Why You Should Be Tracking Your SEO as a Growing Business?
If you know anything about the world of digital marketing, you’ll know that it’s always changing. It changes so quickly that what worked last month, might not necessarily work as well this month. There is always a new tool, technique or strategy to be paying attention to, and businesses have a lot to keep up with. One minute everyone is focusing on email marketing, and the next minute social media marketing is at the heart of every business’ digital marketing strategy. One day everyone’s talking about long blog posts and keywords, and the next it’s all about pay-per-click campaigns. But, one aspect of digital marketing that had remained consistently important is search engine optimisation.
What is Search Engine Optimisation?
SEO is a digital marketing strategy aimed at improving a website’s visibility in search engine results. It is a way to optimise a website’s content and keywords, and various technical elements, like backlinks and metadata, in order to ensure that each and every web page is listed as high on the search engines as possible. A lot of digital marketing practices revolve around paid advertisements to attract more views, but the idea behind SEO is to do things organically.
SEO is just one of the key parts of creating and maintaining a great online visibility, and it works for any business or industry. The real trick to getting the most from SEO, using it effectively and really making it work for you, is one of continuous adaptation of your SEO strategy and tracking of your SEO progress. Below, we take a look at how to track your business’ SEO efforts from monitoring keyword rankings, through to assessing conversions, all aimed at keeping you a step ahead of the competition.
Tracking Your Business’ SEO Progress is Vital
Pay Attention to Your Keyword Rankings
When it comes to tracking your SEO progress, the first thing that you need to do is to track your keywords. You can do this by identifying the keywords that are important to your business and the keywords that resonate most with your target audience, and seeing where you rank on Google for each one. Think about what your target audience is likely to search for when they are looking for your products or services, and what words are strongly linked to what you have to offer. There might be specific phrases that your target market is likely to use, or even slang terms that commonly crop up.
There are a range of SEO tools that you can use to help with keyword tracking, all of which are beneficial to businesses of all shapes and sizes. These tools will help you to track how your chosen keywords are performing, and they’ll give you an insight into keyword rankings, search volume and competition.
Think About Where Your Website Traffic is Coming From
It’s important to analyse your website traffic sources. You can do this with Google Analytics and Google Search Console, both of which help you to monitor your organic traffic. These tools offer valuable insights into how well your SEO efforts are working, allowing you to make any changes needed to boost your success. It’s a great way to see where your website traffic is coming from, and which sources need a bit of a boost. It’ll highlight if you’re spending your SEO budget in the right places.
Analyse which keywords and pages attract the most organic traffic. Try to understand what works best and why, as this can help you to optimise other content and strategies. If you used similar keywords elsewhere, you might achieve similar success on other pages. After all, what works for one web page or blog, is likely to work for others.
Don’t Forget About Backlinks
Backlinks are a big part of SEO, but they are often forgotten about. In fact, a lot of people don’t give them a second thought. Many businesses focus on keywords, content and blogs, even though backlinks are equally important. Use an analyser tool to evaluate the quality and quantity of any backlinks that point towards your website. Tools like Ahrefs or Moz can help you with this, both of which allow you to assess your backlink profile in detail.
When you are checking your backlinks, focus on the quality of backlinks rather than quantity. It’s better to have a few high quality, relevant backlinks from respectable sources, than it is to have a lot of low quality backlinks.
Track Your Conversions and Sales
It’s important to track conversions on your website. This includes macro conversions – such as product purchases or leads – which should be your primary focus, as these have a direct impact on your revenue and are what bring in the big bucks. Micro conversions – such as email sign ups or video views – are also important, as they suggest you’re making progress towards your sales goals. Though micro conversions don’t have the same impact on your revenue, they do show that people are managing to find your business online. You need to monitor conversions from the moment someone becomes aware of your business for the first time, to their final conversion. Understanding where leads drop off or convert can guide your optimisation efforts, as you will know what needs to be worked on.
What Are Your Competitors Doing?
Your focus should be on your own business, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t take a look at what other businesses are doing every once in a while, especially your direct competitors. Look at your competitors’ SEO strategies and compare what they are doing to what you are doing. Identify their top performing keywords, content strategies and backlink sources, and determine if any of them could work for you. As you are similar businesses – you’ll have similar products and services, and a similar target market – it’s likely that you’ll benefit from the same approach to SEO. Though you shouldn’t copy another business’ SEO efforts, there is no harm in taking inspiration from what they’re doing. You are likely to have the same goals, so what works for them is likely to work for you.
Analyse your competitors to find opportunities and gaps in your own SEO strategy. Consider what you can do better or differently, and how you could go one step further than them. Remember, a lot of customers are likely to click on the first business they come across in the search engine rankings. You need to outperform your competitor if you want to secure the top spot.
Tracking your SEO progress is a continuous process and it’s not a ‘one time only’ task. It involves everything from monitoring keyword rankings, analysing traffic sources, evaluating your backlinks and staying aware of what your competitors are up to. By using the right tools and staying proactive in your SEO efforts, you can make informed decisions to enhance your online visibility.
