Search Engine Optimization:

What’s Fact and What’s Fiction

Myths and misconceptions abound when it comes to what works and what doesn’t when trying to elevate the online status of a website. Must you pay for top billing? Are there secret codes and key words that should be plugged in? Can you do it yourself; or should you hire an “expert”? The answer is yes and no.

There are two different types of online search results—organic and sponsored listings. Sponsored listings, which are paid ads, are the very first listings that pop up on a page when doing a search, plus those that appear on the right side of the page. 

Organic listings are determined exclusively by the search engine—Google, Yahoo, etc., which sends out “robots” to see what’s on a site—text, links, etc. Then they decide where your listing will rank online.

Onsite and Offsite Optimization

There are two areas that search engines look at to determine rankings—onsite and offsite optimization. Onsite optimization is the content of a site—key words, text, and pictures, etc. Search Engines look at the actual site to see what user’s see. It is not interested in what is “buried” and not seen by users.

Offsite optimization takes a look at a site’s popularity, which means how many other sites out there are linked to it. For example, if there are 100 links pointing to your site, but there are 150 links pointing to your competitor’s site, then your competitor’s site is more popular and may get a more favorable ranking. There are other factors involved, but in the end, search engines look at a combination of a site’s onsite key words and offsite links to determine rankings.

Linking up with your friend’s sites—known as reciprocal linking—worked well in the past, but Search Engines see this practice as a tactic to increase rankings, and no longer gives it any status. Search Engines now look for one-way links—sites linked to your site that your site is not linked back to.  This eliminates people trying to inflate their site’s popularity.

Summary:

• Onsite optimization: key words, text, photos, etc.
• Offsite optimization: links pointing to your site
• Search Engines combines both to determine rankings

Fooling Search Engines

Let’s say you use a Search engine to look for refrigerator repair shops. During your search, you expect to find relevant results, but instead the search engine gives you lists of shoe repair shops. Not very effective and not likely you’ll use that Search Engine again. For that reason, Search Engine’s are very protective of their method for ranking sites because they don’t want that scenario to happen. Artificially inflating websites with keywords that aren’t relevant degrade the quality of the search and turn away customers.

Many people and companies think they can somehow fool Search Engines into giving their site a higher ranking. For that same reason, Search Engines are always on the lookout for tricks and tactics people use to influence search results and artificially inflate their rankings. Most Search Engine’s algorithm methods for ranking sites are not available to the public. If they showed their hands, then every site would be on the first page; and that’s just not possible. A Search Engine’s reputation to provide quality search results is always on the line. Therefore, it takes an unbiased look at sites to give the best, relevant results.

What You Can Do

If you launch a new business, you promote it by utilizing public relations tactics and advertising, all of which help you establish relationships with potential customers and other businesses. Forgetting about the Internet for a second, if you launched a new business today, how would you promote it? Typically, with tried and trued public relations strategies.

Try using those same PR tactics online. For example, find a blogger that will mention your site; arrange to have advertising appear on other related websites and/or form strategic relationships with related companies. Establishing these types of connections will help build offsite popularity. Also, continue to add fresh, relevant content to your site to encourage both repeat visitors and others to link to your website.

Summary:

• Use traditional PR methods to promote your business/site
• Get bloggers to mention your business
• Establish strategic relationships with related businesses
• Keep your site fresh , relevant, and updated

Pay Per Click Advertising: It’s Better on Top

Want your listing at the top of the heap? Then consider Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising. Sponsored optimization advertising can get you a ranking above everyone else’s.

For most Tucson businesses that serve a small geographic area, it doesn’t make sense to spend a lot of money optimizing a site. Search Engine optimization can be costly because it’s labor intensive—it requires a lot of legwork and the ability to form multiple online relationships. It’s not a quick trick you can apply once and forget about; it’s an ongoing process that is time intensive.

Pay Per Click online advertising is a good alternative to Search Engine optimization because you can achieve good rankings while controlling the cost. With PPC, you can buy rankings for any key word within the search engine and you only pay if someone clicks on your ad and goes to your website. The idea of paying for clicks that don’t necessarily generate direct sales can be scary to some business owners, but it’s as scary if you understand your conversion rate.

With PPC, you can set a budget. Say you want to spend $10 a day and your hits cost 50 cents each. That means once you’ve gotten 20 hits for the day, your ad no longer shows up online…until the next day. And you start all over again. You’ll need to measure every lead that comes to your door, such as, What search engine did the potential customer use to find you? What link did they click on? It’s important to put systems in place to measure responses.

How much you pay per click depends on the demand for the service or product. You pay for the privilege to get people to your site. Yes, there will be clicks that don’t turn into business, but that’s true with any advertising media. If you buy an ad in the newspaper, how many people will just turn the page? Online, however, people usually search with a purpose. They’re looking for you; they are not just randomly flipping through the pages of a newspaper. So your ad is more targeted to your customer.

Sounds easy and cost effective, but to make sure it actually is a sound business expense you need to understand your conversion rate, which is how much business you generate. In other words, how many people actually do business with you compared with the number of people that could potentially do business with you. If you spend 100 dollars and get 100 hits, and 1 person does business with you, then your conversion rate is 1 percent. That customer cost you $100. Does it make sense for you to spend $100 per customer? For some businesses, it does; for others, it does not.

So yes, you can get a top listing if you pay for it. PPC advertising can be a great way to target customers and get your site to the top of the page. It offers predictable costs, higher rankings, more targeted searches, access to better analytic tools, and provides traffic to your site.

• More traffic to site
• Higher rankings
• Lower costs
• More predictable
• More control

In conclusion, making your way to the top of the search engines can be done both through organic search optimization and pay per click advertising. Each method comes with its own set of challenges and rules. However, we believe Search Engine optimization can be labor intensive and costly, while Pay Per Click advertising offers a better solution for local businesses looking to attract local traffic.