Ah, SEO! Love or hate it, the reality is – we all need it. Especially if you are a local business serving clients in one city or neighbourhood, SEO can really be your best friend.
This blog post will delve deeper into how we integrate the best case practices of SEO in every website that we create, and make the process more transparent for all business owners.
First, let’s start by sharing what SEO actually is and why it’s so important for local businesses.
SEO = Search Engine Optimisation. Having “good SEO” means that your website content is clear, organised, and easily understood by Google (and other search engines) so that when people search for “Category + City” that matches what you offer, your website shows up in the first 10 results.
Why is SEO important for local businesses? In simple terms, because having more visibility among potential customers who don’t know you exist yet can bring you lots of new customers. Without paying for ads, dropping flyers in people’s mailboxes, or even having a marketing team.
Step 0 – understanding SEO
How do you know where to order pizza from when you’re visiting a new city? You probably open Google Maps on your phone, type “pizza” or “pizza near me” and see what looks good around you.
How do you learn what the weird blinking light on your new washing machine means? You probably open YouTube and look for a video that shows you how to do that.
How do you pick a wedding dress? You probably go on Pinterest, type “minimal wedding dress inspiration”, go down the rabbit hole for days, or weeks, then open Google and search for “bridal shops + MY CITY” to book an appointment.
This is step 0 of understanding SEO. Think of which apps you use as a customer, where you search for information or new businesses (dentist, plumber, key duplication store, etc) before you spend any money.
This is also where most businesses make the mistake of thinking that just because social media exist, it’s the best way for them to grow their audience. Based on the scenarios above, does a local takeaway pizza shop need a glowing Instagram profile? Or a jazzy Pinterest profile full of videos? Clearly NOT.
However, if they have the capacity, skills or budget, being present on Pinterest, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Threads, Reddit, Quora etc can definitely bring positive results. Over time 🙂 Potentially, over a long time.
And this is why at Girls Who Web we love SEO. SEO doesn’t require daily hustle. SEO is complex, but easy to implement. SEO lasts for a very long time, even if you never update your website. Sure, having a well followed Instagram profile brings klout. But we just love efficient digital marketing strategies that don’t require ongoing efforts.
One more thing to understand about SEO is that Google is a “sorting” engine, not just a search engine.
In every search you type, Google simply sorts the content of the internet from most relevant to least relevant. This is based on the search terms (ie Pizza + City) but also!! on who you are, your browsing habits, and all the information that Google has about you. Sorted from most relevant, to least relevant.
It’s a work of beauty.
But it’s also where lots of the confusion comes from.
No one is “Number 1 on Google” for every keyword and every person.
It’s also very important to be “Number 1 on Google” for the right keywords and people. In the next paragraphs, we’ll discuss this.
Step 1 – Busting some myths about SEO
A. Your website needs to be on WordPress to have good SEO.
False. We have seen websites on Squarespace, Shopify and Wix topping the charts for the relevant keywords too. You can use ANY CMS and be on the first page of Google. The tool doesn’t matter.
B. You need a blog to have good SEO.
False. A blog can certainly help, if done right. But, if your blog is just floofy articles of 500 words written by a clueless intern or even worse, AI, you’re wasting the internet’s resources and adding no value to your customers.
It’s better to have 4 well-written articles on a Squarespace websites than 200 mediocre ones on WordPress.
C. You need to hire an agency to have good SEO.
False. hahahahahhahahahaha. So false! SEO is a valuable tactic which includes lots of technical and strategic elements which sure, require experience and expertise.
However, if you are a small local business, this is often an unnecessary large expense that won’t materially change the outcome. You can achieve 80% of an agency’s results on your own (we share how in step 3).
D. You need to run Google Ads to have good SEO.
Also false. While ads are a valuable digital marketing strategy to acquire more targeted traffic to your website, how much you spend in ads does not impact your organic ranking.
Step 2 – how we implement SEO best case practices at Girls Who Web
We are specialised in delivering pixel perfect, good looking, functional websites to local business owners, so SEO is an essential part of how we design websites – not an add on we charge a premium for.
You can view our website design packages at this page.
We start by auditing your current position on Google. We do this by accessing your Google Analytics and Google Search Console. These free tools by Google clearly show how you rank for certain searches in your target country. Here’s how it looks like:
Google Search Console then also gives us the list of top queries. This is what people search for. And this is where most business owners are surprised!! Sometimes, people search for what you do without using the right words or spelling. What’s great about Google is that the search engines are smart enough to understand what people mean.
This is why focusing on using a specific spelling or word is a pointless pursuit. If you want to call it couples therapy or couples counselling or relationship psychotherapy – Google knows it’s all similar and how relevant that is to you, even if you never use the word “psychotherapy” in your website*.
*I do know there are differences between therapy, counselling and psychotherapy. Just making a point.
What we learn from Google Analytics:
- How much of your total website traffic is organic traffic (healthy benchmark: more than 50% if not running ads)
- Whether your website is indexed by Google
What we learn from Google Search Console:
- What searches drive most of your traffic (usually it’s your business name)
- What high volume relevant searches are you not ranking for
- What words and questions do people search for that are relevant to your business (these are blog post ideas or FAQ ideas)
Once we have analysed Google Analytics and Search Console, we are ready to implement the required changes as we re-build your website. This can mean changing a page URL, or suggesting questions for your FAQ section.
What if you are launching a new business? In that case, you would have no data available in Google Analytics. So, we use Google Trends and other technical tools to research your category and position you in the best of ways to get started.
Step 3 – what can you do as a business owner to improve SEO (without spending $4000 on an agency every month)
When I share this advice with business owners, they don’t believe me.
They don’t believe me because every SEO expert out there has succeeded in convincing flower shop owners that they need to spend the same $5000 on SEO as a city-wide food delivery company.
They also don’t believe me because it’s very simple advice.
And we’re all wired to believe that complicated things work better than simple ones.
Here goes:
- Create a Google My Business profile. Free. Takes 10 minutes.
- Add as many relevant photos to the business profile. Yourself, your team, the lobby, the view from the street, the logo, the products. Preferably nice looking photos. But iPhone photos will do as well. This shows Google you are real.
- Go to your profile settings, and fill in as much information as you can. Your website, your phone number, whether the business is LGBT friendly or woman owned or wheelchair accessible. As MUCH as possible. The more info you give Google, the better Google knows how to sort you into the correct category.
- Grab the “request review” link, and message your last 5 customers personally asking to leave a review. Here’s a script that works.
Hi NAME, I hope you are well. I am ramping up our marketing and online presence, and my focus this week is to collect as many reviews as possible. Would you mind taking 2 minutes to leave us a Google review at this link describing your experience with us / our products / our service? It would greatly help us! - Share this link on social media, your email list, turn the link into a QR code and print it so that it hangs around the cashier desk in your shop / office. Your goal is to outnumber your competitor! Because who will Google recommend? Someone with 2 blurry photos and 1 review, or someone with 50 photos and 25 reviews? Who’s more likely to be real and legit? Unfortunately, Google doesn’t know if you’re better at flower arranging than your competitor. But Google will realistically infer that if you have 1000+ reviews, you know a thing or two and are therefore worth sorting at the top!
- Repeat this review request process every month.
- If you want to be fancy, automate this process via Whatsapp or email marketing (or we can help you implement this!).
Congratulations, you’ve just learned the easiest, fastest, most reliable SEO strategy there is. Customer proof! And it’s not just because it’s Google reviews. It’s because each review, or each press mention, is just a single data point that Google uses in its algorythm to decide who’s worth recommending over someone else.
As a bonus tip: change your Google Profile name from “Specials Ltd” to “Specials – Orchids & Roses For Every Celebration”. You have up to 90 characters in your name, make sure you use as many as you can to describe what you do OR describe who is your audience. Examples:
Specials – Women’s Executive Coaching
Specials – Knee Pain & Recovery Specialists
Specials – Plus Size, Unusual Wedding Dresses
You get the point.
Share your unique value proposition in your name. It’s important you use simple rather than clever words.
My previous company name was Juicy Pickles. We offered digital marketing services. And yet, the only SEO I was getting was for people in Singapore looking for pickles to buy. Needless to say, when I chose the name for this company, I knew I wanted to include WEB in the name to avoid the same mistake!
I hope this article was helpful in explaining SEO and how we integrate it in every website project that we work on. If you’re looking to develop your first website, or redesign your current one simply book a call with our team for a non-salesy chat.
