How I Got My Business to the Top of Google Searches
Author: John Edwards
Author: John Edwards
So what makes me an expert I hear you say? I am a business man with nearly 10 years experience in web development, search engine optimisation and PPC advice. In my day job I run a very successful Stansted Airport Taxi business which is now booming owing to the number of online enquiries we receive every day, the result of many hours of work that I will share some of my secrets with you in this short article. Unlike my competitors, I do not use Yellow Pages, Thomson Local and many of your more traditional form of advertising. My advertising budget is miniscule to what other comparative companies have. So what are you waiting for? In a recession you need to ensure that you review your costs at every level of your business and ensure that when you invest in advertising, traditional or online, that you are maximising your return on investment at every opportunity. The cost of Yellow Pages or Thomson Local is not cheap ask yourself this, would you like more enquiries than you already enjoy currently for FREE? If your answer is yes then read on and I will showcase a method for you to procure, develop and optimise a website for as little as 25 for a whole year! The investment you need is time and commitment and no I am not just going to refer to pay per click advertising. Organic search results FREE advertising and massive exposure on the top search engines..and you dont need to have any in depth knowledge of web site design, HTML, CSS or anything! Before we start I am a normal commercially minded business man, I am not a geek or next Bill Gates, rather, a business man who respects the fact that consumers have changed the way in which they make decisions about buying goods and services ask yourself this your customers have access to the internet and you are not listed on Google will they still call you or will they see what one of your competitors are doing first? Can you afford to take the risk? Of course you cant, it is just common sense isnt it? Please read on and pass my advice on to your friends and colleagues as I believe all businesses should have a chance to realise the true potential of the truly inclusive market place called the world wide web. So what will I cover? Introduction Website Builder Site Specific Keywords and Title Tags The must dos explained quickly! The Beauty of Good Website Content and Large Web Sites Secrets of quality, organic Back links and Social Networking sites Many SEO Consultants make bold claims about how you can get page one listings for keywords that may or may not be relevant to your business only for you to find that the keywords that they are looking to optimise their sites for are so obscure that no one will ever search for them, no wonder they can get onto the first page of Google! We operate a successful Stansted Airport taxi and chauffeur business. We took a decision a few years back to not only have a good looking web site but to have a site that is capable of being found very easily all across the web. You can have the most beautiful web site but unless people can find it the site will offer you little in terms of a return on investment. The techniques and process I am about to go through with you have formed an integral part of our growth strategy for our business over the past 5 years and now I am going to share some of our secrets with you in how we have used Google and effective search engine exposure to really make a success of our business even in a recession. Google is king. Whilst it does pay to be listed on the other search engines, to be on the first page of Google is the only place to be found if you are truly serious about significant web traffic. As an example, our premium site that offers Stansted airport taxitransfers to and from London Stansted Airport enjoys over 90% of its search engine traffic from Google, period,ue to its extremely strong web presence on Google and other major search engines. In fact dont be fooled into thinking that I have been working on this example website for 5 years I first started this site in November 2008 and was number one on Google for a very competitive search term by 28 January 2009!! No PPC, no external consultancy, no tricks a sustained number one position since 28 January 2009! Yes it can be done and you will do the same if you follow the steps I am about to share with you. Introduction Website Builder If you are new to the business of web site design and development dont be encouraged to pay hundreds of pounds to develop a site from scratch. If like me you are a small business owner looking to make the right step to internet marketing for the first time, then in the interests of controlling your costs please consider the idea of building the site yourself before spending hundred, possibly thousands, on an external consultant. Here are my reasons: A quality website built from scratch that is not built on a template can cost you from 1000 to 10-20k depending on what you want to use the site for; If you require a shop window or e-commerce site on the web then this can be done simply and cheaply but in a way that still generates you massive traffic and leads/sales. I would rather you spend your budget on PPC advertising once you have built a content rich, well linked site for only 25! Even before you buy a domain for your web site the first tip I would offer you is to decide upon the one significant keyword term you want to rank well for. Dont just pick your business name; instead, think what your customers do when they are looking to buy your product or service. How do I do that? Simple, use the power of Google to show you what search terms people are clicking on for their Adwords campaigns. Google publish all of their adword campaign results online the Google Keyword Tool should only be used as a guide as to what terms related to your business might generate you significant traffic. Interestingly you can also see how much others [competitors?] are paying for the top sponsored listing in adwords! In my example we operate a Stansted Airport taxi service my research found that the term Stansted taxi was the premier of searches used. I then decided that this was the search term I was going to optimise my site for. But what about my own company name I hear you say? Think about this lets say you run a successful Furniture shop in Saffron Walden, Essex called Smiths Furniture Store. Now ask yourself, if I bought the domain
www.smiths-furniture-store.co.uk and I optimised for this search term who from outside Saffron Walden would find you? In other words, unless I know the name of your business I am unlikely to find you! Now lets try
www.north-essex-furniture-sales.co.uk. In this example you have sacrificed your local brand to effectively broaden your on line appeal to thousands of other potential customers not only based in Saffron Walden but in the whole of North Essex and beyond!! By carefully selecting a broad domain name for your market place you can ensure that you can generate significantly more traffic to your site and bag new customers too!! Win, win. In our example of Stansted taxi, we offer chauffeur services also, but we needed a domain that would broaden our appeal on line we opted for
www.stanstedtaxiservice.co.uk as everyone knows what a taxi service is. Now you will notice that our chosen primary keyword phrase of Stansted taxi is also contained within the domain name this is not an accident!! So choosing a domain name is really important remember, ask yourself this question at this point, is my domain going to help my site be understood and found more easily? Domain name chosen what next.? My top tip is NOT to spend thousands on buying a site - there are now a number of Flash site maker providers who offer you unlimited pages to build your own web site for FREE or for as little as 25 [with no adverts]. 25!!! Yes it really is as cheap as this and it includes hosting and you WILL be found on all of the major search engines. They will provide you with all of the tutorials you need and even provide templates to help you get going in about 30minutes easy to upload, no fuss, just perfect for the small business! So how much have you spent so far, 35 which includes your well thought out domain, not bad and you have only been reading this for 5 minutes! Site Specific Keywords and Title Tags The must dos explained quickly! Now that you have your new site your next thought should be given to content. You will hear a lot about this because Google ranks web sites on the basis of votes or back links from other sites who consider your site important enough to offer useful info or links that may interest their users. Whilst there are other reasons for ranking well in Google please take it from me, this is THE one to get right, without which you will not get far. Many of the bigger businesses have been around long enough that they attract thousands of back links every day this is why they are difficult to beat. I did though and now I am going to tell you how. Your web site needs to contain a reasonable number of variations of your primary keywords. Dont get silly with this the keywords need to be kept to a total of 5 good phrases that enable you to make clear and articulate sentences with. Yes, you can also use your keywords in your titles but make sure that your main body text is readable! An example from my Stansted London Taxiwebsite is listed below: As we are based at Stansted Airport you can relax in the knowledge that we are close at hand to manage your Stansted London Taxi24 hours a day. Our dedicated call centre staff are on hand from 8am to 11pm on +44 [0] 8456 436 705 to discuss your Stansted to London requirements and provide you with a FREE quotation. We are also able to field any email enquiries you have. Remember, if you are travelling from London to Stansted, we can help you too! Stansted London Taxialso offers a meet and greet service where by the driver will meet you with a board with the name/company clearly written. Ideal for first time visitors to the UK, if there are any delays with your flight then please don't worry, we will monitor your flight and only dispatch a driver once you have landed. At Stansted London Taxiwe are committed to providing our customers with very competitive fares and all journeys have a fixed price regardless of the route or time taken*. When you book your London to Stanstedtaxi please remember that there are no cancellation fees and no premium charges for late night or early morning bookings. The Stansted London Taxifleet is a modern range of air conditioned cars, MPVs and executive Audi A6's. Wherever possible you may also benefit from a FREE upgrade to further enhance your travel experience! Spot the keywords related to my business? One clue spot Stansted London Taxi and London to Stansted? The insert is clearly written and will provide the Google search engine with rich content with which crawl. So lets dispel the myth of meta data - title tags, header tags, meta tags and image alt tags. Many SEO Consultants make this out to be rocket science but let me tell you it really is very easy: Each of your pages will have a Title tag USE THIS CAREFULLY it is imperative once again that you look to include your primary keyword and other phrases in your title tag. Why? It is this statement that will normally be used by the search engine to tell a customer what you are offering a massive sales board online 24/7 so you need to fashion this to your business very carefully. In my business I want my customers to be under no illusion that we offer airport taxis and what number to call. My customers dont even need to click on the url to get a number. When I see companies with Home Page in their title tag I just giggle as this is such a wasted opportunity you have been warned! Using the Smith Furniture Store example again, this is what I would look to include: North Essex Furniture Sales | Saffron Walden | 01799 555666 Header Tags use them, all of them! Ensure that H1 are keyword rich and as you go through H2, H3 you should look to vary your keyword phrases keep them relevant and never neglect this! Tip: look at other establish sites tight click on the site and view their source to see what they are doing always useful tip to check you your competitors! Ensure that you have different title tags for each of your pages make it relevant but NEVER be lazy and have the same title tags throughout your website. Meta Tags Keywords limit these to no more than 5 key phrases it will help to keep your website really focused on your chosen niche/market too many keywords mean that you may link on page 10 for 100 keywords wouldnt you rather list on page 1 for 5 and enjoy serious traffic??? Meta Tags Description This is another area where many businesses, both big and small neglect. Now sometimes Google, depending on the search, will decide itself what to show but you can help driver better traffic to your web site and help Google by writing a keyword rich, but user friendly, description for EACH page of your web site. See my own example below: Saffron Walden and North Essex Furniture Sales - Affordable furniture available in our Saffron Walden, Essex showroom. Call in today to discuss your furniture requirements. Notice my use of Saffron Walden Furniture throughout and the way in which it reads in an articulate fashion, this is the sort of approach you will need to master to ensure that your preferred description is used as opposed to a randomly chosen search engine description. I hope that when you design your web site you will have some nice images to showcase your wares that will help make your site look more attractive. This is just a small reason for having images however, trust me. When I look at most sites and right click on images I am amzed when I see image3 car. The ALT TAG effectively acts as a label and MUST be used. Try to ensure that you have a variety of your keyword phrases contained within each single alt tag. This is a little tip but you will be amazed what difference it can make. The Beauty of Good Website Content and Large Web Sites Take Note! This is really an add on from the last section but never underestimate the power of good content on your web page. This is no secret you might be able to get away with this on yahoo, Bing and MSN but you wont with GOOGLE! Remember to write as naturally as you can and dont be fooled into thinking that you will simply be able to list out your keywords and aim to beat google this way you cant I have tried and was penalised heavily! My primary site is large with many sub pages. GOOGLE LIKES BIG SITES. Google also likes a site map on your web page this is essential and will enable search engines to track and make easy sense of your web pages. One essential tip is to link each page with each other using IN SITE anchor links. Using various phrases from your keywords be sure to make each link in BOLD on the page. Once again, this will help to make it completely clear to all search engines what your web site is and provide you with well optimised back links to all of your pages. Secrets of quality, organic Back links and Social Networking sites Please wait for my next article How I Got to the Top of Google Above Major Competition - A Practical Step by Step Guide to help you Generate Effective Back links to generate Massive FREE search engine web traffic to your new website! About the Author:
To contact me to discuss how I could possible help you with your website development and search engine optimisation then view my contact details on our
Stansted London Taxi web site.
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