SEA: Search engine analysis. (Steve Hayes)
continued...
The good news is all is not lost. While not every website owner can get to number one in the Google listings for every wished for search term, proper web site analysis and analytics can help you go a long way towards achieving a good, or maybe a great position, at a reasonable cost if done correctly. Much of the search engine ranking success is dependant not on what is within the content, but relative to who likes and links to the optimised content. But it's a classic chicken and egg scenario. You want people to visit your site to increase its popularity. But to be found you need recommendations and cannot get recommendations because you cannot be found. What you may have to do is kickstart the process preceeded by quality anaylsis and analytics.
The competition can sometimes be so great in a particular fast selling online industry that the best you could hope ever for is a high page one ranking in the short to medium term and a good to medium search engine ranking in the long term without the continued intervention and tweaking. This is true for a lot of your prefered search terms. Within a hypothetical fast online selling industry, that alone could guarantee you a certain amount of success. Of course this can also lead to a value via word of mouth. This assumes of course what you have on offer within your site meets your potential online customer requirements. There lies the rub.
It is also important to keep the bounce rate low by giving the visitor the opportunity to find what they want right away. If the visitor to your site searched for an item and was referred via a link from say Google, if they arrived on the home page and the searched for item is not obviously available ... bye bye. They go elsewhere hence the term 'bounce rate'. By measuring what and where people go to on your site you can also find areas that need improvement. You can only manage what you can measure.
Discounting 'white hat' and 'black hat' SEO practices for the moment there are two ways you can achieve consistent high search engine rankings. You can pay for targeted advertisements (sponsored results - example: google adwords) to ensure you achieve a good listing or you can attempt to achieve a good high ranking in the organic search engine listing alone. Neither can be achieved economically without expert knowledge and an ongoing organised persistance for a length of time.
What is an organic search engine listing you may ask? An organic listing is one that appears in the none paid area of a search engine results web page relevent to a searched for term.
Fact: High search engine ranking achievements will vary in keyword density for an agreed search keyword range. Depending upon the external competition for keyword placing, the amount of relative time and effort required to meet this competition head on varies. But higher ranking results because of good keyword density will increase website traffic
Fact: There are a few SEO 'experts' (good and bad) out there and competition could be fierce for ranking slots in a very competitive sellers market.
Fact: Concentrating on the big four search engines will suffice for well over 90% of internet searches.
If you think your site is missing the boat and needs an 'adrenalin fix' send me an email outlining your concerns and your website URL. I will check over your site and get back to you with some suggestions. My SEO services are not free but I will promise you will get good value for your money. Costs vary depending on your site technology, size, and objectives. Reports can be ongoing, or one-off