Facts on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) & Ranking

• Google has 85% of the search engine market.
  
  
• 72% of users click on natural links not sponsored links.
  
  
• The top (non-sponsored) result on page one gets 50% of click-throughs.
  
  
• If you are the second page in a search you only have a 1% chance of being clicked upon.

Do You Know?

• What are the relevant searches that users make on your website? That is, what keywords or phrases are typically used by potential visitors to your website.
  
  
• How much traffic comes to your website(s)? Do you see statistics about how your website is used.
  
  
• Where does the traffic you get actually come from? Is it direct, via search engines or directories.

It is a moving target!

• Google and other search engines regularly change or tweak the way they rank websites.
  
  
• Your competitors change their websites.
  
  
• New websites emerge.

What To Do

Below are listed some ideas that will influence the quality of your website and make it more search engine friendly.

• The name of your website.
  The name of your website (i.e. the domain name) should describe what you do. If your business name doesn't encapsulate what you do then you will lose out if it is the name of your website.
  
  For example we took over a website called 2btransport.com. This name doesn't state explain what they do just who they are. They are motorcycle couriers, So we created other websites for the same company that tied in with their business. So they now have motorbike-courier.co.uk, motorcycle-courier.com, and others. As they are based in Essex they also have essexcouriers.co.uk
  
  
• Use Multiple Domains (i.e. websites)
  For Orchard Maintenance Services (and 2bTransport above) we have also created variations of the website that provide a slightly different focus on the services provided. By using the domains garden-maintenance-uk.co.uk, and house-maintenance-uk.co.uk in addition to the above website we get two additional websites that may rank highly when a potential customer uses a search engine.
  
  In reality it is a single website that presents its information through the different domains in slightly different ways.

• Good Content
  Don't just sell your service. Like this web page your web pages should offer also assistance and advice to both existing and future clients. That way you are providing them reasons to visit your website beyond that of buying your product or service offering. They might, as a result, add you to their favourites
  
  If you are a health club don't just focus on selling memberships. It may be useful to provide information articles on keeping fit whilst pregnant, or make use of your membership etc. Just like at Neal Training.

• Web site structure and focus
  Whilst your website might be thought of as an online brochure it is also different to a brochure. To improve your rankings your website is possibly more of a blunt tool that a paper-brochure. It will get to be a little pedantic in how things are described. You might notice this and it might offend you. However being pedantic by saying the same thing several times either in the same way or in subtly different ways will improve your visibility and ranking in search engine results.
  
  For example I'm now going to say optimisation of your web pages to improve search ranking may seem a strange optimization. However whether we say optimisation or optimization what I achieved is that someone who spells optimisation in the British or American way will have a chance of finding this page.
  
  Likewise use abbreviations such as SEO but also spell it out occasionally to make sure we all know that SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation or Search Engine Optimization.
  
  
• Keyword sprinkling
  Throughout your web pages the relevant keywords should be used to ensure that each web page has a chance of appearing in a relevant search.
  
  
• Keyword Variations
  Use a variety of similar keywords if necessary, sometime even misspelling them if you know that this often happens. Possibly a restaurant website might want to include the (misspelt) keyword restarant.
  
  For 2bTransport we made sure that we used the terms motorcycle courier, motorbike courier, bike courier and others.
  
  
• Repetition to a degree

  Repeating the words 'garden maintenance' on your home page 500 times will just get your website blocked by the search engines.
  
  
• Avoid passive voice
  You will probably find that your website copy often you the passive voice in describing the business, a service or product. For example, "We are great at improving the visibility of your website" should be "Richard Daley Associates" are great at improving the visibility of your website".
  
  
• And More
  Of course, there are many other factors to consider but the above will do for now.

What Determines my Ranking?

• Website content.
  No content means nothing to rank.
  
  Search engines, like Google, really do care that the websites they find have information that their search clients
  would want to read.
  
  An example is that on our web hosting website, we have a page describing email etiquette. This now has a number of incoming links to it. This indicates others have found the page useful and created a link to it from their websites which helps push up the ranking of our website.
  
  
• Keywords.
  The website needs to be focused and each web page should try to present one coherent topic.
  
  For example if you offer two training courses then the detailed information on each course belongs on separate pages.
  
  
• Incoming Links.
  The number of links you have to your website will affect ranking in some search engines including Google. Google also takes into account the ranking of the websites that link to your website. The higher their ranking, the higher yours will be.
  
  If you are a customer of Richard Daley Associates (did you notice we didn't use 'our' which is another example of the dreaded passive voice) your website is automatically included in our web-ring. This appears on each website that we operate. Currently this is around 100 websites. See RDA Client List.
  
  It is also very useful to get your website listed in relevant directories and trade directories. We would generally advise against those where you have to pay to have your website listed.
  
  
• Other factors
  The domain name, page title, page description, alt image tags also influence your ranking.
  
  

  These factors are often not visible on the web page as seen by the user or if they are visible may not seem important. However they influence your website's ranking.

Should I Use Pay per Click?

• Pay for Search Engine Optimisation not pay-per-click (however see the next point).
  
• If you are in a really competitive area pay-per-click such as Google AdWords may help.

Searches

• Do you know what users' relevant searches are?
  What keywords or phrases are used by your potential customers and whether these bring up one of your your web pages in the search results (and where in the search results)?
  
  For example, do they search for "SEO" or "search engine optimisation" or "improve web ranking" or something else?
  
  Using pay-per-click (e.g. Google AdWords) for a short while may give you insights into the types of searches that are used. Using this information the website may be 'tuned' to match the typical searches used.
  
  
• Do you know the differences between searches such as:
  

  pay per click
  

  "pay per click"
  

  pay+per+click
  

  pay "per click"?

  
  
  
• Have you ever studied the help available on Google about using searches?
  
  
• Have you ever used the Advanced Search on Google?

What Should My Website Designer and Web Site Hosting Company Offer?

• Guidance on designing your website to improve its rankings
• Assistance in getting links to your website in a legitimate way.
• Access to Usage Statistics
• Access to Google Analytics
• Support for Google Webmaster and Microsoft Webmaster (as these allow the website designer to monitor how well the website is working)

Testimonial 27 May 2009

Dear Richard,

Just a note to say thanks for doing such an excellent job building and promoting my websites. Since changing to Richard Daley Associates I have been consistently achieving first page position on Google natural listings.

This has enabled me to substantially reduce my spend on Google AdWords. My total annual website management costs have reduced by about 50% and the increase in business has been very noticeable.

Thanks again and regards.
Clive
Clive Tooby
Proprietor
2b Transport
Tel: 01277 626677
Mobile: 07816 867741
Website: http://www.2btransport.com

Can we help?

Please contact us if any of the above is relevant and you want to improve the visibility of your business on the internet and see increased traffic to your website.