SEO Basics for Your Startup Business
The benefits of setting up your startup for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) success?
By Lenka Davis and Robin Anderson
Entrepreneurs are go getters and do it yourselfers by nature so below we have listed the SEO basics for beginners that you can do. Worldwide, approximately 380 websites are created every minute and if 10% stay active that comes out to 136,800 websites being created every day. That’s a lot of information your customers have to search through to find your business.
We also have a list of resources for when you need to bring your SEO game to the next level, because we know you will.
If you understand the basic SEO definition you can scroll down and check out the four keys in our basic SEO checklist.
What is SEO?
SEO, search engine optimization, is the process of increasing the quantity and raising the quality of unpaid organic website traffic from search engines such as Google, Bing or Baidu. In other words, it is how you are going to get the right customers to your virtual store. As of January 2021 there were over 1.2 billion sites on the world wide web. (NetCraft’s Web Server Survey) Additionally about one third of websites have blogs. It is increasingly important to get your segment of customers to easily find your website.
Much has been written about SEO (search engine optimization), from how to use it to why not to set it up. In the mid 1990s, webmasters would have to manually submit their webpages to each search engine so the pages could be indexed. Since then, SEO and the web page indexing process has been a necessary part of building a webpage. Now indexing is done automatically by each search engine.
SEO is constantly evolving due to updates to Google’s search algorithm. Therefore, it is important to monitor and update your efforts as these changes are implemented.
Build your foundation now, and keep in mind that SEO is a long game (but so is trying to watch everything you like on Netflix). Then, once you have the foundation mastered, you can search the web to your heart’s content for all the advanced SEO techniques. (fun! Or frustrating?)
By the way, there are only a few esoteric reasons you would not want to maintain SEO for your website. Two examples are that no one searches for your type of product or service because it may not exist yet, or if your business has fast changing inventory or offerings. Other than that you are going to want to check out the list below.
Why is SEO important?
The main reason is because a majority of people are still searching for answers or content through search engines. As we know, it's the Information Age and you can find the answer to most questions and gain knowledge through the vast amounts of information online. The trick is finding the best answer. Even though this might be changing just a bit, due to private or invite only groups such as those on NextDoor, and Discord, communities like Slack and social media features like private Facebook groups and Clubhouse, the volume of traffic is still on search engines. That is where you will want your business to be found.
Incorporating SEO into your website gives you the advantage of delivering results for a longer amount of time than free social media posts or paid ads can do.
Another major reason is that you want the right customer to find the right information or product. That customer will then have a good experience on your website and get the information or products they need. The buying process has changed just in the last decade because buyers now do so much research online. They are knowledgeable enough to have lots of data and lots of prepared questions. Have you ever shown up at a store with a printed out web page or a pdf on your smartphone ready to discuss it all with the salesperson? If you are that awesome salesperson with all the answers you want the customers to come to you!
Benefits of SEO
People window shopping or information gathering on the internet will have a more likely chance of finding your business. Adding SEO to your marketing efforts is one part of what marketers call an inbound marketing strategy.
It’s cost effective in that for a small amount of time you put into using the best keywords for your web pages, rather than paying for web traffic through ads.
Four keys to basic SEO
Here is a basic SEO checklist to begin getting your website optimized
1. SEO Keywords
Use keywords that your customers will use to either search for your service or your product. Phrases or names can change with each age, demographic and with each industry. Look up your main keywords in Google Trends before you put them onto your web page.
Google Trends is a service provided by Google that allows you to search for keywords by different date ranges and regions of the world. It also allows you to compare a few search terms to see if they are trending up or down.
Here are two examples of how to use Google Trends.
Example 1: You search one or two related terms in the US, such as the recently popular dogecoin and bitcoin, and it shows you the interest in those word searches over time.
Example 2: Here is one search term for chocolate cupcakes recipe and when there is most interest in them in the US in the last 12 months. A good guess would be that they are a popular dessert for the February 14th Valentine's Day holiday.
Other free and paid keyword sites you can use are Ubersuggest, keywordtool.io and Google Keyword Planner which is part of Google Ads. An important point of keywords is to use authentic words that your target customer is using to search for their answers or information.
2. Website Navigation Design
In order for your website to be ready to offer your visitors a great experience, it should be easy to navigate. Make sure what your visitors are looking for is easy to find on your home page. One way to do this is to lead the visitor down a short path to the information they want. Put all like pages together, such as all product related pages or blog articles linked off of a master page, etc. Streamline your navigation bar. Apple, for example, has always been ruthless about keeping their navigation bar with the minimum necessary links. Leave lots of white space (or black space if you have a black background) around images or between text, so that the reader can rest between images and words and comprehend what you are trying to convey.
For articles, blogs or how to pages, put the relevant keywords into groups. Have your webpage load fast and be mobile friendly and responsive. Users are moving more and more towards looking at webpages on their mobile devices rather than on their desktops.
3. SEO Content Basics
So how exactly do you use the keywords you have collected? You will want to have the main ones in your headline and in your paragraph headers on the home page, and the rest in the web pages that go into more details. So product pages or ‘how to’ pages and blogs are good places to make sure that your keywords are represented.
If you have more keywords that you feel will help the visitors and the search engines, then add those in as your web page tags. Depending on your site provider they can be added into the code, for WordPress websites, or into a page setup menu for a website made by Squarespace, for example.
When you write copy for your pages, keep the tone conversational so that people from all over the world who have a varied level of comprehension of English, or the language you are writing in, can easily understand what you are writing about. The quality of your content and crawlability of Google also depends on how well your site pages are written.
Also, don’t forget to optimize your images with keywords in the description, in the alternative text, or file name. To make sure your site continues to load fast use a compressed version or small image file size. Use keywords in web page URLs, newsletter to your customers and in your social media posts.
4. What is SEO Link Building
Link building is a big part of getting your website optimized. There are many ways to approach this task. As a startup or small business that is just beginning it’s important to get it started. Think of the link building as two parts, one is from your site and the other is to your site.
On page links
This includes adding links into your blog post, articles or other pages from other organizations and professional groups related to your business. Links from your site are also referred to as on-page links.
Off page links
This includes collaborating with other partners or influencers for cross-links such as guest blogging, links from companies, organizations and other writers. You can also have your website or blog article be featured in another partner’s newsletter. Links to your site are also referred to as off-page links.
How to track your SEO
It takes time for your SEO to work for you, however, you can keep tabs on it through a few different locations. One is through Google Search Console. It tracks the top queries that result in bringing up your website on a results page. You can find information under Performance, and then make sure the Queries tab is selected. Here you will see a list of Top Queries with Clicks and impressions columns. Browse the key phrases that bring visitors to your website
Optimizing your website for today’s search engines has become a popular topic however, if you write about what you are an expert in or feel you have a community of people out there that will benefit from your information then you are heading in the right direction. Becoming familiar with keywords and web page navigation will get you a solid foundation.
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Fun Fact
What does a rock band that started in 1974 have to do with the beginning of SEO marketing? As you can guess by simply asking this question a lot. SEO was used since the early 1990s, but the term SEO Marketing was not born until the Jefferson Starship returned as a band in 1997. The band had a webpage built, however, it was not ranking on the first page of search engine results and this upset the band manager. According to several web sources, the agency repeated the band name all over the front page in the same color as the background. The search algorithms no longer work this easily however, this method did work for the iconic band and shot their ranking to the first position of page one!
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References
Keyword tools
Google Keyword Planner (it’s free, but conditions apply)
Ubersuggest
Keywordtool
SEO Services and Products
SEO Topic Related Sites
Search Engine Journal
Search Engine Land
Common Terms
SEO - Search Engine Optimization
SERPs - Search Engine Results Page
Blog - The shortened version of web log which could be anything from a detailed article or informational description or discussion on a topic.
On-page Links - Links that lead from your page to another webpage
Off-page Links - Links or cross-links that lead readers to your site.
Lenka Davis is a Managing Partner at Fly to Soar. She has worked in marketing, managing projects and building tools in the high-tech industry for Fortune 100 companies and also ran her own business. Follow Lenka and the Fly to Soar Team on Instagram @flytosoarcompany
Robin Anderson is a Managing Partner at Fly to Soar. She has worked as a marketer in the high-tech industry for companies ranging from startups to Fortune 100. Follow Robin and the Fly to Soar Team on Twitter @flytosoar.
