4 Sales-Driving SEO Principles Every Small Business Owner Should Know

April 29th 2020 | By Emma Grant

When you started your business, you were no doubt acutely aware that there was going to be an element of marketing involved amongst your many tasks. But what you might not have realised was what was to lie ahead when it came to online marketing and search engine optimisation.

There is so much to do when you run a small business. And when it comes to SEO, the sheer scope of the task can appear quite daunting. So much to learn, so many different facets to get your head around.

Search engine visibility is such a massive driver of enquiries and sales.

What are the most important SEO principles for the best in search engine visibility?

You know it’s so important to be visible in the search engines, as it’s such a massive driver of enquiries and sales. But where do you start? How do you work out what the most important SEO principles are so that you can focus on those first and foremost? Or, if you’re using an SEO agency, so that you can be certain they’re concentrating on the strategies that are proven to get the best results fastest, and so you can understand what they’re doing and why?

It’s precisely what we’re going to explore here in this post: the top sales-driving SEO principles, how they work and why they are so important.

1. On-page factors

A good SEO starting point is your website itself, and on-page SEO factors really do form the foundation of a solid online optimisation strategy. It’s also a good place to kick-off, because it’s one of the easiest to master, and usually delivers the best value results for the time you need to put in.

What on-page means as an SEO principle…

It means you need to make the most of what’s already on your website. It’s all about optimising…

• Optimise your keywords, including making use of related keywords.
• Optimise your title tags, using the right keywords in the right places.
• Optimise your meta descriptions, again with the right keywords, but also by making sure they’re powerful enough to compel a click.
• Optimise your headings with all the right tags.
• Optimise your images by including ALT tags and descriptive captions, using keyword rich file names and keeping image sizes reduced.
• And finally, publish high quality content that’s optimised for your core keywords.

On page factors are all about optimising. For meta data, for keywords, and more.

2. User intent

Continuing on the subject of high quality content and following on from last year’s Brighton SEO event, our search executive Genesis was prompted to ask the question, is content still king? His answer? Content is certainly important, but what really matters is answering the questions that users are asking.

One of the biggest takeaways from Brighton SEO 2019 for Genesis was that content must answer what people are asking, which means it’s crucial to write material that does just this. In other words, content is important, but user intent is king.

What user intent means as an SEO principle…

It means you need to create quality content, on a regular basis and that engages the reader. This content needs to be based on, for example, what people are asking, the information they are seeking, and the products they are comparing. As Genesis recommends, we have to do our homework on this.

Our core aim here is to think about what content will fulfil the intent of the search engine user. Are they likely to be asking how, can I, when, why or where?

Identifying the queries that drive users to any given site is our strategy here, and that’s something you’ll find amongst your analytics under search queries. Find out the queries, then craft great content that answers them.

3. Link building

Link signals are important for organic SEO as well as ranking as an important local SEO factor. It’s a huge subject though, but there are some essentials to help guide you in the right direction.

When a website gets a link coming into it, it’s like a vote of confidence. The higher ranking and more authoritative the page giving the link, the more that vote counts. And the more quality links a website has coming into it, the more Google will consider it important, duly rewarding it with a rankings boost.

What link building means as an SEO principle…

It means link building is important, but that it’s vital to pursue only links that are relevant, that serve a purpose to the visitor and that are visible. A link to your content from a site that has nothing in common with what you do is highly unlikely to be clicked. A link that doesn’t look compelling is pointless. And links that are buried in untapped corners of a website simply won’t get found.

Research, again, is so important here. Research the sites where your audiences hang out. Research the sites that link to your high-ranking competitors. And finally, put your user intent research into action.

It’s vital to pursue only links that are relevant, that serve a purpose to the visitor and that are visible.

4. Technical factors

Whilst this one is by no means for the faint-hearted, it is nevertheless one of the most important SEO principles. So, if you’re not well-versed in code-related tactics, it’s best you hand this one over to the seasoned experts. We’re including it here because you need to know it matters. A lot.

What technical means as an SEO principle…

It means looking at the infrastructure and hosting of your website to make sure it’s fully geared up to load pages quickly and to perform optimally; to interlink its pages in a well-structured format; to avoid identical content appearing on different URLs; to make sure redirects are properly set up and to ensure mobile-friendliness. Amongst many, many other things.

For the non-tech online marketer, Search Engine Journal summarises technical SEO really well.

Core SEO principles for sales-driving success

By increasing online visibility through core SEO principles, your small business will start to enjoy a boost in enquiries. And with a solid conversion strategy, those enquiries will have the best chance possible of turning into sales.

As we discussed, there is a lot to get your head around when it comes to SEO, but as a known driver of sales, it’s so important to make certain you keep those core principles at the top of your task list.

No time for SEO? Not sure how to get the most out of a search engine optimisation campaign? Talk to Figment. Our experts have been achieving exceptional results for a host of small businesses for a number of years. Why not get in touch and discover today how we could help make a difference for yours?