SEO:Google’s free tool you need to use before writing a word.

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Anyone who has a business website wants to get found on Google. SEO helps customers find your website, so how do we improve your chances of being found? I know what you’re thinking – we find an internet expert to fix the problem. You can do that, and we’ll talk about the best way to utilise that option in another article, but there are some DIY alternatives.

SEO is big business all around the world, with some companies paying thousands of dollars a week to ensure that their website stays at the top of everyone’s search results.

For those of us who take care of our own internet popularity, let’s break the task of SEO down into bite sized pieces. To make your website more visible, using the internet, you need people to know how to find you. If they are searching for a company that offers your services and/or products, will your website contain the words they search?

Imagine your ideal client… They are sitting down at their computer and they need you. How do they find you? They open a search engine like Google, and they type in something like one of the following:

•A question, like ‘How do I find a…’
•A description of what they are looking for, like ‘used motorbikes’
•A description of the kind of business they think might sell what they need, like: ‘bike shop’

They might also include information like this in their search:

•Suburb, state, country
•Postcode, street name

Does this give you ideas about which words people might be using to search for you? You may have already started making a mental list of these words. Now, how do you test your guesses? I’m happy to tell you that there’s a way you can check what words and word combinations people are searching. This means you can know exactly what words and phrases to include in the back end and the front end of your website.

Google AdWords Keyword Tool is free, and it allows you to check your word searches, to see what people are searching when they look for you. For example, if you type ‘second hand motorbikes’ into the search field, here are some of the search stats returned:

Second hand motorbikes    4 400
Used motorbikes        18 100
Second hand bikes    12 100
Buy motorbike        9 900
Motorbike sale        165 000
Motorbike dealers    22 200
Motorbikes for sale    74 000

Which of these words/phrases should you use in your website to attract the most hits? All of them! The more of these strong search words and strings of words you include on your site, the higher your chances are that new customers will find you.

So choose words and phrases that you would use to search for your kind of business, insert them into Google AdWords Keywords Tool one word or phrase at a time, and pay close attention to the combinations in the list which show the biggest number of searches. Record all of these, and use them on your website.

If you want to go the DIY SEO route, a consult with us could be exactly what you need. In just an hour we can cover a lot of information that will help you regularly update your SEO and give you an edge in your field. Most businesses don’t have the first clue about SEO, so you don’t need to be an expert to be ahead of the pack.