Starting up a small business? You may be tempted to spend your money and capital on a boatload of paid advertisements on the Internet or social media to get sales quick. While that is definitely a viable tactic, you might want to consider the power of search engine optimisation – or SEO.
SEO is considered to be one of the most effective digital marketing strategies. Over 60% of B2B marketers state that SEO generates more leads than any other marketing strategy. Another 70% of online marketers say that SEO is actually more effective than PPC.
It stands to show that SEO is definitely something that you should be doing as a small business owner.
But do you want to know just what SEO can do for a growing business like yours? Find out our top 8 reasons as why SEO is important for small businesses in this article! Let’s get right to it!
Reason 1: SEO builds brand awareness
Do you know how many Google searches are made a day? Over 3 billion! And with an effective SEO strategy, that is a lot of potential for your business to appear on the front pages of Google.
When you combine this with a great, memorable buying experience, people will be bound to remember your business’ name. This is especially true when they’re in need of your products or service again. This in turn generates countless amounts of brand awareness which is incredibly important for a business looking to get off the ground.
Reason 2: SEO is cost-effective
Small businesses usually have limited budgets. This means that you simply can’t afford to waste money on strategies that don’t give you the return of investment (ROI) you’re looking for. Luckily, SEO can potentially be a very cost-effective digital marketing strategy.
A well-targeted strategy will allow you, as a small business owner, to get the same results without spending huge amounts of money on other advertising strategies. And even though your SEO strategy still requires money to maintain, the cost will be significantly lower than paid ads.
Reason 3: SEO is a long-term strategy
Investing a large portion of your marketing budget in paid advertising will bring you results. However, these results will only last as long as your investment does. Unfortunately, this strategy is simply not sustainable as a small, growing business.
Spending money on SEO instead will bring you website traffic and new customers for longer periods of time. That’s because the goal of SEO is to get you to the front pages of search engines and then maintain those high ranking positions. No, SEO won’t bring you instant results, but the longevity of those results are well worth your investment – making it a key reason as to why SEO is important for small business
Reason 4: SEO builds trust and credibility
SEO is a great way to build brand credibility and improve your reputation as a business. When your business is able to get to the front page of the search engine result pages (SERPs), you are seen as reliable, trustworthy and dependable. Think about it – how many times have you trusted a business that you’ve found on Page 3 of Google? Not only that, but a good SEO strategy with credible backlinks are a testament to both customers and search engines that your brand and your content is a source of authority.
Reason 5: SEO improves website UX
Another reason why SEO is important for small business is on-page and technical SEO. This refers to optimising your site so that search engines recognise it as functional and high quality. Technical SEO has an add-on effect, it improves the user experience (UX) for your customers! By removing errors, bugs and declunking your web pages, you are creating a smooth, easy browsing experience for your target audience, which makes it easier for them to engage with your audience and purchase whatever your small business is offering.
Reason 6: Local SEO Increase Engagement and Conversions
SEO gives you the power to target different audiences and customers based on demographics, geographics and behaviour personas. And since over 45% of all Google searches are looking for local information, this makes local SEO very effective for small businesses. Small businesses should be looking to dominate their local areas before anything else, and SEO can help you do that. Try using specific location-based keywords and inserting local backlinks and citations in your content. By doing this you can attract new customers that are ready to engage with your business.
Reason 7: SEO helps you beat your competitors
Unless your small business provides a one-of-a-kind product or service, chances are that you’ll be competing with other businesses for a share of the market. SEO has the power to literally elevate your business above the competition. This is super important especially if you’re in an oversaturated market.
A great SEO strategy can place your business higher than your competitors in SERPs, which has huge implications for click rates of your website. In fact, the first organic result on Google has a click rate of 28% which drops to 15% for the second organic result.
Reason 8: SEO results in more targeted traffic
Traffic is great and is always a positive result for any business, big or small. But what separates a successful business from the rest is how well they are able to convert that traffic into sales and profits. An SEO strategy with keywords that address user search intent is capable of bringing potential customers which are primed and ready to purchase your product or service.
This reinforces our previous point – how SEO will prevent you from wasting money on results that won’t move the needle for your business. Targeted SEO will only generate relevant traffic that is actively searching for a solution that your business can only solve.
Use SEO to Grow Your Small Business Today
As you can see, SEO should be the go-to digital marketing strategy for your small business. Not only is it’s cost effectiveness perfect for the tight budgets of small business but it will bring in relevant results that will last for long periods of time.
Looking for more reasons why SEO is important for small business? Or maybe you’re looking for more articles to grow your business in general? Check out the ZipZipe blog and start learning today!
