Portland, Maine (PRWEB) September 02, 2013
There are ways to make sure that businesses are left unhindered when search engine algorithms are updated. Google is notorious for constantly updating their algorithm, the additions to their Panda and Penguin updates sending many high ranking sites reeling to the bottom of the list. Google is not alone in this practice. As they are the most widely used search engine, they also tend to get the most coverage. Other search engines including Bing and Yahoo do the same. My Local Leads is a local SEO specialist, providing services that help local businesses across the US improve their visibility, gain new clients, and get the phone to ring. What follows is some of the company’s best advice on how local businesses can improve their rankings while simultaneously avoiding negative reactions to search engine algorithm updates.
Write for the readers, not the computers. When trying to improve online lead generation through organic search optimization, many businesses fall into the trap of providing low quality, keyword stuffed material. It is important not to do this. Yes, the page, article, or blog post should make use of the keyword, but that will happen naturally as valuable, insightful, or entertaining information is written for the reader. If people go to a page and get something that makes no sense or has nothing to offer, they will navigate away from the page quickly, which will hurt rankings. The search engine algorithms have gotten so advanced, they can detect the relative quality of the content by a number of different metrics and they even tell when the page is trying to fool them into believe bad content is good. Follow the basic guidelines of titles, meta descriptions, and latent semantic indexing, but the business should write for the people they want to attract or keep engaged.
Improving the user experience goes beyond the written material on a website and it is important for improving ranking and visibility. This combines a number of different disciplines including demographics research, user testing, split testing, conversion rate optimization, graphic design, appropriate use of whitespace, and using media rich content. Everything from the color and size of the font that is used to the responsiveness of mobile websites can have a major impact on the user experience. If the company provides a lackluster user experience, they will achieve lackluster results. If, however, they provide a superior user experience, they will improve rankings and search engine updates are not going to take that away of them.
It is also important to have a mixture of both timely and timeless information on a website. Older websites and pages have an edge when measured for search engine ranking. However, breaking news and time sensitive information can quickly grab impressive search engine results as well. Keep the old mixed with the new for maximum effectiveness. This means that is important that older pages and posts are periodically checked to make sure they are working and active and that updates do not kill links or destroy the formatting and presentation of the page. It also means that content should be regularly added to the site, although testing will need to be done to find the proper amount to add as either too much or too little added within specific timeframes can be detrimental.
My Local Leads helps local business with search engine optimization, website design and development, mobile marketing, and more. They can help manage a local businesses online reputation and provide valuable insight when it comes to online lead generation and customer retention.