Improving Search Rankings with a Blog
Like a lot of people, I like proof. I decided to use this web site to demonstrate how making simple changes to a web site can improve search engine rankings.
I had let this web site fall into a state of irrelevance. It had few pages and very little content. I wanted to improve my rankings for the topic of Web Development in Santa Barbara.
I started by checking my rankings to get a baseline. The word Development did not occur in my web site at all so I substituted Developer instead. I searched on Web Developer Santa Barbara and found my web site listed on page 12 on Google.
The reason I wanted to add Santa Barbara to the search term was because it would not be possible for a small web site like this one to rank high on a very generic term such as Web Development. Your small business will likely never rank very high for the generic product or service that you offer, either. But being a small company, I prefer local business. Aiming to improve my rankings among Santa Barbara Web development firms made more sense for me.
The next step I took was to redesign my web site. The appearance did not change. The important thing was that I added more content. I added a blog which would allow me to easily add new content to the home page and add new information to the rest of the site. Keeping the home page fresh makes search engines happy. The blog also allows me to add more keyword-rich links to each page. I write on the subject of Web Development, SEO, Web site usability and general web site improvements. Having new content on these subjects keeps my site fresh and helps me weather the changes in my ranking as other similar web sites do the same.
After adding the blog, I tested my ranking for Web Development Santa Barbara and found I had moved to page 3 of Google’s listing. That was a significant improvement, from zero to 3. With the word Developer, I moved to page 4 from page 12.
I would love to be able to help your small business improve its search rankings. Please contact me for a consultation.