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These times of uncertainty as a result of the novel Coronavirus pandemic are certainly trying for all businesses and their owners. In such circumstances, most businesses feel like they need to back out from their usual obligations and take adopt a new strategy. While this might be needed in most facets of running a business, when it comes to SEO and digital marketing, retreating and taking a break isn’t an option. Elucidated below are all the ways that you can and should maintain consistency in your SEO strategy throughout this global quarantine period.
The Importance Of Maintaining A Presence
Global pandemics (such as we are experiencing now), deep-seated economic recessions, and depression-like situations, have all occurred in the past. And if it’s one thing that the world learned in the aftermath of these situations was that small businesses have the power of resilience. The current situation is not very different from the situations of the past. Small businesses will have to brave through these periods to come out successful on the other end. This is a good time for business to focus their efforts on growth and maintaining their presence in the market, in order to witness tremendous growth spurts when the economy does go back to normal.
Despite the fact that short-term strategies are required for the unpredictable situation that we are currently in now, these strategies shouldn’t have a bearing on your growth strategies. Just like all the pandemics that came before it, COVID-19 is sure to die off at some time or the other. Therefore, it is in the best interest of all businesses to position themselves in such a way, that they are in a better position than their competitors to make the push to the top when everything goes back to normal, and the world goes back to functioning as it once did. This includes continuing your SEO efforts and your pursuit of cementing your brand’s online presence. Remember, the steps that you take now will determine how well equipped you are, to make the push to the “big leagues”, when the economy gets back on track.
Search Engine Optimization Is A Continued Effort
Optimizing and fine-tuning every aspect of a brand’s online presence takes months if not years. And, making use of the time that you currently have (not being able to do the things that you normally do) to focus your efforts towards the optimizing of your brand’s online presence, might be the deciding factor when it comes to whether or not you’ll be able to overtake your competitors after the crisis ends. While your competitors take a backseat and relax their SEO efforts, this is the perfect time for your brand to go all-out and cement its online presence and claim its space at the top of your specific niche.
Halting your SEO efforts abruptly could have a drastic negative impact on your brand’s ability to bounce back when the pandemic ends. This is where implementing a long-term digital marketing strategy aimed at making sure that when things do get back to normal, your brand will be there to exploit the first wave of customers that come in and scoop them all up by enticing them with your amazing products, and exemplary cost-effective services. Thinking ahead instead of making fear-based decisions based on what’s going on now, is the key!
Consistency Is The Name Of The Game When It Comes To SEO
Devising and implementing an ace SEO strategy involved long-term thought processes. This is due to the fact that SEO is something that does not yield immediate results. It is akin to planting a seed and putting in the work every day. You’re not likely to see a plant the very next day, but if you’re sure to do what’s necessary every day without stopping, one day you will notice a spurt. And after this spurt, it’s easy to sustain growth and yield rich dividends from all the work that you’ve put in.
Continued maintenance of an SEO strategy, followed by close monitoring and fine-tuning as per the insights gained (from monitoring) is paramount. Meanwhile, if your brand already has an SEO strategy in place, then taking your foot off the pedal at this point, can not only be counterproductive but also detrimental in terms of your brand’s ability to bounce back after the crisis dies out.
Put Your Customers First
Continuing your existing SEO and digital marketing efforts doesn’t mean that you should act as if everything is normal and not address the elephant in the room – COVID-19. Try to tweak your SEO strategy around offering your customers pandemic-specific help, information, products, and services. Communicating these things through marketing emailers and your brand’s social media platforms is the way to go. To this effect, you can start –
- sending out updates through newsletters via emails,
- posting relevant crisis-related updates via social media,
- update your GMB details as per your changed work timings, services, offerings, etc, during this crisis period.
- make sure all customer service lines, chat services, email accounts, and the like, are open at all times to address the concerns of customers.
Making sure to keep the above points in mind and persisting with your SEO and digital marketing efforts is guaranteed to put you in a better position than you ever were to take your competitors on, when things go back to the way they used to be, and return to normal!
FAQ
How long does it take to create a responsive website?
To get started, a typical website will take 14 weeks from minimum from inception to the delivery stage. It could take much longer depending on your requirements. Discuss with your website development team to get an idea about the delivery date. Actively research the market and the best service provider to get it done professionally. Website development is one of the crucial aspects of your business on which you shouldn’t compromise. Ensure that you get regular updates from your development team to make sure everything is executed as per the schedule. There are chances that conflicts might arise which may compromise the overall development process, you should be prepared to tackle the situation and get things done in a smooth manner.
What are breadcrumbs?
Breadcrumbs are nothing but a secondary navigation system that can be used to learn about the user’s location on a particular website. Visitors can get a better idea about the webpage if they have an overview of the hierarchy on the website. They serve as an effective visual aid that represents the location of a user within the website. It is not a complex mechanism on websites and will up only a line on your website. One of the main advantages of breadcrumbs is that they do not have any negative impact on your website in terms of content overload. If you have a large number of web pages piled up on your site, you must incorporate breadcrumbs into your site.
What is Google sandbox in SEO?
Google Sandbox is a common term that is used to explain the lower rankings of new websites in the Google search results. The function of Google sandbox is to provide results that are highly relevant to the users. Filtering out new websites and constantly monitoring them helps the search engine to provide relevant results. Moreover, it is difficult to say how long a website will be inside the sandbox as it primarily depends on the types of keywords it will be competing against. If your website has high-quality and relevant content, then the Google sandbox shouldn’t be a huge problem for you. The ultimate aim should be to optimize the website to stand out from the crowd.
What are accelerated mobile pages?
Accelerated Mobile Pages is an open-source project that is designed to optimize faster mobile pages. To break it down into simpler terms, it is making a page loading faster that is already optimized to be mobile-friendly. You have to use a streamlined version of CSS if you are opting for accelerated mobile pages. The website must be validated properly on a regular basis to ensure that they work properly. If you are looking to offer a better user experience, incorporate custom fonts into it and declare the proper height & weight of the page to avoid quirky-loading images. Accelerated mobile pages can significantly reduce the overall bounce rate on your website and improve conversion rates for your business.
What is SEO in marketing?
SEO marketing is the process of increasing both the quality and quantity of website traffic. All this results in increasing the exposure of the business to the right target audience. SEO is that one marketing tool that holds the potential to pay dividends over time continuously. If you have content that is strong and has every reason to rank at the top, you need not invest in other marketing tools and techniques to increase the visibility of your website. It is because of this that SEO marketing plays a pivotal role in growing your business. Therefore, optimizing your site in a manner that shows up within the top search results is critical.
Why is website development important?
How good your website is has a lot to do with the business you generate at the end of the day. Here is why website development is important.
- The first impression of your business is the website. If your website is outdated, the impression of the business left behind is definitely not what you’d want.
- By looking at how well the website is developed, the customers get a fair idea of how they would be treated by the business. If the website is not worked upon well, they tend to believe that the business won’t take efforts in catering to the requirements of the customers as well.
- A well-designed website enables the audience to build trust with the business.
- A poorly designed website has an adverse impact on Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
What makes a good website in 2022?
In order to make it into the list of good websites, there are a couple of things that one needs to take note of.
- A good website doesn’t take much time to load.
- A website that is trustworthy – both in terms of content as well as technicalities is the most sought after.
- The website should be free of bugs.
- Make sure that your website caters to a specific goal/objective.
- For a website to reach out to the maximum, it is important to understand the target audience in-depth, right from what they need to what other websites do they use.
- Making use of the right words, font and style always help.
What is the best SEO tool in 2022?
There is no specific best SEO tool, but here is a list of SEO tools that all the experts are using in 2022.
- Ahrefs – SEO keyword tool
- Google Search Console
- SEMRush – Marketing tools for SEO
- KWFinder – SEO keyword tool
- MOZ Pro – Complete SEO software
- Ubersuggest – Keyword Tracking tool
- Answer the Public – Keyword association tool
- Woorank – SEO Ranking Tool
- Majestic – Marketing tool for SEO
- Google Trends – SEO trends checking tool
- SEO Quake – Free SEO audit tool
- Siteliner – SEO analytics tool
- Fat Rank – SEO ranking tool
- Screaming Frog – SEO audit and insights tool
- Serpstat – One stop SEO platform
How can I increase the traffic on my website?
There are several ways to increase and divert traffic to your website. Listed are a few that you might be interested in.
- Invest in some paid advertising that will guarantee you results.
- Open Social Media accounts and post attractive content regularly.
- Use attractive titles that make browsers want to open the link.
- Review and up your on page SEO game.
- Target long tail keywords with colloquialisms for each customer location.
- Indulge in some guest blogging that will build external links
- Strengthen internal linking to subtly encourage more customer interaction.
- Make your site responsive to be accessible on all devices.
- Improve site loading speed to reduce abandonments.
- If you are an E-Commerce site, post clear and attractive product images.
What are the new SEO trends of 2021?
SEO is one of the most effective and inexpensive ways to boost traffic to your site. It can open the gateway to new customer pools, even on a global scale. The top SEO trends of 2021 are,
- Core web vitals : Loading, Interactivity and Visual Stability
- Google’s BERT: Using Machine learning and natural language processing for intent matching.
- Keyword research: To identify high ranking keywords.
- Original content: Value adding content that attracts traffic organically.
- Voice search: Voice activated searches that include colloquialisms in global languages.
- Artificial intelligence: Using AI to personalise the customer journey.
- Video marketing: For visitors to better relate to the brand with audio visual stimulation.
- Featured snippets: Elevate reputation of the business with features snippets on Google.
- Influencer SEO: Partner with social media influencers to get their following as customers.
- EAT & Branded SEO: Build expertise, authority and trust by building brand awareness.
Why every business needs SEO?
For anyone who wants to implement digital marketing for their business, Search Engine Optimisation or SEO as it is commonly known should be the first priority. It is more than the misconception of just adding keywords to your content. When done right, SEO can do the following for you.
- Send quality traffic your way.
- Boost the business reputation
- Get results with inexpensive methods
- Increases customer engagement with the site
- Help you understand your customers
- Help you beat the competition
- Continuously evaluate and boost performance of the site
