SEO for New Businesses

SEO has been identified as the marketing method with the best overall ROI, and our experience certainly confirms that. But it’s not fast. And that means that SEO for new businesses can sometimes be frustrating. We spoke recently with a business owner who was very frustrated because his website had been live for 11 days and still wasn’t at the top of the search engine results.

In this case, he may still be frustrated in 11 months, because he went with a company that promised him top rankings (read why that isn’t a legitimate promise) and frankly wasn’t doing anything to deliver on that promise.

But we had to tell him that 11 days isn’t long enough to judge. We expect to see some changes in things like traffic and queries within two weeks, but real results take a while. Then they last, as long as you keep up your efforts, and build steadily, and that’s when you’re going to be really happy.

But what if you’ve just opened a new business and you’re in a hurry to get the word out? What should you do when it comes to SEO?

• Start now. Start to build strong content at your website, good connections online, and a strategic SEO plan. The best time to do this is the minute you think you might want to open a business. The next best time is right now. This is because all websites start at zero: zero readers, zero social media followers, zero influence, and zero authority. The sooner you begin building those things, the sooner you’ll benefit.
• Use your assets. Maybe you have state of the art machinery. Maybe you’re well known locally for your community work or you have team members with  credibility in your field. Maybe you have a cool building or a photogenic team. Whatever you have going for you, use that to inform your SEO tactics. We can help you with that. 
• Use other channels. While you’re working your way up to #1, you can use other tactics to give your website a jump start. Networking, pay per click ads, social media, and well-chosen banner ads can all give you some traction — temporary or otherwise — while you get started.

Just remember the “start now” part. Don’t send out a guy with a sandwich board for six months while you think about SEO. Work on SEO while the guy with the sandwich board is out there, and in six months you’ll be seeing benefits.