SEO is becoming more important than ever for businesses, especially small businesses.

And here are 7 reasons why you should have Search Engine Optimization (SEO) done on your web site.

However, these 7 reasons boil down to 1 important thing:

Trust: If you are at the top of Google (organically), it means they trust you. Backlinks to your site mean other people trust you. If you can show all that trust, your customer is more likely to trust you.

Here are 7 ways to start building that trust:

#7: Local searches are growing.

Google research showed that 78% of local-mobile searches ended in a sale… in 2014! Your business is losing customers if you are not being found in local searches, even if you are a company that is only online.

Google also did a study in 2018 and found out that over half of all searches were for local products and services.

#6: Local SEO can get you higher in Google, Bing and other search engines.

People like working with local people first. So, when you have articles that affect your local customers, they are more likely to read those articles.

“What the heck does that have to do with SEO?” I’m glad you asked! Google looks at many factors when ranking web sites, and “bounce rate” is one of those factors.

Bounce rate can be best explained this way: Think of a time you did a search, and the results showed a page that looked like it would have the answer to your question. But when you went to that page it didn’t have what you were looking for. So, you quickly hit the “back” button and kept looking down the results for something more relevant.

Sound familiar? What you did was just “bounce” off the page because it didn’t have what you wanted.

The higher the bounce rate on a web site, the less likely Google will rank that page for certain keywords because people aren’t finding what they want.

However, people reading your local article are far less likely to bounce off the page because it has information they are looking for, so Google will love that page and rank it higher.

The added benefit is that you may get more customers also.

#5: Organic searches are the main way people find your web site.

Your business web site visits will be hurting if people can’t find you on the internet. Of course, you need to be sure that your web site was created correctly in the first place. Click here to find out if your web site is currently SEO friendly. Organic SEO takes more time than paid ads, but it’s worth it in the long run. When is the last time you did a search on Bing, Google, Yahoo, or another search engine? Did you look at all the ads at the top, or ignore those and go down to organic results? Or maybe you looked at the map for suggestions? Your potential customers are doing the same thing.

Organic results, including the map, are 80% more likely to be clicked on than paid ads. So, no matter how long it may take, doing organic SEO is more important than any other kind of marketing over the internet.

#4: Proper SEO also means a good customer experience.

Have you ever gone to a web site and noticed that things don’t work right? Maybe there’s a broken link, or an article ends in the middle without you being able to read all of it. These things not only affect your customer’s experience, but they also affect SEO.

When your web site is set up correctly (including using correct keywords), it will get higher in the search engines, which means more people will find it. As more people find it, they will read your articles, watch your videos, and listen to your podcast.

Google will see that people are staying on your site for some time and rank it even higher.

And, some people will like your content so much that they will link to it, which will make Google (and Bing, Yahoo, etc.) even happier.

Are you starting to see how that circle works? It all starts with a properly designed web site that both customers and the search engines will like.

#3: Good SEO also helps you learn about your customers

There are many apps out there these days. In fact, the Google Play® store has almost 3 MILLION apps listed in it alone (as of the end of 2021). That’s just apps for Android. It’s estimated that there are around 35 MILLION applications for Windows 10.

With all those apps, it’s difficult to recommend a certain one, but find an app like Google Search Console (or just use that one). Google’s Search Console is fantastic to look at stats about web site visitors. For instance, you can not only see how many people came to your web site, but what keywords they used to get there (whether they are keywords you meant to use or not). You can also see which pages are the most popular, and which pages may need help.

Proper SEO is the cornerstone of getting the right prospects to your web site, so it’s extremely important that you know how people are finding you. That way, you can fix problems quickly and get your pages on the right track.

#2: SEO is good for your branding strategy.

Branding is another cornerstone of your business. Your web site should have a specific color scheme. Your logo should have the same colors, and you should be using the same font type for normal text throughout your web site.

I had a client some time ago that thought contrasts were more eye-catching, so he had a sales page with 35 different fonts and sizes (no, that’s not a typo). It was an eyesore, I don’t know how he got business. It reminded me of the earliest days of the Internet (and those days were not pretty). Keep you site simple and professional, your customers will appreciate that.

#1: All the points above help build a feeling of trust in your potential and existing customers.

The #1 thing that will get anyone to buy from you is trust. Without trust, you have no customers. I’m going to go over each of the six points above so you can see how trust fits into all of them.

#7 – Local searches are growing because people are looking for trustworthy companies to do business with.

#6 – The higher you get in the search engines, the more the search engines trust you. And people see that trust (which is why you and I rarely search past the 1^st page).

#5 – Same as #6 above.

#4 – Have you ever gone to a web site looking for a phone number and not found one? How much trust did you have in those people? A properly designed web site helps to build trust.

#3 – The more you learn about your customers, the more you can get them information that they are interested in, which builds trust in your company.

#2 – Branding is so important that car companies spend millions of dollars on their brands. For those of you that remember, most major car companies changed their brands to more circles and swoops in the 1990’s. That was after a lot of time and money was put into how their new brands would look.

And your brand should be just as memorable. That way, no matter what advertising you have, people will know it’s you by your brand.