Lesson 1: What is SEO?

Course Complete

In this lesson we will dig in and help you understand what SEO is and how it relates to your business

Search Engine Optimization (SEO),is the work that goes into a website so it ranks on the first page of search engines like Google.

An optimized website shows up high on the search engine results page (SERP) simply because it provides the best answer to a query.

Paid: Paid results are typically referred to as pay-per-click (PPC) advertisements. Traffic from this source is any visitor that reaches your customers' website after they have paid for advertising promotions.

Local: Local results are extremely dependent on where the searcher is at the time of the search. These results are pulled from Google My Business listing information.

Organic: Traffic from search engine results that is earned, not paid. This is the most sought after type of traffic.

So how does Google judge if a website is the best answer?
They look for 2 things: relevance and trust.

The two major factors that Google looks at when trying to decide who the best answer is are Relevance and Trust.

Relevance = Onsite

Relevance has everything to do with your customers' website.

Two aspects of onsite: Code and Content – when Google crawls a website, they see both the code and the conten

Trust = Offsite

Trust is measured by the number of OTHER websites that talk about or link back to your customers' website! The more other websites talk about and link back to their site, the more trusted they become

Let's dig into each of these a bit further.

Relevance = Onsite SEO

Your customers might think their website is perfect because it looks good! But remember, Google looks at the website's code so your customers might have the prettiest website in the world but if Google can’t see their site it won’t help their rankings.

Google wants to know you are who you say you are.

When someone asks a question, they want a relevant answer in return.

All the content on a website should clearly support the products/services it sells.

If a website is unclear or confusing, Google will not recommend it to its users.

Trust = Offsite SEO

Trust is a huge factor in ranking on the first page. Google wants to give searchers the best answer for a query. They want to ensure before recommending a website that they are recommending a trusted, reliable company.

Directories are one of the best ways to establish trust on the internet. Building trust in your listings will:

Make sure your information is uniform and accurate across all directories.

Lets users know you are an active and operational business.

Increase your chance of being included in local map pack search results.

Google is shouting to millions of online searchers...
We want your clients' business to be the best solution to their needs.

Google = A Referral Machine

Transform websites into long-term assets in which Google becomes a “word of mouth” referral.

Once relevance and trust are established, Google uses this for its best answer and highest referral. When they rank a business high, they refer it to anyone who searches.