6 Reasons Why SEO Is as Important as Your Site Itself
You’ve spent many sleepless nights designing and developing a glorious website for your product. You’ve poured over CSS templates, meticulously set up your CMS, and configured your web analytics package.
Now that the all-important site launch announcement has been freshly fired off, why are you still hearing crickets?
It’s time to generate interest in the web property you’ve worked so hard to build. Here’s why you should be just as focused on SEO as you are on Web development.
1) Findability
If your site is the destination, then search results are the roads that lead there. Your head terms like office supplies are your highways, while long-tail keywords like HP Deskjet ink cartridges are your back roads.
Strategic SEO planning helps connect your site to well-trafficked Search routes that are relevant to your destination.
2) Exposure
If you can’t be found, you won’t be seen! Findability can get you listed for the right keywords, but if you don’t rank you’ll still be invisible.
The SEO process forces you to consider online exposure from the perspective of your content assets. And SEO arms you with a unique set of data: precisely what your audience is querying. If you’re not writing pages that are relevant to the audience’s interests then they just won’t see you.
3) Connectivity
With exposure comes awareness of the larger world. And not all other properties appearing in Search Results are competitors. Some can be allies, “frenemies” or boosters. Take another look at the SERPs. Some of those listings above you just might be receptive to linking or useful to follow on Twitter. Either way, SEO is a great way to avoid marketing in a hermetically sealed bubble.
4) Authority
Once people know who you are and have connected with you, your site can begun to build it’s most important asset of all: credibility. In fact, Google’s original algorithm was build with this in mind. Google takes connections from other authoritative sites into consideration when ranking pages for relevant keywords. So the more people engage with you and begin to trust you as an authority for your topic, the better you are likely to rank!
5) Brand Management
Heavy is head that wears the crown. Established authority requires vigilance. Once you become a presence both online and in the SERPs, people will try to overtake you – and some people don’t play fair. Some may try to besmirch your name, taint your branded search results and generally muck up your reputation.
Fortunately, SEO is often the solution to its own pitfalls. By setting up Google Alerts and monitoring your keywords, you can engage in reputation management and defend against online potshots.
6) Long-Term Traffic
When launching a new brand, many businesses wind up focused on traditional, and often pricey, promotional tactics –usually with short-term exposure in mind. As television ads cycle out and promotional events are crossed off the calendar, this lack of long-term planning can cause brands to fade out of the public eye.
SEO provides a wonderful path for long-term exposure. Generally, keyword relevancy grows rather than wanes over time. So as your print ad is replaced in next month’s magazine, the audience looking for “designer office furniture” will still be exposed to your brand.
Avoid a Traffic Breakdown
Building a great site isn’t the end of your online marketing strategy; it’s merely the beginning. If no one can find you – or worse, if no one knows who you are – your domain may join the multitude of unvisited pages rusting out along the information superhighway.
