Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) services have long been part of the Internet’s digital landscape. Optimising your website for ranking well in search engines has become an industry unto itself. In this post, we’ll discuss how ongoing SEO campaigns help to maximize your brand’s marketing efforts.
SEO, like all things powerful, can be used for good or bad. It can be used with the best, honest intent, as found in “White Hat” SEO. Or, it can be used with manipulative intent, known as “Black Hat” SEO.
Therefore the reputation of SEO will vary depending on with whom you talk. It will depend on what experience the person, company or search engine has had with SEO. In the truest sense, SEO’s brand is constantly under scrutiny.
And rightly so. It is a double-edged sword that can make or break a brand’s online visibility and authority.
But today, we are going to focus on how Ongoing SEO services are an essential part of any brand’s marketing strategy. Yes, this includes your brand!
We are focusing on the importance of Ongoing SEO, as it is the best kind of SEO. Doing SEO optimization on your website one time may produce some short term success. However, the best solution is to maintain focus on your SEO strategy and tasks at least every month. This ensures a higher rate of success.
To be sure, this article is only an introduction of Ongoing SEO’s influence on your brand’s marketing efforts. Each factor we discuss are worthy topics in their own rights.
Why is SEO important in a digital marketing strategy?
In 2021, Google approaches SEO factors as an aspect of the larger scope of a brand’s influence online. Google’s search results focus on brand quality. Brand consistency, brand discovery, brand authority, brand mentions and brand trust are just a few examples.
To be successful online, your brand will need to fulfil Google’s “brand-centric” checklist. Google continues to create and refine this secret list through continual changes to its algorithms, apps and search results pages.
It’s a daunting task and one that an SEO consultant or SEO company should not take on lightly.
The scope of this task requires planning. It requires a strategy. A digital marketing strategy, to be precise.
Similar to a business plan, a digital marketing strategy requires significant input to research, create and present. And also like a business plan, it functions best to be kept as a “living document.”
This flexibility can be life saving for a brand as the future brings unexpected and unprecedented change. SEO is a primary tool in any digital marketing strategy for this same reason.
Proper use of SEO tools and an SEO strategy can improve:
- Local SEO rankings in local search results including maps and geo-targeted searches
- Organic search engine rankings and targeted traffic
- Adjusting to search engines’ crawls and indexes
- Social media marketing research
- Domain name choice
- Hosting choices
- Web design and development processes
- Content creation and delivery
- And paid advertising efforts
Digital Marketing & SEO go hand in hand. SEO consulting services are an integral part of a brand’s larger marketing vision. Without attention to SEO factors, it is impossible to maximise your brand’s potential online.
What is a marketing plan and how to make one?
If you’d like more information about what makes up a top quality marketing plan, read this article.
If you are looking for a way to improve SEO on your website, that is only one part of the puzzle. In the same way, SEO tips can help you with specific challenges. But, they must be done under a larger strategy to build brand awareness, visibility and authenticity.
Brand Development & Ongoing SEO
What role does SEO play in branding?
When we speak of brand development, we refer to the process of researching, designing and refining a brand. This includes the visual brand and logo design, but also beyond that, into delivering consistent messaging and information.
SEO branding strategy sets a strong foundation for brand development. It allows you to base your unique vision of the brand on trusted and proven SEO data. This helps to refine your own vision, but also develop it with a succinct understanding of your competitor brands’ market share.
By using SEO for brand awareness, for instance, you increase brand recognition from day one. Your USP (Unique Sales Proposition) will be more defined and effective. Your messaging will inherently support your main targeted keywords and search terms. You will reach targeted traffic (i.e. more customers) in previously untapped markets.
A well researched SEO strategy will help define your brand’s visual identity, messaging, even your chosen domain name.
Web Design & Ongoing SEO
As a Calgary SEO expert, we have produced hundreds of SEO audits over the years. In most cases, we use more than one third party SEO tool. And as a local SEO consultant, we always include a manual review.
Technical SEO reports are great. However, AI or automated auditing software still cannot match a manual review by a live human.
SEO best practices include making sure that the SEO web design efforts appear natural and intuitive to the end user. This circles back to Google’s emphasis on delivering quality content to their search audience.
In the case of eCommerce SEO, the focus is on delivering the best product options. So, determining what problem the product solves will often be the starting point for the SEO research for an eCommerce website. It is not only about making people aware of your brand. It can be as specific as identifying the best product meta description to connect it to its intended buyer.
When it comes to WordPress SEO, there are many aspects of the web design process that include attention to SEO elements. This includes the actual website development, an xml sitemap, internal links and plugins used on the WordPress website. Also, it is useful to connect the website to Google Analytics and Google Search Console. So, whether you are providing a product or service, your posts and pages will need individual optimisation.
How can website design affect SEO and vice versa?
Here’s a great Search Engine Journal article on 5 Ways SEO & Web Design Go Together.
Website design is dynamic and ever-changing. It is a perpetual online evolution. So, it just makes sense that your brand’s SEO needs to be addressed with the same approach.
Web Hosting & Ongoing SEO
Web hosting and its relationship to SEO has become more defined over the years. It is a great example of how SEO factors are often less obvious, but not necessarily less important.
Four key aspects of web hosting can affect your SEO efforts:
- Security – Using an SSL Certificate to encrypt on-page transactions, especially for ecommerce sites
- Server Speed – Affects your website’s page speed
- Server Type – Whether you are on a shared or dedicated IP, for example
- CDN – This is a recent addition to help speed up delivery of website content. A CDN (Content Delivery Network) stores local copies of your website around the world.
Google and other search engines want to deliver the best results to their search audience. These four aspects of web hosting ultimately affect your website’s rankings to some degree.
These aspects are best determined at the start of your brand’s journey online. However, they are also an ongoing concern for the website’s entire lifespan.
We are not simply looking to optimise content. We need to address key structural and technical concerns right from the start.
Learn more about BlindDrop’s Managed WordPress Hosting.
Digital Marketing & Ongoing SEO
To this point, we have covered:
- Building a strong brand
- Developing a well optimized WordPress website with SEO content
- Hosting this site on a secure, fast and optimized platform
In essence, we have addressed the On-Page SEO concerns for your brand. Your website will have its best foot forward as it steps into the online world.
Now, we need to actively market it.
We return to our original digital marketing strategy. This includes our SEO strategy for targeted keywords and search terms, competition analysis and site audits.
We can now focus on creating new content for the website and other “Off-Page” campaigns. These tasks will reference our SEO research constantly. This can include:
- Content Creation including SEO copywriting for new pages and blog posts and to achieve such highlights in search results like a featured snippet.
- Guest Posting on other authority and industry blogs
- Content marketing of text, infographics, videos and podcasts
- Citation and link building in relevant authority websites
- Social Media Marketing across your top social channels
- Display Advertising that provide contextual visibility for your brand
- Paid Advertising such as “Pay Per Click” to reach those areas that your SEO efforts have not yet achieved
In conclusion, ongoing SEO has become a necessary part of any brand’s online success. It provides the foundation for optimised hosting, Web design and development, brand creation and all digital marketing efforts that follow.
The beauty of Ongoing SEO is that it is never to late to start! The optimisation process works for website redesign too. A professional SEO team can provide the best SEO packages for your brand’s specific needs.
Ready to Improve Your Website’s Rankings?
BlindDrop specialises in custom Web design and redesign of WordPress sites. There are always opportunities to improve your site. Our custom solutions are optimised from the ground up. We deliver leading edge SEO Web Design and digital marketing services to Calgary, Cochrane and surrounding areas.
