Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

I spent this last weekend reading David Meerman Scott's book entitled "The New Rules of Marketing and PR" which I believe is a must-read for anyone in the advertising, public relations and printing businesses these days. David is also the author of a continuing blog entitled WebInkNow. The thrust of the book is how to get your business to the top of the heap when customers are searching for you online. He discusses many activities including writing a blog, email blasts, news releases, podcasts, video and continuing to update the company website.

All of this activity feeds upon itself resulting in a better ranking of the company website by the search companies such as Google, Bing and Yahoo. The vernacular being used to describe this activity is Search Engine Optimization ("SEO"). When you do a search using Google or one of the other search engines, there are two different results displayed on the page. At the top and to the right are the paid search or sponsored link areas. These are companies that have paid to be listed in those areas based upon the search terms that were typed. If you click on one of these terms, that company will pay a fee to Google based upon a bid price, usually pennies to $10 per click, based upon what words were typed.

The best area to be on the search page is below the sponsored links, but as close to the top as possible. These are free clicks to the company. Those companies that do not have a great web presence, will probably not be on the first page, and depending on the term, may be several pages back. Most customers do not leave the first page during their search. Therefore, in order to improve their rankings, companies need to increase their web presence and activity. Not only does the website of the company need to have all the right keywords, but the site needs to be active. The more web activity that links into the company site, the higher the rankings by the search engines.

There are many ways to improve the web activity. I will be writing about what companies can do to improve their rankings as time goes on. Suffice it to say, that creating a blog, sending out news release, especially those that the search engines can scan, having other companies link-in to your site, being active on the social media scene and updating your websites frequently can only help your rankings.

You can reach us at AlphaGraphics at the following websites:

Mesa 535 W. Baseline Rd., Mesa, AZ 85210 480-844-2222

Tempe 720 W. Elliot Rd., Tempe, AZ 85284 480-413-1900

Phoenix 8041 N. Black Canyon Hwy, Phoenix, AZ 85021 602-234-2944