Rodney Ringler |
Rodney Ringler is President of Advantage1 Web Services, Inc., which
owns a network of Web Hosting Informational Websites including
HostChart.com, ResellerConnection.com, FoundHost.com,
ResellerForums.com, and HostingKnowledge.net. Rodney has over 15 years
industry experience from programming to internet marketing.
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Rodney Ringler
has written 2 articles for SB Informer. |
View all articles by Rodney Ringler... |
Small Businesses Can Increase Website Revenue and Leads Through SEORodney Ringler
March 26, 2009
Small businesses are
struggling in these tough economic times. They are in a pinch, needing to cut
costs, but also increase revenue and customer base. How do you grow your
business when you are cutting costs? One avenue is shifting more of your
marketing focus to the internet and onto your website. With a little training
you can learn enough Search Engine Optimization techniques to put your website
at the top of search engine pages for your important keywords(search terms).
Search Engine Optimization(SEO) is free and requires no costs, which can bring
you free leads and customers for years to come. If your business's Marketing Plan does not include an SEO section you
should add one immediately. SEO for most small businesses is not as much work
as you think because you are not going for some of the most competitive
keywords. For example, trying to rank high for a popular generic keyword like "real
estate" is
very hard, but ranking high for "fort
mill real estate" is much easier. The 3 most popular search engines are Google, Yahoo, and MSN. There are also
many smaller search engines as well as industry specific directories that you
can rank high in to generate traffic. Even though the major search engines have
their own algorithms they all operate on the same basic principles. To rank
high for a keyword, 2 things have to happen. First, your web page needs to be
deemed relevant for that keyword, and secondly, you must have a high page
ranking. Search engine rankings have nothing to do with how much traffic you
receive. Search engines also treat each page of a website separately, and will
rank them separately. Obtaining relevance for your web pages for your keywords requires going through
each page in your website one time and making some changes which include:
- Put the keywords in the text through
the site. - Put the keywords in the Page Title - Put the keywords in the meta
description and keywords - Put alt tags with keywords on all
images An SEO book or internet search will teach you even more. For the most part this
is a one time task and not one that requires work every week. Now your site is
optimized and in the list when someone searches. The second step of obtaining a high page rank allows you to rise to the top of
the list for your search terms and get on the first page of a search. This is
an ongoing part, but the work is free and does not require that much time each
week. The whole key to page rank is incoming links. These are links from other
websites to your website. The major search engines rank your web pages by who
and how many other web pages link to you. Ranking has nothing to do with
traffic to your website. The general theory is - if
someone is willing to link to you and direct their visitors to you, then you
must have some quality content. Getting links from high ranking sites and/or
sites related to yours help more, but all incoming links help. The following is a list of ways to gain incoming links.
- Develop link partnerships with
related websites. You place a link to their website on yours and they do the
same.
- Submit articles/press releases to
online article sites with links to your site in the article or bio at the end.
We use a list of over hundred sites including www.EzineArticles.com and www.GoArticles.com as well as business specific content sites.
- Post to forum boards related to your
business. Always have a link to your site in the signature of every post.
- Create/reply to blogs. Always put
links in your post's signature and blogs.
- Submit your site to the thousands of
online directories and search engines. These basics can get you started and a class or book can teach you more.
Ranking high for the right terms will bring you free targeted leads for a long
time. What better lead is there than someone searching specifically for your
products or services.
Hostchart is a leading web hosting directory website that has been in business for over 8
years. They provide numerous web hosting articles and tutorials as well as
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