Your Small Business is Probably Not Going To Get High Rankings On Google

Google reports that its search index contains hundreds of billions of webpages and is well over 100,000,000 gigabytes in size. And the real number may actually be has high as 130 TRILLION pages. With that much competition, how is your small business ever going to rank high enough to be seen? The answer: you’re probably not. Let’s face it, 75% of Internet users never scroll past the first page of search results. So, not only do you have to contend with millions competing sites, you also have have to accept that if you’re not in the top 10 results for a search, most people won’t see you. Does this mean that search engine optimization is a waste of time?

Probably not. Here’s why.

Search engine rankings are based on many things:

• Age of your website. The older the better.
• Mobile friendliness.
• User experience.
• Speed of your website. The faster the better.
• Focus. Can Google tell what your site is about? Do you look like an expert on a particular topic?
• Freshness of content.
• Social signals.
• Quality inbound links from authoritative websites.

Although all of the above are factored into your rankings, the most important are good content and quality, inbound links. The content speaks for itself. Google only wants to show searchers information that is relevant and usefulI. Links reenforce the usefulness of the content. If you put up good information, other sites will link to it. The more of those links you get, the stronger the signal is to Google that this content is worthwhile to show in search results. And if the links to your content are from large, established, branded sites, all the better. A link from CNN counts a lot more than a link from Joe Schmoe’s personal blog page.

The major obstacle to small businesses is getting quality inbound links. Larger, established sites get links without even trying and many larger businesses have dedicated link building teams. It’s almost possible to compete at this level. But does this mean you should give up on search engine optimization (SEO) altogether? 

No.

The crux of SEO is to do all the things that Google (and other search engines) like. It turns out that those same things are beneficial to your website overall.  A good user experience, mobile friendliness, and site speed should be a focus of all websites. If a visitor become frustrated because your site is unusable, they’re going to leave regardless of how good your content or product is. The remaining best practices are essentially brand building. By continuously adding fresh, useful content you reenforce your status as the go to place for your particular goods or services. And as always, brand building is about promotion and customer service.  This can be through social media, traditional media, advertising, and PR. Doing all these things may not get you in the top ten in Google results, but they will definitely benefit your business overall.

There is one other perk of doing SEO even if you have little chance of ranking nationally. Google also presents results in a local context. For example, a search for ‘tires” may bring up results consisting of tire manufacturers and nation-wide retailers. But a search for “tires in Hickory NC” will bring up many more local websites. If your business is locally or regionally focused, you have a much better chance of showing in a local context. This may not deliver the search volume of being ranked for broader searches, but it may help build your customer base nevertheless.  

If your business needs help creating a search engine friendly website, quality relevant content, social media promotion, or would like to advertise directly on search engines, Jackson Creative is your one-stop source for all these digital marketing solutions.