What is SEO and why is it important for your business?

Search engine optimisation (SEO) is crucial to get more eyeballs on your ethical company’s product or services pages. However, simply plugging in a few keywords and hoping for the best isn’t enough.

I’ll guide you through the basics of what search engine optimisation is, how you can use SEO ethically, and why you shouldn’t just rely on keywords to become more visible.

Each of the topics I mention could be a long blog post in itself, so I’ve included plenty of links for further reading. However, I hope this post will help you get a quick overview of the most important issues.

What is search engine optimisation (SEO)?

First, a quick definition: SEO is the process of optimising your web pages, so they rank better in search engines like Google, Bing, Ecosia, and so on. 

All search engines use web crawler bots (also called ‘spiders’) to look for relevant sites, then index and rank them in order of relevance. This is a complex process, as there are many factors influencing how well a page will rank. We’ll look at some of these later in this post.

What you’re trying to do is rank highly on the first page of the search engine results pages (“SERPs”).

A selection of your web text may even be shown prominently on top of the first page by Google or Bing in so-called ‘featured snippets’. 

An example of a featured snippet for the search term “ethical marketing” is shown below. Here, Google has found what it has evaluated to be a good definition of ethical marketing and shows it on top of the page, above the “People also ask” section. 

Interesting fact: according to a 2020 study by Search Engine Watch, featured snippets gained a whopping 35.1% of all clicks on a search engine results page. 

Benefits of SEO for your business

Ranking highly gives your web pages (and overall website) a distinct competitive advantage: 

• A well-optimised, trustworthy website increases brand awareness.
• SEO works well with other digital marketing and offline strategies.
• Unlike paid advertising, it doesn’t cost you anything when engines crawl your website.
• The more high-quality users / ideal target audience find you through organic search, click through to your site and convert, the better for your business.

Which search engines should you focus on?

Google currently has a market share of 92.09%, according to StatCounter Global Stats (April 2021 – April 2022), so it’s wise to optimise for Google search results (using Google Ads Keywords Planner for keyword research, for example).

The good news: most SEO tips in this article should also work for other major search engines. However, there may be slight SEO differences in e.g., Bing, Ecosia, and DuckDuckGo. Also, don’t forget to check out tailored SEO tips for YouTube: it’s the world’s second-largest search engine.

In any case, there’s no guarantee a search engine will display your text on page one and/or as a featured snippet, but there are things you can do to make good search engine rankings more likely. 

They are divided into “on-page”, “off-page”, and “technical” SEO factors.

On-page SEO factors

These are elements on your web pages that are under your control. There are many, so I’ll focus on the most important in my view.

• E-A-T: Google will consider your expertise, authority, and trustworthiness when ranking your content. A new site with few high-quality external and internal links won’t rank highly. Similarly, text that isn’t unique or well researched is likely to fail.
  
• Keyword research. You’ll need to find and integrate relevant and fairly popular terms that aren’t too competitive. Analyse exactly which keywords web visitors use when they search for a certain topic. Answer the Public and Google Ads Keywords Planner are good free tools for this.
  
• Search intent. Always check what Google displays on page one for your chosen keyword. For example, users searching for “German translator” will actually find many free online translation tools and dictionaries, no human English ⇄ German translators like me who’d like to offer their services. 🥴 So, if I wanted to write a page about my own translation services, I’d need to find different, more specific (“long-tail”) keywords. Users are more likely to search for longer terms, such as “German translator near me” or “German translator Oxford”, to find me!
  
• Good writing. Focus on producing high-quality and relevant content for readers. Answer their questions while keeping things simple and engaging. Ideally, important SEO keywords should be integrated early on in your text. However, never overuse keywords if you can help it. “Keyword stuffing” is punished by search engines. 
  
• Well-structured content. Structure your pages properly. For example, use relevant URLs, meta descriptions, title tags, and header tags (H1-H6). Don’t forget bullet points / lists, nicely structured paragraphs, and the odd emphasis (bold / italic) to help guide your readers’ eyes.
  
• Optimised images with relevant ALT text. Use editing software like Pixlr to reduce the size of your pictures. Large images slow down your website, which affects your ranking. Also, don’t forget to add ALT text, which needs to be relevant in terms of SEO and descriptive for users with accessibility issues (e.g., visual impairments).

Off-page SEO factors

These are elements not directly related to the content of your web pages, which you still can influence. The most important in my view are:

• High-quality backlinks. The more “E-A-T” websites link to your own website, the better yours will do. 
  
• PR. Regularly search for potential PR opportunities on Twitter, using #prrequest and #journorequest. Even good stories that aren’t directly related to your business can help you rank. Just make sure you’re featured in newspapers or magazines that are as ethical as possible. I’m not a fan of certain tabloids, for example, so I wouldn’t want to be featured in those. However, this is a personal choice.
  
• Mentions and positive reviews. Good reviews or mentions of your website will influence ranking. These could be, for example, on Google My Business, social media, or podcasts. So, always make sure to ask for reviews when you’ve finished a project (as long as both sides are happy with the result, of course). 
  
• Good content marketing. Anything you do to regularly promote your website on high-quality digital and offline channels can help improve your ranking. However, you need to make sure to focus on the right target audience and engage them, so they actually click through to your website. In my view, content marketing also includes: 
  
  • Guest blogging and blog swaps with respected experts in your industry.
  • Influencer marketing. Just make sure you choose ethical influencers in your field. This platform may help with this.
  • Online and in-person networking. Try Meeow (globally), the ethical hour, or your local LEP networks (UK only), for example, to build genuine business relationships that may help increase website traffic to your site.
  • Your own newsletter, if you have one. Check out this free email marketing course if you’d like to learn more. Important: don’t spam!

Technical SEO factors

Technical SEO is a very important and sometimes overlooked ranking factor.

Crucial elements are, for example:

• Your site structure / XML site map, which helps search engines understand and rank your site. Yoast has a good guide on this. 
  
• Website speed. Tools like Page Speed Insights can help you optimise your site, though you’ll probably need a web developer to help with fixing some issues.
  
• Mobile-friendliness. Much of today’s traffic comes from mobiles rather than desktops, so if your site isn’t mobile friendly, you’ll lose out. Check out some tips on how to make your site more responsive.
  
• Site health. Try Google Search Console to audit your site and fix any errors.
  
• Thin or duplicate content. Content that is too short, badly written, or that duplicates other content on your site isn’t likely to rank well. And, of course, you shouldn’t ever just copy / plagiarise content from other sites!
  
• Site security. Your site should be properly secured. Your URL must start with “https” rather than “http”, for example.
  
• Canonical tags. You have to let a search engine know your primary web page when you have a few pages with similar content. You can check whether your site uses a canonical tag here.
  
• Broken links. Search for these regularly and fix them. 

So, why don’t your SEO efforts pay off?

If your SEO marketing efforts aren’t getting you anywhere, don’t despair. This could be due to a number of reasons – let’s look at these below:

Lack of SEO strategy

If you don’t have a long-term SEO strategy in place, your website isn’t likely to rank highly. 

• Think about your blog content and plan posts that are on relevant, similar topics, but aren’t optimised for the same keyword(s). Don’t compete against yourself in the SERPs.
• Update your content and post regularly and consistently. 
• Check your analytics and see what content works (and doesn’t).

Disregarding local SEO 

Don’t forget local SEO if you’re relying on customers in your neighbourhood. Google My Business is a great free tool to get your company seen locally. Ahrefs has published a useful how-to guide on improving your local SEO.

Insufficient keyword research

Refer back to my points on long-tail keywords above. It’s important to use the right terms and find relevant keywords. Here are some more examples on short-tail vs long-tail keywords.

Being unaware of users’ original search intent

It’s always a good idea to test your chosen SEO keywords by running an incognito search and checking what kind of user intent the search engine is catering for on page one of the results.

There are four different types of search intent you’ll need to bear in mind before you choose your SEO keywords:

• Informational intent. Mostly used for blog posts, which are meant to inform readers. E.g. “What is SEO?”
• Navigational intent. Here, users already know where they want to go online. E.g. “Netflix Log-in”
• Commercial intent. Users will want to find out more about a product or service before deciding to make a purchase. “German translator near me” would be a good example here.
• Transactional intent. Users actively want to buy something specific. Perhaps “Claudia Kozeny-Pelling translation services Oxford” in my case.

Optimising for a keyword that has a different search intent to the one you’re trying to aim for won’t work well.

Assuming SEO keywords rank the same in other languages

In short: they often don’t! Keeping the English original version of an SEO keyword may make no sense in the target country, and a literal translation may not work as well. To illustrate this, check out this example I’ve sourced from Google Ads Keyword Planner below. 

We can see that the German translation of our UK keyword doesn’t have as much competition, but a far smaller monthly search volume:

	Example 1	Example 2
Target country	UK	Germany
Target language	English	German
SEO keywords	“SEO strategy tips”	“SEO Strategie Tipps” [Literal  translation]
Average monthly searches (period: May 21 – Apr 22)	10-100	1-10 *
Competition	Medium	–

[* Same average monthly search and competition results for “Tipps zur SEO-Strategie” or “SEO-Strategie-Tipps” in Germany.]

So, for optimal search engine marketing, it’s important to:

• set your target language and target country in the Keyword Planner, and 
• do some research into alternative terms, which may rank better in the desired target country and language. 

Using unethical (“black hat”) SEO tactics

You won’t get good results with techniques that are against search engine guidelines. These are called “black hat” tactics. Avoid them at all costs. 

These include, for example: 

• Keyword stuffing.
• Using automatically generated content that doesn’t make sense but includes high-ranking SEO keywords.
• Paying for links to your site.
• Sneaky redirects to a different URL than your users originally requested.

For more information, check Google’s Webmaster guidelines.

Badly researched and/or poorly written content

A good search engine optimised article should offer easy-to-read and valuable information. High-quality content is key. 

A good SEO content writer will take time to research and only use valuable sources to back up their claims (e.g., Statista and other E-A-T websites.)

Poor site speed and other technical SEO issues

Again, website speed and technical SEO are crucial. For a free course on technical SEO, check out this one from Semrush Academy.

No / few backlinks

Don’t pay for links! Ethical backlink building is important. I’ve already mentioned some ethical back linking techniques above, e.g., guest blog posts and swaps, as well as responding to (ethical) PR requests. 

Ignoring other digital and traditional marketing techniques

Your long-term marketing strategy shouldn’t just include digital marketing techniques. Think about other, offline marketing tactics that could work well for your ethical business. For example, face-to-face networking, print advertising, or GDPR-compliant direct mail.

Organic marketing isn’t everything, either. You may need to invest in paid online advertising, too. You can attract quality traffic by focusing on tailored advertising campaigns.

Not investing in SEO experts

Don’t settle for cheap content agencies or completely automatic AI writing software. You’re more likely to get badly-researched gobbledegook that way. “White Hat” (i.e. ethical) SEO content writers and technical SEO experts, however, will be able to help your website succeed. 

Need help with SEO content writing?

You’ve seen the benefits of SEO. However, it’s not always easy to put everything you’ve learned into practice right away.

Not to worry! Hire an SEO professional. (It doesn’t immediately have to be a full SEO team.)

If you need help with international SEO content writing—specifically, English and/or German SEO content—consider hiring me.🙂 I provide SEO content writing, copywriting, and marketing translation services in English and German (DipTrans MCIL).

(Side note: if you’re wondering why you should hire a marketing translator or an ethical copywriter, why not check out my blog posts on this here!)

You can also find other good content writers and copywriters on professional databases, such as ProCopywriters.

Hope you’ve enjoyed this blog post. Any questions, please feel free to contact me.