As prospects get more and more Internet-savvy, it’s important for a company to position its website to maximize its ranking when potential customers are searching.
This article from Insurance News Net explains how more people than ever are searching for insurance information online, more than 16 million queries in 2009 alone. The statistics reinforce the importance of optimizing a website for customer searches. This process, known as Search Engine Optimization (SEO), deploys various strategies to ensure that a website ranks highly when high value prospects are searching.
However, SEO continues to be misunderstood, misapplied and mismanaged by many financial service companies. With that in mind, we have created the following SEO Fact or Fiction quick guide to better understand what can and cannot be accomplished through a properly executed SEO strategy.
SEO just deals with key words, right?
FICTION. SEO includes anything that can be done on a site to organically increase rankings. That can be anything from creating more pages to ensuring copy headlines are maximized.
If I optimize my site I’ll jump in the rankings tomorrow.
FICTION. Rankings take time. A company shouldn’t reasonably expect to see any results for at least six months. These strategies take patience. If a company is looking for quick results, there are other more effective strategies. For example, paid search is a great way to fill the gap while waiting for a rise in organic rankings.
I should focus my company’s SEO efforts on a limited number of keywords/phrases.
FACT. Though it may be enticing to optimize for every word under the sun, in reality a focused approach is key. Trying to rank for everything will dilute efforts, resulting in ranking on nothing.
The more traffic my site gets, the higher it will appear in search rankings.
FICTION. Traffic does not equal rankings. Relevancy is the key factor in search engine rankings. While increased inbound links do improve rankings (1 link = 1 vote), traffic to a site alone is irrelevant and unidentifiable to the search engines.
If my competitors’ sites are already optimized, I should just give up
FICTION. The Internet is a big place and there is room for everyone. If competitors are wining on certain phrases, research can be done to identify relevant keywords with high volume and less competition. And those keywords should become a company’s target.
