SEO is search engine optimization and it is one of the ways to help your website/blog to be seen online. The importance of SEO cannot be overemphasized as it helps small business owners create fast and user-friendly websites that rank higher in search engines.
This in turn helps to bring in more qualified potential customers to their sites and eventually increases the conversion rates.
SEO also helps build brand awareness for your business as search engine users are more likely to trust a site that are on the first page of search engine results pages (SERPs) than brands that are not.
What is SEO?
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a process or strategy of ranking a website higher on the Google search result page (SERP) so as to attract customers to your website and thereby create engagement.
What are the Benefits of SEO?
For small business owners, you can make use of SEO to build a strong web presence and bypass your online competition to gain new customers for your business.
Nowadays, it is easy for small businesses to compete favorably with the bigger marketing firms with bigger marketing budgets or funds. Nigerians have now realized the importance of SEO for small business growth
You need to know that SEO is divided in two and they are: onsite-SEO and offsite-SEO. This is what must be done to rank in the first page of the google search result page.
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Here are the top 5 Importance of SEO for small businesses owners:
1. Attract Customers
A business website with a good ranking on top of search engine result pages will definitely get more clients as to when they search and see it, they will definitely click it.
According to research by Statista in 2020, it was discovered that over 4.6 billion internet users in the world and more than 99 million internet users in Nigeria alone buy online. This is why it is becoming very important to be on top and that’s why small business owners have started optimizing their website to attract these customers into their website and get them to make purchases or take a desired action.
The goal of any business owner having a website is to attract customers. And this cannot be done by just building a website, they need to optimize the website using Search Engine Optimization.
Note: Businesses that have a SEO optimized website attract far more customers and grow twice as fast as their competitors without one.
2. Cost Effective
Search Engine Optimization is far less costly than billboard advertising, newspaper advertising, outpost, radio advertising and it is far more effective.
Imagine been found freely for certain search terms on search engine result pages (SERP) without running ads.
3. Better Conversion Rates
Search engine optimized websites guaranteed to load faster, user and mobile friendly and will display properly in almost all types of devices be it mobile or tablets. Legible websites are easy to read and easy to navigate. Hence, more likely to grab and hold attention from your readers or visitors – i.e. they’re more likely to become your loyal customers, subscribers, and returning visitors.
An optimized web will land more people on the site as people can search and find you. Note* Without optimizing your website, your website won’t be found when searches are made.
4. Build Brand Awareness
A major reason to have a higher ranking on search engines is to get more awareness. The more people see your site, the better awareness you get and the more likely for people to click or patronize you.
When your site is found on the first page of major search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing, your potential customers are more likely to trust your brand when they search for a particular term rather than other brands that don’t have a strong web presence.
Using SEO build up your brand awareness and when people see you frequently on searches they are likely to trust your brand and buy from you.
That is why small businesses that want to build better brand awareness must start locally and build it up to international level using SEO
5. Beat the Competition
When you have two sites offering the same service at the same cost and one has SEO involved while the other does not. The one with SEO will be found easily by searchers seeking such service online while the other won’t be seen. When you are found, you will get the clicks and definitely more sales.
Know that you are shortchanging yourself if you do not key into SEO and we are in a digital world where everything is moving at a fast pace. You can also save a lot when you optimize your website and blogs for search engines.
