Over recent weeks we have been cleaning out some of our old files – files relating to new business opportunities where we were asked to quote for Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) work.  In some cases we won the business and in others we didn’t – mainly because the prospect could not see the ‘value’ or the return on his investment in organic search engine optimisation.

Hindsight is a perfect science of course but the sad fact is that all of the people who chose us to market their business online for them are still in existence.  Sadly, and we take no pleasure out of this, many of the businesses who felt unable to justify the investment in our search engine optimisation services a few years ago are no longer trading.

The ROI on internet marketing, including search engine optimisation and social media marketing is that your business will still be around in 5 years time!

Since we started our WSI Internet Marketing business back in 2005 things have changed considerably.  Oh how easy SEO was back in 2005!  A typical scenario back then would be:

We used a good keyword research tool to help us create effective keyword meta tags for each page.  We did a very mild rewrite of the web page content to include the keywords we had identified and that was about it.  The client was happy and we had a relatively easy life!  Our clients’ websites had keyword meta tags and those keywords were actually part of the web page content – wow! – this put them ahead of about 80% of their competitors.  We were regarded almost as ‘guru’s’ because of our knowledge of the dark art of SEO!

Today things are very different indeed – although hopefully our clients still think we are guru’s who know what they are doing!

Today the ‘algorithm’ used by Google for example has many contributing factors and the ‘weighting’ attached to each of these factors is changing on a frequent and regular basis.

Most readers will at least have heard about the Google ‘Panda’ updates – there have been about 7 of them now.  Despite the many tweaks and changes over the past few months one thing has become abundantly clear to us:  ‘Content is King’.

Google is always on the lookout for fresh user generated content.  Fresh, quality content needs to be published on all your ‘web properties’ not just your main website.  Yes you need to publish a regular flow of good content on your own website – a blog is arguably the most efficient way of doing this – but you can also publish some great content on other web properties.

What do you mean web properties?

A web property can be simply defined as any website or online portal which features your content.  These can include amongst others, your directory entries and your social media profiles.

When did you last update the details for your business on the directories you are listed on?

How often do you publish content on your social media channels?  Do you always include a link back to your website when you publish your social media pages?

The more ways people can find your business name and detail of what you can do for them, the higher you will appear in the organic search results.

If you would like to know more about how to succeed on the internet and how we can help you achieve your internet marketing goals, please leave a comment below or use the contact form.   Griffin & Black– Internet Marketing Services for Businesses in Surrey, Sussex, Kent & throughout the South East of England.