SEO, or search engine optimization, is a major method in directing traffic to your website more efficiently. Big search engines like Google use algorithms that constantly scour the web for information that is relevant to their customers’ search terms. If someone is trying to find out how to build a treehouse that’s safe for kids, Google is going to take a few nanoseconds to dig through the internet for content about Treehouse Safety. There are many ways to optimize a website and its content for search engines like Google, but one of the most practical ways is to simply produce content which contains the sort of search terms that real people type into Google. A short article can’t do justice to the ever-changing field that is SEO, but there are some concrete benefits to learning about and incorporating some SEO best practices into the way your website works.
- Your Work Will Pay Off Better. You may have amazing content. But if it doesn’t contain phrases that real people are searching for, and if your site isn’t constructed in such a way that allows search engines to easily check your stuff, your audience is going to be severely limited. Contrast this with content that is constructed with Search in mind. The latter will bring in a lot more traffic than the other piece of content, even if it isn’t technically any better in terms of content and writing quality. SEO is the language of the internet itself, and you’ve got to learn to speak it if you want your content to be discovered.
- Your Network Will Grow. As your site becomes more accessible for people interested in your niche, or area of expertise, you will become a known entity on the web. Sure, you may only be known by other people in the Treehouse Safety community. But on the internet, that might be 10,000 people. Writing material in a very small niche isn’t problem if you are drawing readers from everyone in the world. So create your content bravely, no matter how obscure. SEO will help you find your audience.
- Your Work Will Last. If you successfully create material that is relevant and optimized for the way people search for information on the internet, you stand a chance of having your material bring in traffic for years to come. The average blog post is a flash in the pan. It doesn’t draw much attention and piddles out in a matter of hours. But the best material, always with a provocative searchable title, has a way of staying at the top of search results for months and years. Many content creators have residual income coming in from old content for many years.
If you want to take your SEO to the next level, you may very well have to hire the pros. A company like WSI (most used search engine search term: SEO Northern Ireland) have mastered all levels of SEO, even the most obscure. Take your SEO as far as you can on your own, then hire the pros when you get stuck. Together, you’ll start bringing serious traffic to your site.
