By Chris Wilson, Smarter Searches

In the world of marketing and advertising, there are many ways to promote your business or
brand. Getting your message in front of your target audience is crucial for success in any
industry. Marketing strategies can include many creative and engaging tactics, such tv
commercials, social media campaigns, crowdsourcing and user-generated content, and many
more. All of these tactics can engage your audience and promote your brand in flashy and
exciting ways.

On the opposite end of the creative spectrum, we have SEO, or search engine optimization.
While SEO is arguably one of the least sexy marketing strategies, it is easily the most important
for sustained success in the digital space. But how can “search engine optimization” be
considered a marketing strategy? Before we go any further, it’s important to note that SEO
focuses on organic search results; organic search results are the unpaid results below the ads.
This is the best kind of traffic, because, fundamentally, it’s free!

The two main purposes of SEO are 1) to optimize websites so that they are fully compliant with
the Google search algorithm, and 2) to ensure that the right content is put in the right places so
that your site is shown to your target audience. Let’s take a look at what each of those purposes
mean, and how you can apply them to your marketing strategy.

Google updates its search algorithm an estimated 500-600 times per year (Source: Moz). That’s
as many as two updates in any given day. Most of the updates are minor, but every few months,
Google will roll out a big change that can change the best practices for SEO. So if you’ve done
some SEO work to your site in recent years, and you think that’s sufficient, you have to think
again. SEO is something that needs to be at the core of your marketing strategy and performed
on a monthly basis by an experienced professional. Ensuring that your site is properly optimized
and compliant with best practices is the best way to get your great content in front of your target
audience.

Now, let’s talk about the aforementioned “great content.” As stated above, the other main
purpose of SEO is to make sure that your content is in the right place, and is being shown to
your target audience. Everyone knows the cliche saying “content is king,” but you can’t make
content for the sake of making content. It has to have a purpose.

SEO focuses on keywords, and making sure that they are in the right places, so that Google
knows where to send searchers who are looking for your product or service. If you own a
clothing boutique and your home page says “We are a family-owned business, and we pride
ourselves on providing high quality products to our customers,” nobody is going to find you,
because nowhere in that text did you say that you’re a clothing boutique. So identifying what
your target keywords are, and making sure that they are present in the body text, meta tags,
and image ALT text is very important.

When a paid campaign comes to an end, the ROI typically ends with it. With SEO, the content
you create, and keywords that are indexed by Google will keep gaining traction, and keep
providing value to your website until you remove it. This is where SEO provides its greatest
value. Investing in SEO as part of your marketing strategy will provide long term growth and
success for your company or brand. Staying up-to-date on the Google updates and consistently
optimizing your content will help you to maintain sustained growth and success online.

Chris Wilson is an Account Manager at Smarter Searches, a Certified Google Partner