Keeping your Web site current and well-placed in search engine rankings is a seemingly never-ending task. Each day that your site’s ranking slips is a day your competitors are getting a jump on your business.
Of course, keeping your site fresh and relevant is critical. Still, redrafting your messages, adding new content and updating product information regularly can seem like major undertakings—the kind that are often put off in the face of more pressing deadlines.
Luckily, there are a number of ongoing, relatively easy steps that can help keep you and your company ahead of the competition and on track toward building ongoing awareness and new business opportunities.
Help Prospects Mine Your Content
Although content is king, a multitude of pages and PDF data sheets can’t take the place of clear, well-organized information that is optimized for search engines. Regularly update your site content with items such as press releases and new product descriptions that are rich in keywords that detail your company’s products and services.
For example, think “fiber-optic cable adapters” as opposed to “adapters.” Help your Web visitors stay up to date by setting up an RSS feed from your site. Rather than sorting through your site to find what they want, users can subscribe to a content-specific feed and get the most relevant information from you directly. That’s a powerful tool when prospecting for new customers.
Start Talking – Commentary and Blogs
Mention blogging to busy business execs and their eyes glaze over. “I don’t have time to write stuff every day for a bunch of people who have nothing better to do than hang out on the Internet.” People like who? Journalists looking for a story? Industry analysts charting the next trend? Web crawlers looking for new and relevant content?
Anytime you talk to your business community, whether it’s an editorial, a white paper or a regularly updated blog, you’re driving people to your site and to your business. Blogs are fairly easy to set up—you can be blogging in a matter of minutes through servers like Blogger and WordPress—and easier to update. The tough part of blogging? Providing new content and responding to user comments.
But it doesn’t have to be that hard. Set aside two 30-minute blocks each week for your CEO or senior executives to draft a quick missive. Remember, this is a short form piece (300 words, if that), not a major industry presentation. Comment on a recent article. Pose a question for the market to respond to. Offer your ideas on where the market is going, or what needs to happen to move it forward.
A blog is more of a conversation; keep it informal and thoughtful and encourage a friendly and lively exchange of ideas. Yes, your Web community is looking for information and resources when they need it, but they’ll keep coming back to a company that is sharing ideas.
Let Online Directories Optimize Your Traffic
Companies spend significant time optimizing their sites for the general search engines, but a number of major online industry and vertical-market directories do a lot of that work for you. Start by making sure your company and products are listed on vertical search engines. Some offer free online listings where customers and prospects can link directly to your site. These sites get tens of thousands of visits every day because they target specific industries. They invest a lot of time and money optimizing their directories with the mega-search engines like Google and Yahoo, so you don’t have to.
Make Your Press Room Work Harder
Most online press rooms offer little more than a few news releases, a company fact sheet and PR contact information. A more robust press page can boost your Web optimization and increase your media inquiries. Start optimizing your releases for newswire distribution by drafting content that is rich in descriptive keywords and phrases relevant to your business. Next, make your site a real media (and customer) resource by including links to industry information, third-party research, associations your company supports, and tradeshows and conferences you attend. Relevant links improve your optimization and make your press room a destination for media. And don’t forget to post content in HTML text instead of as a PDF to help crawlers more readily find and index your content.
Link Up With Relevant Sites
The purpose of a linking campaign is to create links directing users to your site from other quality, trusted, relevant sites. Who determines the quality of these link associations? The high-powered general search engines, like Google.
According to Google, “Webmasters can improve the rank of their sites by increasing the number of high-quality sites that link to their pages.” In more detail, Google explains each link as a type of vote of confidence. Google calls this their PageRank system. But instead of each vote counting the same, the “voter’s” credentials are also evaluated and hold different weights based on the same criteria: the number of relevant and quality links jumping to their site. Couple this concept of Web-page ranking to the universal text-driven method of user searches, and you get accurate search results, interested customers, and more conversions.
Establishing relationships with Webmasters of trusted sites is the path to a good linking campaign. Remember the importance of relevance: find a way to link your site to a trusted one with some kind of relevant angle or commonality. If it’s not a relevant link for them and they post it on their site, it may adversely affect their PageRank.
Building your company’s Web awareness and driving prospects to your site is a lot like any marketing and sales effort—it’s an ongoing process. But it’s an ongoing process that doesn’t require a major campaign each and every time you have something to say. Just tap into some existing industry resources, make your content easy to find, engage your customers, and keep up a steady drum beat. Do a bit every week and you’ll find your major Web overhauls are few and far between, leaving you more time to take care of all your new customers.
Julie Mason is general manager for Kellysearch.com, and has more than a decade of experience in online marketing.
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