Nathan Yerian
Small business owners know they need websites to be successful today. The Internet has become what the phone book used to be to businesses. Your goal is to be one of the top results returned in search engines so that your company has the opportunity to be in the solution set of your potential customers.
Getting your website to display at the top of a search engine's results page can be tough but doesn't necessarily require that you purchase the spot (pay per click). Getting good page rankings does require SEO-savvy programming from the start, a steady stream of relevant content, and backlinks to keep your page at the top of results.
If you're considering a new website, or redesigning your existing one for higher traffic and a more professional look, make sure you work with web designers that will optimize your website for search engines from the start.
While working with clients in the Houston area, I have noticed that some Houston web designers leave on-site search engine optimization out when they quote websites. This allows them to appear to have a lower cost during the bidding process. Some will offer it as an add-on, or will go back after the website is complete and offer this service for an additional fee. This is truly something the client should have been informed about upfront, and the web designer, or company should have included it in the original bid.
Here are 3 reasons you should insist that your web designer must optimize every website for search engines before the site launches.
1. Your website is a marketing platform
The most important reason why web designers should build on-page SEO into their clients’ websites is because it helps solve a challenge the designer knows the client will have . A quality web designer knows that you’re coming to them because you have a business goal you want the website to fulfill. You may want increased web traffic, more website leads, or just more sales in general. Your web designer should propose a solution that achieves your true goal, not just one that offers a pretty picture.
A complete website proposal will cost a little more but should include seo keyword research to identify which search terms are being used to find your products/services by your target market, and a keyword integration plan to effectively use the terms throughout your site.
On-page SEO keyword integration includes assigning target keyword phrases to every page on your new website. These keywords will then be integrated into your URLs, website copy, image file names and alt tags, page titles, headers, and meta descriptions.
This plan should also include redirecting your existing web pages to the new web page that will be taking its place. By redirecting your existing URLs, you are transferring the SEO value that your existing pages have to your new website. If this process is not done effectively, it will negatively affect your rankings in the search engines.
Doing this work before the site is built allows it to be optimized from the moment it launches. If your proposals don’t include this kind of optimization, expect to have to pay more to add it after your site is launched.
2. Jump Start Your Search Engine Rankings
The web designer you choose to work with should have a plan in place to attract customers to your website right away so that you immediately begin earning a return on the money you’ve invested into the creation or redesign of your website.
By requiring your web designer to build in on-page SEO from the beginning, it can help the search engines correctly categorize your site and put you in a position to get found sooner.
3. Initial SEO Frees Up Marketing Time
Simply building a website is not the only marketing activity that will need to take place to give your company an edge online. Once the site launches, you need to focus your efforts on online marketing initiatives like:
• Off-page SEO (Link building)
• Writing press releases and blog posts
• Creating content offers and landing pages for lead generation
• Creating and sending marketing emails
• Engaging with your target market in social media
These important activities take time and are crucial to making a website both fully functional and able to attract visitors and then convert those visitors into customers. These are the activities that will generate new customers, and additional revenue for your company.
Preforming on-site SEO upfront will allow you to focus your marketing resources toward these components instead on using these resource toward an activity that should have already taken place.
If you have a web proposal that does not include on-site SEO, it is time to get some competitive bids. Your new website should be viewed as a solution to a marketing challenge. Providing on-site SEO during the design process gets you one step closer to a full marketing solution.