  Better targeting equals bigger demand and better conversions.  Here is how to make it work for you:

Step 1 – Target Your Campaign As Specifically As Possible

First, make sure that your campaign is targeted specifically to the area you do business in.  Search engines like Google,  allow you to target your marketing campaigns based on City, ZIP codes, neighborhoods, or even a specific street intersection.

This way, when you advertise your coffee shop, you can be sure that biggest percentage  of consumers exposed to your campaign are within a range that would make sense for them to choose your coffee shop.

Step 2 – Use Your Location To Your Advantage

You can use your location to your advantage in promotions by focusing on providing consumer incentives at a hyper-local level. For example, you could provide a time-sensitive coupon to consumers within a few mile radius of your business.

Step 3 – Explain Your Location
With geo-location, you can also explain your location, preventing a situation where you have a customer who is interested in what your company offers but does not want to bother looking up directions.  Not only could you provide a map, but you could even provide directions from the person’s location (walking, driving, or by bus).

Step 4 – Play Up The Novelty

Lastly, make sure that your geo-location marketing campaign plays up the novelty presented by location based marketing.  Major retailers, such as Starbucks, are using programs such as Foursquare and Facebook Locations to turn location into a game.  Consumers can “check in” at your location, allowing you to provide incentives for consumers to visit a specific location more frequently by offering status (mayor status, badges), points, or incentives based on the number of visits (free appetizer on your fifth visit).

Local Internet Marketing is a key part of growing your business and brand, to attract local consumers.  Local Internet Marketing isn’t just about having a website, it includes being findable in multiple places when local consumers are looking for your product or service.