One simply can’t emphasize the importance of SEO enough. When you talk about digital marketing, it is impossible to overlook SEO. It is because an optimized website has so many things to offer which directly influence the bottom line.
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So let’s break down the top ten much sought-after benefits that can easily be obtained through tasteful SEO:
1 Attracts Quality Traffic
From the marketing perspective, there is an ocean of difference between “traffic” and “quality traffic”. You can bring traffic to your website through many tactics. But that’s not going to make much of a difference as far as your sales are concerned. That’s where SEO is handy.
It pulls the quality traffic which is more likely to convert. It is not same as inviting people through cold calling, interruptive ads, and spam emails — these strategies have long outlived their utility. People find them annoying. On top of that, applying these strategies means that you’re not familiar with modern-day marketing trends.
SEO, on the other hand, is an inbound marketing strategy. Meaning, it is more customer-centric than an outbound marketing strategy.
Majority of marketers have more faith in inbound marketing methods than others
2 Enhances Trust
Google is the number one search engine. This is why people have such high regard for Google. Once you appear on the first page of this search engine, people are going to trust your brand like anything.
Nothing influences the purchasing decision today as much as your brand’s credibility. As many as 81 percent of consumers undertake online research before deciding their shopping brand. SEO gives you more opportunities to stand out from the rest and get noticed by the public.
3 Long Term Strategy
The best thing about SEO is that it does not disappear overnight — like most of the marketing strategies. Once you gain the top slot on a search engine, it is tough to undo that position. We all have seen a variety of brands clinging to the top position for a long period even after they have lost their luster.
Because SEO does not improve your ranking in a matter of days. It takes time. Similarly, it does not snatch your hard-earned position instantly. Unless Google brings any drastic change in its algorithm, this process will stay as it is.
4 Improves Link Building
Linking building is again an important factor which makes people confident about your business and invites traffic from vast and varied places. Every top website would like to link your brand when you occupy a respectable position on a search engine. They rate your content as more authentic and trustworthy.
Some websites might have more readership than yours. This will help your content reach out to the maximum audience. In a nutshell, your website referrals will upshoot.
People devote a considerable budget to raise their game of link building but SEO will do it for you ever so cheaply and effortlessly.
5 Promotes User Experience
Until your website provides quality user-experience, you can’t stand at par with your competitors. Because Google will not consider it for the first page. SEO will help you to build a website which gives high priority to the user experience.
Since most of the internet traffic comes through smartphones today, SEO takes so many features into account with respect to user experience. Take note of the following things to improve the user experience:
- Easy navigations are a must. It cuts bounce rate to a great extent
- The design must be easy on the eyes. Too many features upfront make it tough for the user to stay longer on a website
- Videos and photos should stand in line with your content. Also, never compromise on the quality of visuals. Poor quality showcases your unprofessionalism.
6 SEO is Cheaper
Ads are pretty expensive and last for a short period of time. Not all of us can afford this luxury — especially small businesses with limited resources. On the other hand, SEO is way cheaper than this.
Of course, you need to have good writers to pen down top-notch content, you might have to receive the services of an SEO agency too, still, at the end of the day, it will not be as costly as other marketing approaches. Affordable SEO packages can make life easier for you.
Besides, depending on the topic, you will have to update the content after every few months. Rest assured, all of this is worth it because it is going to be a lasting investment.
7 Easy to Quantify Results
There is only one way to improve a website, that is to know what is wrong with it. Unless you diagnose the issue, there is no way you can fix it.
Sometimes, you have to review your marketing strategy to check if it is providing the desired results. You can’t learn where your marketing campaign is heading unless you can quantify the performance thoroughly. That’s where SEO swings into action.
It saves us from blind marketing. For example, it can tell you the number of bounce rate, conversion rate, number of social media shares and much more. You can even hit upon the appropriate keywords.
By using the right measuring metrics, you can remain updated with your progress in the Google ranking. To sum up, the main purpose of measuring the performance is to get rid of the mediocre stuff from your website by connecting the dots.
8 Boosts Market Share
Do you know that 75 percent of the users never go beyond the first page? That means you potentially exist for only 25 percent of people if you miss out being on the first page of the search engine.
Needless to say, being visible to such a vast audience will definitely aid you to maximize your market share.
9 Rewards with more Engagement
There is no rocket science here. You are always talk of the town when you are on top of Google. People will spend more time on your website, they will share your videos on social media, and word-of-mouth marketing will go around like anything.
Once you make your way to social media, you are set to attract a lot of traffic. At the same time, social media is a great component of PR strategy today and trending on social media will make you shine among the rest.
10 Increase Email Letter Subscribers
Email marketing has not lost its luster. It is still a useful tool for marketing even in this era. So if your website has an email newsletter signup, SEO will rapidly increase the list of your subscribers. What’s more, all the collected leads will be highly-convertable.
There are plenty of marketing options available in the digital world. But none of them comes close to SEO since it covers every single aspect of marketing so flawlessly. Be it brand awareness, conversion, social media following, etc, there is nothing SEO can’t do for you!
Author Bio
Sohail Rupani is a Senior SEO Strategist and Blogger for PNC Digital, Link Building HQ and Appiskey. He is passionate about technology and loves to analyze the tech industry in his spare time and stay in touch with the latest happenings. He also writes technical articles about SEO and digital marketing. Follow @sohailrupani for more updates.