Once upon a time, getting your business on the front page of Google was as easy as doing some quality keyword research, writing great content, and making sure quality sites were linking to your site.
Since then, though, the times have changed.
Even if you miss the days of simple Google ranking, there’s not much small business owners can do but adapt to it. Yes, ranking in Google is more complex today than it’s been in the past, but it’s still far from impossible.
With that in mind, here are our top five tips to get your business to rank at the top of Google’s search engine results page:
5 SEO Tips to Get to the Top of Google
If you’re looking for ways to land a spot at the top of Google, focusing on SEO is your best bet. Here are five professional tips to help your rankings:
1. Optimize Your Content for RankBrain
RankBrain is a machine-learning artificial intelligence system that helps Google sort its search results. Right now, RankBrain mostly helps Google process ambiguous questions that the search engine hasn’t encountered before — an estimated 15 percent (or 450 million) of each day’s search queries.
To take advantage of this intelligent and increasingly critical system, the key is optimizing your content. Specifically, you want to create content for your website that answers unique questions. An FAQ page is a great way to do this, as is a series of blogs with a question-and-answer format.
2. Make the Most of “Near Me” Queries
One of Google’s greatest SEO focuses in recent years has been the idea of “micro-moments.” According to the search engine, micro-moments are “intent-rich moments when a person turns to a device to act on a need — to know, go, do or buy.”
In our complex, modern SEO environment, one of the best ways to get your website on the first page of Google is to optimize for these micro-moments. This means anticipating user needs, being relevant, and making your website informative and easy to access. In other words — be there, be helpful and be rapid about it all.
Optimize your website for mobile, provide plenty of detail-rich and informative content, and tailor everything you do online around helping customers. Need an example? Do your own “near me” search and check out how the business that pops up has likely collected listings and reviews and quality backlinks, as well as optimizing for mobile and offering helpful website content.
3. Optimize Content for Local Searches
While it’s one thing to optimize for “near me” searches, you’ve also got to take advantage of customers who are actually there. The best way to do this is through local search optimization.
In addition to providing the personalized experience users crave, local search optimization can increase your sales and keep customers coming back for more. Here are a few local SEO tips to take advantage of:
- Identify local keywords. You can use a tool such as Google AdWords keyword tool or KWFinder to identify local keywords and compile them.
- Optimize your existing pages. Optimize the pages you already have on your website by including your town or city name in page titles and descriptions, adding a map, and ensuring they offer local content details.
- Get listed in local directories. Drive more local traffic to your business by getting listed in local directories. These directories should include information like your business name, address and phone number — as well as a detailed description in which you tell customers what you do. Don’t forget to include a few high-quality photos and some local keywords for good measure!
4. Implement AMP
AMP stands for “Accelerated Mobile Pages.” Rolled out globally in 2016, AMP offers higher performance and engagement, more rapid results for mobile users, and a greater level of flexibility for page owners. Page speed is set to become a factor in mobile page ranking as of July 2018, so now is a great time to implement AMP if you haven’t already.
Luckily, implementing AMP is easy: Simply install the WordPress plugin if you run your site on that platform. From there, you’ll just need to validate the code and connect it to Google Analytics.
5. Write More Content
No matter how much SEO changes, one thing stays the same. This, of course, is content. The foundation of all good things in the world of SEO, content is a critical ranking factor and one you simply can’t go without. If you’re looking for a way to get your website to rank on the first page of Google, commit to creating more content.
The reasons for this are twofold. First, Google loves fresh content and will rank websites with plenty of it higher than sites that never post. Second, each new post you create gives Google one more page to index, which means more chances for you to rank and more pages for your customers to find. To improve your pages’ chances of ranking, don’t forget to include relevant keywords.
Ranking Made Simple
While ranking at the top of Google can seem like a difficult process, it’s not nearly as challenging as many people make it out to be. By doing simple things, like researching and implementing keywords, optimizing for local search, utilizing AMP and creating more content, you can create a website that ranks on the first page of Google and is every bit as visible as you want it to be.
Does SEO seem too complex for you to undertake alone? Contact our team for professional SEO services designed for small businesses like yours!