What, exactly, is SEO anyway?

In a nutshell, SEO (or Search Engine Optimization) is the activity of optimizing a web site in order to improve the site’s position in the search engines’ results. By improving certain internal and external factors SEO consultants can effectively make the site more ‘search engine friendly’, which leads to getting higher positions in search results – and therefore more traffic to the web site.

SEO is often considered the more technical part of online marketing, as such the terms are often used interchangeably. Here at Stone, we see SEO as an important part of a larger set of elements in a client’s online marketing strategy.

OK, so why does my company need SEO?

If you bothered to create a website in the first place, chances are you want people to see it. When you consider that there are currently around 230 million websites on the internet and around 300 million searches on Google alone per day, it’s easy to see that people are going to need a little help finding your company’s site.

That’s where Stone comes in. If your site can’t be found by search engines you miss out on millions of potential customers that are searching for your product/service. By engaging in an SEO campaign, you’ll help the search engines find your content and also help boost your rankings so that content will be displayed in a position where searchers can find it easily.

Makes sense…what kinds of activities are involved in optimizing my website?

Stone starts out by conducting keyword research, thinking about words and phrases your customers would likely use when looking for the information or products your site offers and using tools to explore opportunities you may not have considered. Taking time to research these options allow us to make the best possible decision about which exact terms your website should target.

Once we’ve got an idea of what keywords will be beneficial to target we’ll make recommendations for the on-page elements of your website. This includes optimizing your actual copy, as well as more technical elements such as title and meta tags, internal linking structure, overall site architecture, image alt tags etc.

At this point, we start with the off-page factors. One of the most important factors that the search engines use to rank sites is the number (and quality) of links pointing to your site. Essentially, the more links you have the better the search engines like your site. Stone will help you build out these links in a way that adheres to best practices standards and fully takes advantage of your targeted keywords.

This can be done using a variety of different strategies and it is here that SEO merges with a more comprehensive online marketing plan.