All of our clients have heard me say: “I’m not an SEO expert, but…”

Honestly, I don’t think anyone is an “expert” when it comes to SEO.  Google changes constantly and I think much of what we read online about SEO is speculation and educated guesses by people who live this every day.

I read articles like this one (Search Engine Journal: What matters most in SEO & Where to Focus Next) and I ask myself what this means for the B2B businesses we work with.

Do you know what structured data is?

Can you find your data on organic user behaviour?  If you can, do you know what to do with it?

Have you ever checked out your domain authority?

Let’s be real.  Most of the businesses we work with know SEO is important, but don’t have any idea what to do about it.  Small and midsized businesses do not have an SEO expert in house and are unlikely to be dedicating their marketing budget to hiring an external expert.  SEO is important for B2B but it’s only one part of the marketing picture.

We focus our clients’ SEO on providing content people want to read in a way that’s easy to digest. And it just so happens that if you do that, you’ll check a bunch of the boxes Google is looking for.  Google also wants you to put out content that answers the questions people want answered.  So, start by doing that and you’re off to the races.

Game Day Tips for SEO

Here are some SEO strategies you can implement as part of your B2B marketing strategy:

1.        Prioritize quality content from a quality writer

It’s better to invest in one good piece of content each month than 4 content pieces that are not well written or researched.  Good content has a long shelf life and that one good piece could still be bringing in leads years after it’s written.  I wrote a blog for a client that was published in 2017 and is still one of the top sources of organic traffic to his site.  Low quality content might not see any traffic, ever.

Take some time to find and invest in a writer who:

• Has a good command of the language you’re publishing in
• Either knows your industry or is willing to learn it
• Can be a long-term resource for you
• Can help you identify content topics and build out a content calendar

Don’t count on well written pieces to cost you $25 for a 750-blog post.  Expect to pay between $0.2 and $0.35 per word depending on what you need.

2.        Take care of your meta data basics

I won’t pretend to completely understand where all this meta data lives on the back end of your website, but I do understand what Google is looking for at a basic level.  I always advise clients to prioritize all their headings – especially the H1, to add meta data to their images, and write compelling meta description (even though Google doesn’t really care about them).  While there is so much more to it, these are three things that are easy to do, can be managed with a simple WordPress plugin like Yoast, and have an impact on whether or not someone clicks through to your site.

Whenever I work with clients, I use a template that includes all the meta data that I prioritize at the very top so it’s developed as the content is written.  If you’d like that template, send us a quick note and we’ll be happy to send it to you.

3.        Know your keywords

You can pay someone to do this research for you if you’re embarking on a big SEO push as part of your marketing strategy.  Or, if you simply want to start adding some content to your website slowly, you can spend some time researching yourself.

There are a million tools out there you can use.  Some are free, some are paid, and most of them give you similar data.  Here’s what I use:

• Good old Google. When you search for something relevant for your business, what shows up in the “People also ask section”?  Those are the questions people are looking to have answered.  If you can, answer them on your website.  Use a new browser or an incognito tab to do this search because Google already has a bias about what it wants to show you.
• Google Analytics. If you have access, the keyword research tools are helpful to understand search volumes and you can specify geography if it’s relevant. This takes a bit to learn, but is easy and inexpensive once you know what to put where.
• AnswerThePublic. I like this partly because of what it tells us and partly because the graphics are always fun.  You can enter a topic or brand name for example and see what questions are being asked online about it.  It doesn’t show search volume in the free version though.

4.        Don’t hire an “SEO Expert” in isolation

We’ve helped clients get out from under bad work by SEO consultants.  In one instance the company created backlinks to the site that displayed inaccurate, poorly written information about the company.  This information isn’t always easy to take down and reflects poorly on your company.  In another instance, the SEO company was recommending edits to the website that might have been appropriate from a keyword perspective, but made absolutely no sense for the audience.  The message was all wrong regardless of the fit of the keyword.

Some SEO consultants know their stuff, but there are a lot out there who just want to stuff your site with keywords and data without truly understanding what you’re trying to achieve.

If you’re going to hire an SEO company to drive traffic to your website, be sure they understand your goals, your industry and customers, and your business.  That also means it will take time and money.  For that SEO company to truly understand the nuances of your business so they can find you the right audience, they need to spend some time getting to know you.

AND, if you’re hiring them, don’t agree to a long-term, month-by-month contract.  Identify what you want done and pay them for it.  I’ve yet to see one of these SEO companies add significant value to a website after the first few months of work.  So, be cautious with your budget.

SEO is a big battle for a lot of small and midsized businesses.  It’s still a big unknown for many.  We’re happy to chat about our approach and share some additional tips.  Just give us a call.