Why Having a Website is Good- But Not Enough

While it is easy for online customers to locate a business if they know precisely which company they want to find, it is growing increasingly difficult for businesses to stand out from the millions of company profiles now available on the web.

Bluntly put, now that your business has a website, your competition has become global, and the need to differentiate your online presence has become crucial to your survival and success. The number of visitors your website has every month determines the traffic of your website.

TIP 1: Ultimately, having a website is good, but it will be of no benefit to your business if it has no visitors.

What is the Difference between Organic and Direct Traffic

A clear understanding of how Internet traffic works is crucial. Direct traffic is visits to your web pages that come from people that already know you. While your leverage of free online services such as Facebook, Twitter and blogging platforms are of benefit, they only help you “host” customers you probably already have. Put another way, these platforms will only receive the “direct” traffic of customers who know who you are and how to find you. What you need to capture is the traffic created by search engines and that is called “organic” traffic.

How Do Customers Look for Your Business?

Your potential customers look for companies by typing a service profile into a search engine to see which companies match their needs. The “service profile” is any number of keywords the customer chooses to describe what they hope to find. Your company will be “ranked” alongside any number of companies with similar profiles. Your goal is to increase your search engine “rank.”

TIP 2: The more traffic your website receives, the more often a search engine will place you at the list’s top as a “go to” source for customers.

TIP 3: Attracting Internet traffic involves ensuring that the words customers use to describe their needs appear on your site.

How to Optimize Your Company Website or Blog

Embedding key words that describe what the customer wants to find often is called using “search engine optimized” language, or SEO. Your company’s blog or website must tailor its profile to SEO language. This is not as daunting as it seems.

TIP 4: Writing articles, blog posts or service profiles about what you do using keywords most people use to describe your services will help you gain the traffic you need.

For example, if you run a landscaping company that specializes in caring for maple trees, write articles about proper maple tree care and post it on your blog. Drive traffic to this post by creating links to such posts on Facebook, online community boards, Craig’s list and the like.

Tip 5: If you want your post to rank for a particular keyword, ensure your blog title hosts this keyword.

Search engines use blog titles to form the index of companies a search engine “ranks” according to level of Internet traffic. A strong online presence demands an effective “company portrait,” a strategic use of SEO language, and the intelligence to help search engines help you. Being attentive to these aspects an online presence will reward you with customer interest, and subsequent revenue and growth.

This is a guest post by Alex Papa. Alex often speaks in seminars around the world showing people how to find new business ideas that will help them live the lifestyle they desire. In his blog he also offers a business start-up audio CD course.

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