Q: How can I get more traffic to my website?

A: Seven Simple SEO Tips.

Many companies and organisations invest heavily in creating compelling and attractive websites, but are you really making it easy for customers to find you in their favourite search engines?
In this article, we reveal Seven Simple Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Tips to help you get some “quick wins” around Search Engine Optimisation.

1. Know your audience – It is very important to have a good idea of who your target audience is, and a clear understanding of what they will be looking to achieve by usng your website. You will want to help your audience find what they want, when they want it, in the format they want, as quickly and as easily as possible. 
 
2. Know your medium – People tend to skim-read while online. Web users are typically very fickle, and if they can't find what they want quickly when coming in off a search engine then they will quickly move on to another site. Write compelling content in a tone and using language that is familiar to your target audience or industry. Well written content will naturally attract an audience.
 
3. Track and measure success – Before you start, make sure you have good tracking mechanisms in place. It is important to regularly track and measure traffic on your site and optimise around popular content. Looking at the keywords that people used to search your site is a powerful way to gain insight into your placement in the market. This will help you to tailor content and the way your describe yourself to meet the needs of your audience.
 
4. Use distinct keywords, titles and descriptions on all your pages – Once again, you are endeavouring to help the user fnd what they want, when they want it. Make sure your meta data matches the content on the page. Avoid going overboard with too many keywords as you can dilute the effects on your ranking and if you go too far search engines will ignore them altogether. We have found that staying below 7 keywords, and less than 170 characters yeilds good results. Make sure your keywords, titles and descriptions appear all on one line.
 
5. Choose your domain name and site structure thoughtfully - In addition to making your site easier to navgate, search engines will attempt to pick up and use a site structure when ranking a page. Search engines will also pick up keywords in a domain name, and will use this information to rank a page more highly.
 
6. Source inbound links from credible, industry-related websites – get as many high quality external links to your site as possible. Search engines analyse the interrelationship between different sites to provide their rankings. Search algorithms typically place a high value on these relationships, largely due to the fact that they are extremely difficult to manufacture or manipulate, and therefore are a good indication of the quality of a target site. Participate in reputable forums, source links from credible community sites and swap links with industry sites where possible.
 
7. Don’t try to out-smart the search engines - Search engines are in the business of identifying genuine search targets and directing users to those targets. Companies like Google and Yahoo! go to great efforts to deliver meaningful results, including removing pages that “rank too well”. The last thing you want is to get blacklisted on Google.

Call us on 02 8022 8479 to find our how best to optimise your website.