SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is the process of improving the quality and quantity of website traffic to a website or a web page from search engines. SEO targets unpaid traffic, rather than direct traffic or paid traffic through ads. It’s essentially a way of helping your own website be found online. Click here to find out how it works in more detail.
There are lots of elements to Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) that help build your digital presence overall. SEO is pretty complex, but here we break down some of the most common terms, and give you a few easy solutions to boosting your small business online.
We will cover 4 key topics:
- Back links – what are they?
- What is relevant content?
- Placement and quality
- How to build a broad digital presence
Click here to read our blog with Menekse Stewart, an SEO specialist. You can also use this link to watch our IG Live on SEO, which explains more about how it all works.
1. Back links – what are they?
A back link is a link from one website to another.
If you can get someone to link to your website, and you link to theirs (known as a reciprocal link), this strengthens functionality of the link. Pedddle is great for helping you with this – click here to see how. If you know any fellow small business owners with their own website, ask them if you can do this for one another.
Alternatively, if you link to a ‘high authority website’ (for example a link within your website blog) that is a well-known website, (such as The Guardian, the BBC or .gov.uk sites and so on), this can help boost your own website’s SEO, as they get so much traffic.
Blogs are a great way to include back links on your website, and it’s easy to link to similar or useful content. Click here to find out how to write a brilliant bog which will boost your website’s SEO. For example, you could include a phrase like the one below to link to a high authority site:
“The ceramics industry is booming at the moment following the success of the BBC’s The Great Pottery Throw Down (hyperlink a link to their website on BBC), and we as creative people love to see others enjoying the craft too…”.
How do you know which websites have high authority? Here is a link to find out. Simply pop in the URL to see if it ranks well in search engine results. Anything with a Google ranking helps – a global rank of less than 1 million is good, and obviously less than 1000 is really good (as you’re likelier to be shown higher in search results if there is less of that type of content).
In summary – write blogs and include links to other websites!
Click here to find out how to write a brilliant bog which will boost your website’s SEO. If you’re a Pedddle member, your Pedddle page includes links to your website and social media channels, which will help to boost your SEO, as our website has good SEO in itself. Make a stronger link by including a link to your Pedddle page on your own website – i.e. back link it. Google sees this collaboration, and will show you up higher in search results.
2. What is relevant content?
It is important to create content that your audience of viewers, customers and clients will want to read and find useful. Google is a search engine, they want to find what people are searching for, so they reward useful websites.
Try to rank locally – 50% of internet searches happen from a mobile device, of which the majority aim to find a local service. Write blogs that link into local stories or events or places local to you. The shop local movement is huge, so local businesses and your local community will also want to support you.
Again, in these blogs you should be including links to other websites to improve your back links. Try to find relevant articles at good authority sites which mention your local area. Ideally, you want them to be linking back to you, but often big websites won’t want to do this – but even just liked to them one way will help you.
Content ideas:
- Have you been involved in a magazine article recently? Ensure they have your website URL pointing at a page on your website. Check out our blog on PR for ideas.
- Write a brief article about Pedddle and link to other people’s pages and websites, as well as other places within your own website. Post this out on social media – direct your audience to read your website blog.
- Guest write for other people. You might have written a similar blog on your own page and you want to share it with Pedddle – email [email protected] if you’d like us to publish a version of your blog! PLEASE NOTE – if you post the exact same blog, word for word, in more than one place, this is actually detrimental to your SEO, and search engines won’t rank identical content well. However, if you tweak the wording slightly, this is fine.
- Write blogs about any events or markets you have been to and link to their websites.
Other tips:
Blogs benefit from having a minimum of:
– 2 internal links (link to a page on your own site such as your Shop or About Us pages)
– Include as least 2 external links to boost your SEO.
3. Placement and Quality
Where you place your content and the quality of it is vital. Your audience, and potential customers, are searching for terms they find useful. For example, they want to find local makers in their home area, so if you’re a jewellery maker in Leeds you might want to write a blog on that so that you show up when they search.
You MUST get links out to good authority websites (well ranked, well liked, reputable and well used sites) to improve your placement. Consider websites such as the BBC, newspapers such as The Guardian, sites like Reddit and even Wikipedia all have good traffic. But do your research, and think about websites that are relevant to your area of business and product type. Sites like the craft magazine Mollie Makes are also useful.
Use this link if you want to find out what a well ranked site is: https://smallseotools.com/alexa-rank-checker/.
Linking to good sites gives you authority. Some websites will not even have a global rating.
4. How to build a broad digital presence
It’s important to not just focus on your website landing page. Listing different pages of your website in various places increases your digital presence. Don’t always use your first page’s URL when linking. Direct to different places, such as your ‘About Me / Us’ website section.
Here are a few examples on how you can improve your digital presence:
- Google Business – get yourself a Google Business page, which is fairly easy to apply for and allows you insights into search results, useful analytics and how many times your pages are viewed and suchlike.
- Pinterest – load some pictures, give some # and details and link to your website page’s URL to shop that product. The more high quality places you get seen the better, and Pinterest is really useful – it’s one of the biggest search engines in itself, and ideal for creative businesses.
- Local forums – this isn’t always easy, and you don’t want to bombard local pages, but could be useful. Do some research.
- Facebook groups – this can be a useful way of reaching people in your local area, or product niches.
- Social media mentions – on Instagram you have to direct people to the link in your bio, but other platforms like Facebook allow direct clickable links. Add your website URLs wherever possible, and include the URL for your Pedddle page too.
- Link to markets and events – mention places you can be found in-person too, and include URLs for tickets or details wherever possible (such as a market listing on Pedddle, with details of that market).
We recommend keeping it local as possible – people want to shop from local businesses, so try and mention the area you live in as much as possible.
In Summary
- Use back links to link to other websites
- Don’t just direct to your website’s landing page – include links to other pages of your website
- Use relevant content – mention things specifically relevant to your business and you as a maker, whether that be in terms of product type, home area etc
- Keep content local and as area-focussed as possible
- Make a list of places you want to be seen in, social media channels to focus on and PR contacts
It doesn’t always cost lots of money to boost your SEO and get your business seen in more places. Read our blog on how to get your business seen without it costing a lot for some ideas.
Want to read some of our other Journal posts?
Click here to read our blog with Menekse Stewart – an SEO specialist. You can also use this link to watch our IG Live on SEO, which explains more about SEO and directing website traffic.
Want to re-think your social media strategy? Check out our Social Media Beginners Guide.