What is SEO?
The Video
The Why
In nearly all the huddles I join, I’m told one of the biggest topics customers seem to ask about is SEO—not only after, but before their sites are even built! WS’s tell me they don’t feel they know enough to provide an adequate answer, so in part 1 of this video, I’m going to give a general overview of what SEO is along with some examples, and in part 2 we’ll cross over into the Designer’s Desk and get into exactly what Marketing Services does for websites to improve their SEO and why it’s so beneficial.
And as always, you can find all the relevant information in the style guide link right here.
The How
So what exactly is SEO?
We all know that SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, but what exactly is it and what does it do for websites? SEO is the practice of increasing both quality and quantity of website traffic, as well as exposure to your brand, through non-paid, what we call organic search engine results.
In the video are some examples of non-organic paid search engine results, along with an organic result.
You will see that GoDaddy is at the top of the organic search engine results, which is exactly where we should be.
So why is having good SEO so important for our WDS customers’ websites?
- While paid advertising, social media, and other online platforms can generate traffic to websites, the majority of online traffic is driven by search engines like Google and Bing.
- Also, organic search results are more credible to searchers than paid advertisements, with something like 20x more traffic opportunity than pay per click ads on both mobile and desktop.
- SEO is also one of the only online marketing channels that, when set up correctly, can continue to pay dividends over time.
- Optimizing your site will help deliver better information to search engines so that your content can be properly indexed and displayed within search results.
So if you’re a WS2 or 3 on a consultation or a WS1 on a marketing services update call, what words or phrases would you listen for to know that the customer is talking about SEO?
- If they mention anything about googling their site or searching for their site online, that usually means SEO.
- Also, if they talk about their ranking in a search engine, that’s an indication they want to talk about SEO as well.
- If they use any of the older SEO terms like keywords or meta tags, that’s an SEO question that we will be getting into in part 2 of this SEO overview.
So what do we have coming up in part 2 of this overview of SEO? Well we’re going to crossover and take a seat at the Designer’s Desk where I’ll be talking to one of our top builders who will be answering questions about things like the elements of SEO strategy. Plus we’ll talk about how SEO has changed since the old days and how it’s handled today. We’ll also talk about what we do when a customer submits a marketing services SEO ticket including how we add and edit fields in the WordPress dashboard along with what each field means.
Thanks again for watching, and stay tuned for part 2 of this SEO overview, the Designer’s desk edition!