SEO is critical to online marketing. It should be a goal of your online marketing plan to rank on the first page of Google for your most important search terms. If you are not easily found on Google, your business may not be found at all. How can we take control of this?

Handle the basics – First step is to consider what keywords are most important for your market or industry. What keywords are your consumer searching for? We research this using the Google Keywords planner – here is a link. Google Keyword Planner
We see below what kind of traffic the search term "Grand Rapids Marketing" is getting, and also relevant search terms, these are also called "long tail keywords."

Make a list of these keywords, as well as related keywords. We do this for two reasons:
1. The main keywords we want to rank for is going to be used in the title, URL if possible, and H1 or H2 headings.
2. The related keywords will help us form an outline of related keywords, some of these will be used in H2 headings.
The content of your site is much more important than the specific use of headings. However, we want to make sure our site is takes advantage of every opportunity.
Off page ranking factors
Networking with link creators is key part of ranking well. Part of the Google algorithm looks at how many important sites in your industry are linking to your site, also known as backlinks. A good way to handle this is by creating great content, such as blog post, that appeal to the people that are actually creating websites in your market instead of the consumer.
Google RankBrain
With recent changes such as Googles RankBrian, sites are being very effectively graded on usability and user experience. For example, when someone lands on your site are they bouncing off the site quickly, or spending a good amount of time on the site and interacting with your content?
In addition to usability, page speed and mobile optimization also plays a part in ranking a site.
Social signals
Is your website contented to social sites, and are these sites sending social signals back to your domain?
Always keep track of your ranking! Pay attention to the changes you are making and how this affects your page rank.
Chris Phillips
Evolve Marketing | SEO Optimization | Social Media Marketing | Online Marketing
Kalamazoo, MI