We’re veterans of the SEO game, and have seen the landscape completely change from those days long ago when you could sprinkle a few keywords on a site and call it a day. But still, many of our clients want to focus on keywords, optimization and Google rankings.
We have a confession to make: it’s 2018, and we don’t have to do much to assist Google in doing its job anymore. Google knows what your site is about, what content you’ve produced, who’s interacting with it, and how active your business is online. They’ve built one of the biggest businesses on the planet by being experts in interpreting this info.
“So What Is It You Do, Exactly?”
That’s a great question, thanks for asking! We don’t think of ourselves as search engine optimizers. Instead, we are Shopper Experience Optimizers now. We’re not just focused on showing Google why you’re the bee’s knees. No, our role is far more complex and involves persuading actual people that your business stands out from the pack.
Your business has dozens of potential touchpoints on the web. There’s your site, obviously. But think about all the other ways a potential customer could interact with you:
- A particularly insightful post might reach them on Facebook.
- A coworker may have forwarded a recent email newsletter.
- A funny picture you shared might resonate with them on Instagram.
- A visit to Yelp or one of the many other review and ratings sites may have clinched the deal and sparked them to contact you.
- A banner ad may be following them around for weeks, reminding them it’s time for a visit.
And the list goes on. In all likelihood, your customers are using a plethora of web resources, and they’re evaluating your business on balance from the total experience they’re seeing.
The 360 Approach
This is why optimizing your total online presence through ongoing marketing work is so important. You might have amazing before and after photos showcasing your work, but if you have a weak social presence and only a handful of customer reviews, you may never get the chance to reach potential clients with those tremendous photos. Or you may be nailing it on social media, but you aren’t monitoring your reviews or your website is 10 years old, and now that prospect who initially got such a great vibe is cooling her jets and shopping your competitors.
Taking a 360 approach to your marketing helps you identify weak links and make sure you are presenting a unified image and message across the web. And believe us, optimizing your presences across the web is a heck of a lot harder than simply getting your site ready for some Google love.
The New SEO in a Nutshell
Shopper Experience Optimization is a more complex game involving a mix of many tactics and strategies. The biggest pieces of the puzzle include:
- Killer Content: Remember when people read stuff? (Like blogs from marketing agencies, for instance?) Well those days are pretty much gone and now you have to create more complex types of content, like videos, infographics, interactive widgets, and much more.
- Reviews: When was the last time you purchased any product or service over 50 bucks and didn’t look online to see what other people say? Exactly.
- Clean Coding: Your site needs to load in an instant, look fantastic on any device, and be coded so that Google can index, parse out, and display all kinds of information easily.
- Social Smarts: It’s not enough to be “on” Facebook, Instagram or Pinterest. You have to provide a true glimpse of what your business is all about and show off your superb customer service.
- Local Presence: Maps, apps, social channels, directories. There are tons of ways to find your business online, and you need to have an optimized presence on them all.
- Paid Ads: PPC and social ads can help you target your message to new potential customers. But beware: no one wants to be advertised to anymore. Focus on amazing offers, helpful tips, and entertainment.
When we add all this up for our clients, we’re able to achieve a more impressive and more persuasive experience than any of their competitors online.