When you search for something on Google, say, “flower basket“, it gives you a list of links that relate to your search. Probably you see a blog about “Make your own flower basket“. Or, it could be a gallery of images of beautiful flower basket arrangements. You could also see a floral shop that sells flower basket in your area.
Whatever the case, you could see this information in an orderly fashion. One link will be on top of the other and so on that it creates a list of links that helps your search about “flower basket“.
But, have you ever wonder how Google decides who gets at the top and who’s at the bottom? How would Google rank these links based on a user’s search?
Now, let’s say you have a website and you want people to come across with it on the internet. How could people know your website exists? What could be the words they are typing on Google to find you? Why is it so important to rank at the top?
Three words: Search Engine Optimization, can answer these. Read on and discover why this process is important for businesses who have a website that relies so much on online presence.
What is SEO?
Search Engine Optimization, or SEO for short, is a process to help your website be visible in search engine results and rank higher on of Google Search. By being visible on the internet, it helps searchers find you and your business.
Google Search collects and indexes billions of web pages on the world wide web. When a user is looking for a particular information, Google Search would then serve relevant information back to the user.
Think of Google Search as a massive library. When you want to inquire about a book, the librarian, which is Google Search in this case, will readily help you find that book that you’re looking for. When you want to look for a cookbook, the librarian would lead you to the right aisle on where you can find the cookbooks that they have.
Now, half of the work is done by Google, you will do the other half. To let Google know what your business or your website is all about, there are several processes or techniques to help Google serve your website to the right users. These techniques include improving website content, improving web structure (like how web pages of your website relate to each other), technical aspects, and many more.
If your business is all about gardening and landscaping, you wish to rank higher in relevant search terms such as “landscapers near me“, or “gardening services“. These terms used by the users to look for information are what we call “keywords”.
Now, you want your website to appear on the Google results page based on these keywords. So, you need to help Google understand your webpages and your website about your business of gardening and landscaping. To do that, you need to improve your webpages’ information and content that revolves around gardening and landscaping. This is called optimizing your webpages.
This is just the gist of how Google Search works. SEO is another universe that needs to tackle on. The important thing is to understand that SEO helps your business and website be visible online, helping your potential customers know that your business exists.
Why is SEO important?
To value SEO means you want to rank higher on Google Search.
Now, before we press further, it’s important to know the term search engine. Search engine is a program that helps you find information online. The most widely used search engine today is Google Search. However, Google Search is just one of the many search engines out there. Some examples are Bing, Yahoo, Baidu, DuckDuckGo and many more.
Now, according to StatCounter, the undisputed king of search engines is Google Search. 9 out of 10 internet users use Google Search to look for information on the internet. Because of its popularity, the term “Google” is now an accepted term that means to search for information on the internet. You can often hear the phrase “I just googled it“, or “I’ll google it“.
In the list of relevant information based on your search, statistics show that 39.8% of users click the first position that appears on their search. This means, whenever you google something, chances are, on all the links that appeared relevant to your search, you’re likely to click on the first link that Google offers you.
That’s why it’s a tight competition gaining the first spot on Google search. Everybody wants to rank higher because of the chance that people could find their website or business. When more people lead to your business, it helps you thrive.
SEO is a cost-effective marketing compared to other methods, such as running ads. Although, in a sense, SEO is free, the tools and specialists are not. There are free SEO tools you can use, but honestly, it doesn’t get the job right. The benefits and features that paid SEO can give helps your SEO journey a lot easier and faster. Features such as competitor research, keyword count, SERP rankings and many more help you get the right decision on what to do next.
When you are more visible, and people talk about your business, you will build trust in your potential customers. Google weight heavily to trust and credibility to rank you higher on the search results. Never underestimate the hard work on building trust. Once you earn it from your customers and your business gains popularity, your website ranking will be hard to wear off.
Conclusion
SEO helps you become visible online and helps your potential customers find you. When done right, it rewards you immensely by voting you as the authority in your space. Search engines, especially Google, help you get on top of the list when you do the right things in this process.
The key is to provide valuable information to your potential customers through your website’s content. Focus on them and deliver content that’s makes you trustworthy. Remember, you want them to know who you are and how your business can help their lives.
Breathe for a moment and don’t get too caught up with the thrill. SEO is easier said than done. This process takes up a lot of hard work, coupled with a long-term strategy. But, small efforts made will make a huge difference.
