Out of everything in search marketing title tags can be the easiest way to gain rankings for your site, especially in less competitive markets.  The key to writing effective title tags is understanding the weight search engines place on the words within them.  In general the first words in your title tags will carry the most weight.  So a company selling widgets could choose either of the below examples for their home page title tag, but I would suggest using the second example.  The reason for this is potential customers are more likely to search for a term such as “widgets for sale” as opposed to the brand.  And if the potential customer is searching for the brand chances are they will still find you.

Company | Widgets for Sale

Widgets for Sale | Company

Using this method along with other SEO techniques can mean the difference between ranking on the first page or 30th page of the SERP.  However, changing the title tag on your site does not mean immediate changes to your rankings.  The search engines will first have to re-index your page which can take anywhere between a day and several months.  Once this has happened you should expect to see a slow increase in your rankings over time.

This brings me to an important point if you are considering starting a new business.  Unless you have already have name for your business, consider selecting a name with keywords in it.  This hold especially true with web only businesses.  The reasoning behind this has to do with links and your URL.  If your name contains keywords the chances of getting anchor text from links with good keywords in it greatly increases.

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Understanding why links are important is essential to obtaining the right links.  One of the best analogies I’ve seen used to describe this is with the political model.  Now the extent the political model was explained (that I have seen) has been simply comparing links to votes.  I will try to take this a step further to offer a better understanding of a link’s importance.

Before we get into the link/vote comparison, I will discuss the basics involved in a political race as it relates to your website.  Try to imagine your website as a political party and you as the mastermind behind it all.  You have several candidates (each a page on your website), and each of those candidates wants to be known for a different message (keywords the page is aiming for).  Frequently, the messages of your different candidates will have some overlap, but each has to offer something they stand for that differs from the others.  Keep in mind the scope of the political party, your candidates should still differ,  just not completely.  Remembering everyone is playing for the same team creates more achievable goals (this is where politics falls apart, but your website doesn’t have to).

The next step in the process becomes getting endorsements (powerful links) and votes (average links).  Remember you are the mastermind behind it all so your goal is to find your strongest candidates and promote them.  An endorsement is much more powerful than an individual vote and usually comes from a trusted source.  With each endorsement you obtain the votes will start to pile up.  This basic analogy hopefully gives you a new perspective on viewing your site as a group and giving the most attention to your strongest candidates.

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Basically there are 3 different types of searches users will perform.

• Informational
• Navigational
• Transactional

Although there is a way to monetize all of these, the real issue here is the user’s intent and how it can vary drastically.  If you can understand why someone found your site, you already have an advantage over many.  Taking this a step further and optimizing your page(s) to either improve the user’s experience or shift the focus of a page to drive the traffic you want is key in SEO.  Below I’ll give you an idea of how each search should be treated.  Bear in mind that not every search can be understood just by looking at the keywords, the use of an analytics program is crucial to understanding what changes (if any) need to take place and more importantly the user’s intent.

An informational search is when the searcher wants to find, you guessed it, information.  A good example of this would be “How many members of Congress are there”.  Generally speaking this is the hardest type of search to directly monetize.  However, if you can drive a fair amount of traffic to a page selling display ads or implementing adsense into your site may become profitable.  Another way to monetize an informational search is the indirect method.  If your site gains trust and authority with the search engines and the content is similar to another page or site you would like to rank you can pass the PR towards that page.

A navigational search is used when a searcher wants to find a specific site.  A good example of this would be “Apple Computers” or “Best Buy”.  If you are getting visitors to your site via this method you’ll be able to better understand your core audience and brand strength.  As your brand grows it becomes even more important to make it obvious to both the users and the search engines what services/products you provide.  Recently Google made some drastic changes to give brand more authority on non-brand related queries.  And even more recently Yahoo has followed suit so Bing won’t be far off as the merger of the two closes in.  Maximizing your revenue requires a careful watch of your analytics programs to discover what visitors are doing.  With this information you’ll know where to make tweaks.  Additionally, this type of search provides invaluable insight into who your customers are and can give you ideas to create an ideal environment for them.

A transactional search is used when the searcher wants to acquire or buy something. For example, “Wiring Diagram for a 2002 Honda”. Just remember “acquire” does not necessarily mean the user wants to buy something.  Seeing terms like these come into your site is an indicator that your focus should be on marketing your products/services more heavily than on a strictly informational search.

When researching your keywords it is important to note that not every search is limited to just one of the three search types.  The intent of the user can be just one, a combination of two or all three.   This can make deciding what content to provide far more difficult, but try to focus on what the known is as it can make the task a bit less overwhelming.

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Many small businesses either cannot afford a professional SEO or they simply don’t have a website.  For those businesses, there is a solution and it is free.

Google Business Center is an excellent solution for getting your business found, but really should be treated as a temporary fix.  Many businesses are already listed, but the information could be outdated.  By searching for your business you may find 5 or more listings, all of your business.  And if the information is incorrect you are losing out.

What I suggest is finding those listings, if they do exist, and go through the claiming process.  If you cannot find your business listing, then just go to the Goolge Business Center add page and add your business.  It is a relativly easy process but if you do get stuck just post a comment with your question and I should be able to help you out.

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So if you are looking to improve your rankings for your small business website, keep the following in mind.

• Why should I do business with you? Make sure this is clear when I get to your site.
• Do your keyword research before just picking keywords you think will convert.
• Get involved in social media – Twitter, Facebook & Linkedin at a minimum
• Look for your competitor’s weaknesses, especially the big ones.  Big companies take more time to react and make decisions than you will.
• Become an expert at what you do.  People look to thought leaders to make their decisions.

Out of the information I offered here the most important would be to do your keyword research prior to putting work into other areas.  If you plan to be successful through your website finding the right keywords is crucial.  A great way to find the highest converting keywords is to run a PPC campaign and track your results, they may surprise you.  This will also cause you to put a bit more thought into what keywords are achievable through SEO within your budget.  

For example let’s use a particular keyword and see how the most achievable keyword combinations can be identified:

Keyword 1 –  Widgets

So Google comes back with 6 million results and the estimate for paid placement is $4.00.  Not so great for the small business, depending on your profit margins for one conversion.

Keyword 2 – Widget Specials

Google comes back with 500.000 results and the estimate for paid placement is $1.50.  Much better price on the paid side plus moving up the rankings here is much more realistic.

Keyword 3 – Widget Specials in MN  

Google now only shows 50,000 results and the paid placement estimate is $0.80.  If your business is in MN this looks like a winner.  Much easier to rank for than widgets and worth spending some money to see if the keywords convert for you.

By applying these tactics, along with the other bullet points above you should be well on your way to improving your search engine rankings and your ROI.

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