An Idiot’s Guide To Easily Improving Your Google Rankings

An Idiot’s Guide To Easily Improving Your Google Rankings

As the headline suggests, in this guest post, Michael Jenkins (pictured below), director of Shout! Web Strategy, extols his wisdom on how to get your business higher up the Google rankings…

Recently I was reading this article about the growing flower delivery market, particularly boutique services like The Little Market Bunch and Posy Supply Co. One of the founders talks about her desire to get to the Holy Grail – page one of Google, curious (and quietly confident) to see how her business would fare against big guns like Roses Only and Interflora.

AAEAAQAAAAAAAAZAAAAAJDU1ZmMwMWVhLTIxMzUtNDZhZC04MTc5LWRmZGQxYTQzZTBjOA

How do I get to page one of Google is probably the most often asked questions of me and my Shout! colleagues. I’ve tried to summarise it into some simple tips – after all, us Aussies love to help the small Aussie battlers right?

Small business vs Corporates

Corporates have large SEM spends. They understand it, they get that they can measure return on spend. In some large corporates they have internal departments that handle it, or a media agency that is booking the spend, typically through programmatic buying. Keep this in mind when you’re a small team of one – or some. It can be hard to compete – think smart!

Most large businesses haven’t “got” SEO. It’s a specialist skill set and the big company’s SEO is usually as good as the agency that they employ.

Most large businesses are late adopters of SEO.

We have seen large businesses that haven’t even considered SEO in the mix. The sites often lack any traces of SEO. Often these brand’s digital agency has said that they build SEO friendly sites, however this is just a very small part of SEO.

Small brands are fast, nimble and usually specialise in a niche. Having niche content allows their businesses to push well above their weight in their space.

Things small businesses need to consider:

Nail on page optimisation. Get all the meta data on your site detailed with precision. This will help pull you up in the rankings. If you don’t know how to do it – research it! Or ask an expert for some advice.

Have an on-site content strategy. Allow landing pages to be deep with copy. Have the UX (user experiencer) geared for conversion and lay out the page copy so it’s broken into readable pieces of information as the user scrolls down the page. If you’re an e-commerce site and have category and sub category introduction texts of 150 words or more, why is this? Because search engines can’t read images unless they are labelled.

Search engine robots can better understand the context, and relevance, of a page when there is adequate text to determine that the page is the most relevant result for the term being searched. Moreover, Google weights text at the top of a page higher than text at the bottom of the page, especially when headings are placed in what’s called H1 or H2 tags. These heading tags will boost your page’s relevance for the search terms that you are optimising for.

Interlink your blog content back to key landing pages of your site to build an internal linking architecture. This internal linking architecture pushes internal page authority and lets Google know that the page you are linking to is relevant within your site hierarchy for the keyword that you are trying to rank.

Write for an industry publication. Not only will it help build your profile and credibility in the industry but once published it will be a quality link back to your website. Quality links equal great SEO.

Do strategic outreach development monthly. How? Sorry to say, but there are no shortcuts with outreach. Your best bet is to search for websites relevant to your industry, get in touch with them and ask if they would like an expert article on a relevant subject. Most site owners will know that you are after a link. The way you approach them is key, so don’t ask for a link straight up.

If they are happy for you to write the article, you can request they place a branded link within the ‘about author’ section of the article. Very few webmasters will have a problem with an ‘about author’ link. Hardly any brands do this and it will certainly make marketing managers cry when they see your rankings surge. This is a little gem that most brands don’t understand or do!

Have a social content calendar – Facebook, Instagram, Twitter – they all help! Google loves to see that you have traffic referred from lots of other domains other than there search engine. Social referrals will help trigger this ranking factor.

Getting to ‘page one’ for keywords and outranking the larger brands is still very possible. SEO comes down to two factors – Onsite SEO and Offsite SEO. When both of these are well optimised, and best practices like above are implemented, a small business can punch well above its weight through effective SEO.




Latest News

Archibald Williams Wins NBA Digital, Activation & Fan Engagement Accounts For APAC
  • Media

Archibald Williams Wins NBA Digital, Activation & Fan Engagement Accounts For APAC

Independent brand and digital agency, Archibald Williams (AW) has been appointed to lead the NBA account across the APAC region. The NBA is one of the most prestigious sporting leagues in the world and basketball is one of the fastest-growing sports in Australia. Effective immediately, AW said it was “excited” to work across all digital, […]

QMS Champions Creativity As First Most Contagious APAC 2023 Sponsor
  • Advertising

QMS Champions Creativity As First Most Contagious APAC 2023 Sponsor

Leading digital outdoor company QMS has announced it is the first-ever inaugural partner for Most Contagious APAC, the landmark London event by creative and strategic intelligence company Contagious, which will be showcased in Australia on Tuesday, 12 December in Sydney and Wednesday, 13 December in Melbourne. Most Contagious is an event that delivers key advertising […]

OMG’s Annalect First To Get Meta’s Advanced Analytics
  • Technology

OMG’s Annalect First To Get Meta’s Advanced Analytics

Omnicom’s data and analytics division Annalect has partnered with Meta, giving it access to Advanced Analytics (AA) – one of Meta’s privacy-focused measurement solutions – to provide Omnicom’s clients with future-proof, next-level measurement. Omnicom is the first holding company to have access to AA. AA allows advertisers to combine their first-party data with Meta’s ads […]

AKQA Launches Eco-Conscious AI DIY Assistant Encouraging People To Gift More Sustainably
  • Technology

AKQA Launches Eco-Conscious AI DIY Assistant Encouraging People To Gift More Sustainably

WPP’s AKQA has launched Fixmas.gift, an environmentally conscious AI-powered DIY assistant, affectionately known as Fixie, for a one-stop solution for all things repair. Fixmas.gift hosts an array of guides and inspiration to empower people to prolong the lives of their belongings or purchase pre-owned items that need a little love and care. Fixie can: Help […]

Marc Collister: AI & Automation Set To Revolutionise Creativity In 2024
  • Opinion

Marc Collister: AI & Automation Set To Revolutionise Creativity In 2024

Marc Collister (pictured) of P2 Content Creators spills the beans on his 2024 predictions drawing from two decades of experience in the advertising, film and television industry. I’m certain it will come as no surprise that in 2024, we can expect our industry to move at breakneck speed again. With even more rapid shifts in […]

Opinion

by B&T Magazine

B&T Magazine
Zeno Group Australia Bolsters Client Offerings With An Expanded Creative Services Portfolio & New Senior Leader
  • Marketing

Zeno Group Australia Bolsters Client Offerings With An Expanded Creative Services Portfolio & New Senior Leader

Zeno Australia has announced expanded creative design capabilities and the appointment of Jim Michell (lead image) to its senior leadership team. The new moves support strong growth in the region. Zeno Australia’s clients, including Abano Healthcare, Motorola and Yorkshire Tea, can now tap into a suite of creative design services to augment the agency’s work […]

Assembled Media Inks TikTok Creator Campaign for BIC
  • Campaigns

Assembled Media Inks TikTok Creator Campaign for BIC

Assembled Media, is drawing upon the creative power of TikTok Creator Marketplace to help generate unique, impactful content for iconic stationery brand, BIC. The social activation campaign titled ‘A Pen for Every Side of You’ promotes the flexibility of BIC’s 4 Colours pen and is active nationwide on the BIC Stationery TikTok account. The campaign […]

Big data and analytics visualization technology with scientist analyzing information structure on screen with machine learning to extract predictions for business, finance, internet of things
  • Media

IAB Launches Fourth Module In Its Marketing Measurement Innovation Series

IAB Australia has launched ‘Evolution in Market Mix Modelling’, the fourth module in its Marketing Measurement Innovation Series, which has been developed by IAB Australia’s Ad Effectiveness Council. The module explores what is driving the increased use of MMM and how the technique is evolving with advances in computing power and machine learning to provide […]

Aerial view of a coal fired power station with large cooling towers emitting co2 into the atmosphere. With its lights already turned on the power station is illuminated in moody twilight.
  • Media

Scope3 Expands Carbon Measurement Capabilities To Include DOOH Advertising

Scope3, the collaborative sustainability platform leading the decarbonisation of media and advertising,  announced the addition of digital out-of-home (DOOH) to its emissions measurement. With DOOH ad spending predicted to grow from $17B in 2023 to nearly $24B by 2028, measuring this channel brings us one step closer to understanding the total impact of digital advertising […]

January 14, 2023 - New York, New York, USA: 2023 NRF Big Show press conference with Composition 2024 NRF Singapore.    Photo by Ian Wagreich / © Ian Wagreich Photography
  • Marketing

Now Open For Registration – NRF 2024: Retail’s Big Show Asia Pacific

NRF 2024: Retail’s Big Show Asia Pacific, is now open for online registrations for the main conference. Jointly organized by the National Retail Federation and Comexposium, Retail’s Big Show Asia Pacific will take place from 11 – 13 June, 2024 at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre in Singapore and is expected to draw thousands […]