On average, businesses around the United States spend 8% of their gross annual revenue on marketing and advertising. Most business owners realize just how important marketing their services/products online is. This is why an overwhelming number of small businesses in the United States have websites, social media accounts and mobile apps. As a business owner, it is your responsibility to figure out how to gain a competitive edge in your chosen industry.

One of the main things you can do when trying to accomplish this goal is to embrace search engine optimization. If your website is SEO optimized, you will have no problem attracting attention from consumers all over the world. The following are some ways you can use search engine optimization to reach a wider audience with your message.

Create Content That Your Audience Is Interested In

In the past, many entrepreneurs thought that publishing any type of content on their website was acceptable when trying to drive traffic to it. While it is important to regularly publish blog content on your website, you have to make sure this content is both engaging and needed. If you are writing blogs about every topic under the sun, you run the risk of alienating a large portion of your audience. Rather than doing this, you need to work on targeting your message.

Gathering information on what type of blog content your core audience wants is easy with the help of surveys and questionnaires. For years, business professionals have used employee engagement survey software to optimize their in-house productivity levels. Using these same engagement surveys, but targeted for consumers is a great idea. The more you know about what your audience wants, the easier it will be to have success with your blog content.

Not only will you need to develop great content to drive traffic to your website, you also have to promote it. Using your company’s social media profiles is a great way to draw attention to new website blogs. Posting about these blogs on social media can also help you grow your online audience.

Develop a Comprehensive Linking Strategy

There are many things that business owners have to do to make their website content more appealing and easier to find. While well-written content will usually rise to the top of Google, you can give it a bit of help with the right linking structure. Including both inbound and outbound links in your content can help you become a favorite of search engines around the Internet.

When linking to other websites, you need to make sure these websites are reputable and trustworthy. Linking to websites that are considered spammy can hurt you in the long run. You also need to have multiple inbound links in your website content.

These links provide context and also allow you to keep visitors to your website engaged for a longer period of time. The longer you can keep visitors on your website, the easier it will become to generate viable sales leads. If you have limited knowledge of content marketing, then hiring professionals to assist you is a must. With their help, you can develop marketing campaigns that actually produce results.

Entertain Your Website Visitors with the Help of Videos

Limiting the type of content you use on your business website can be disastrous. If all you provide visitors with is written content, you run the risk of losing out on sales leads. This is why you need to broaden your horizons and start using video content on your website. Most people will watch a short video before they will read a lengthy blog. With the help of video, you can inform people about the products/services your business provides.

These videos also have a better chance of getting shared on social media platforms. The more people you have sharing your videos, the easier it will be to grow your customer base. Ideally, you want to keep the marketing videos you create short and to the point.

If your videos are too long, people might turn them off before you have conveyed your message to them. You also need to make sure the video content your company puts out is considered high-quality. Hiring a video marketing agency is a great way to get access to top-notch recording and editing equipment. These professionals can also help you come up with ideas for your new marketing videos. Before hiring a company to help with this work, take a look at their portfolio to get an assessment of how talented they are.

Audit Your Existing Website Content

Making your website user-friendly is a crucial component of your online success. If your website is hard to use or scan, it will frustrate visitors and make them leave in a hurry. This is why you have to take the time to audit the content on your website regularly.

One of the first things you need to check for when auditing your content is how scannable it is. If all of the content on your website is grouped together in large paragraphs, then consumers will have a hard time scanning it. Putting in things like headers and bullet points can increase the readability of your content substantially.

You also need to test the inbound/outbound links in your content to ensure they work. Broken links can confuse consumers and may lead to your rank on powerful search engines getting much lower. This is why you need to take the time to audit the content on your website regularly.

Making These Changes Is Important

As you can see, there are a number of things you can do to increase the lead generation power your website has. When fully optimized, a website can help your business grow substantially. If you don’t feel comfortable taking on the tasks covered in this article, then hiring a marketing professional is a wise move. With their help, you can turn your website into a lead generation machine. The money paid to these professionals will be worth it considering the results they can provide.