With so many online platforms to choose from, it can feel overwhelming and complicated for most. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. With an understanding of SEO fundamentals, you can find yourself getting a higher site ranking on the Google search engine and as a result, open the door to a wide range of opportunities that can help your business to grow.

What do Your Customers Want?

One of the first things you need to do is to get to know your customers. Once you know what they are searching for, you can then take steps to tailor your website to meet those needs. The trick here is in learning how to find this out. If you’ve been at this for a while, then chances are you’ve tried all sorts of strategies to uncover this information, but the simplest way is to go back to the basics. Try to put yourself in your customer’s shoes and then decide how you would search for a new business online. You might think about the words they will put into the search engine that will help them get to you.

When Google ranks businesses, their algorithms use these unique keywords, phrases, or expressions and ranks them based on how often they are keyed into their search box.

Use Keywords

Every web page will get a certain amount of traffic based on the keywords they are using. But don’t limit yourself to only one or two keywords. In order to get a better Google site ranking, you’ll need to go a step further. As you play the customer role, think of other keywords that might direct you to your landing page. Everyone won’t be searching with the same words, so you’ll have to think outside of the box. You can get a pretty good idea of what other people are doing by testing a few different words and analyzing the results you get.

Take note of those phrases that seem to appear again and again. These businesses are likely the ones that are getting the highest rankings because they are using the most common keywords. You can use Google’s Keywords Explorer to see just how many clicks each keyword gets. This will help you if the words you’ve come up with will actually be effective or not.

Tailor Your Topics to Your Field

Content marketing is a means of developing content material that your customers will find valuable. A blog is one sort of content marketing, but don’t limit yourself to only this avenue. This actually connects well with the first tip: learn what your customers want. By learning what they are most interested in, which topics are more appealing to them, and what is trending, you can generate interest without too much effort.

To do this, you must find out exactly what they are talking about. You can discover this by visiting several forums related to your particular industry. As you search these forums you’ll quickly learn exactly what is on the minds of your potential customers. Once you’ve discovered this, it is easy to tailor your topics in a way that will have a wider appeal to the customer.

Google’s Content Explorer is another way to find out what is drawing people’s interest. By searching topics related to your niche market, you can use filters that will help you to narrow down possibilities. Take note of the ones that generate the most traffic and follow those links to see how you can adapt your marketing strategies to fit those interests.

Finally, you want to create pages that are designed to make online research easy. While keywords will get more people to your page, it is your content that will keep them there. Make sure that each page is designed well, appealing to the eyes, easy to navigate, and full of information that your customers will find useful. The more your visitors enjoy their time on your site, the more likely that they will return and become a future customer.

Of course, there are plenty more things you can do to improve your SEO site ranking, but by following these fundamentals, you’ll be laying the groundwork for more business at a much faster rate. Everything else can be built on this and you’ll be well on your way to a profitable future and a growing potential of expanding your business.