The landscape of the web is the equivalent of Fifth Avenue in Manhattan or Yorkville Avenue in Toronto.
There is no more-valuable online real estate than the top of the first page of search results netted by a query on Google.

Landing your company on the top of the heap in a Google search takes a bit of careful planning and some forethought, but that doesn’t mean you have to become an expert at Search Engine Optimization (SEO) or computer code, says Scott Wilson, founder and CEO of RankHigher.ca, a Burlington, Ont.-based internet marketing and SEO firm.

“Research shows us time and time again that the vast majority of people simply can’t be bothered to dig any further than the first page of results on a Google search,” Wilson says. “That’s what makes it so important to follow a few relatively easy strategies to improve your website’s Google ranking and push yourself to the top of search results.”

Wilson recommends the following three tactics to dominate a Google search:
·         Create a Google+ Profile

Create profiles on Google+ (Google’s social networking and identity service) for owners, managers and other key members of your company. This tells prospective clients you stand behind your work. It also establishes the groundwork for developing positive relationships and builds credibility with your audience.  Google has updated its algorithm to reward websites that are integrated with Google+ because you are adding a human element of trust and transparency when you put a face and a name associated with your website. Including photos of profile members has proven to increase click-through rates on natural organic search engine optimization campaigns, especially when rival websites do not display a photo.

·         Optimize Content

Your landing page needs to describe your company and the goods and services you provide in 350 to 500 words of compelling and informative text. Repeat specific key words as descriptors to trigger Google’s search capabilities, but only use them a maximum of 9 to 12 times — using them more than 20 times could incur a penalty from Google. In addition to adding your main keyword, also add supporting keywords that are strongly related to your main keyword — called latent semantically related keywords — and insert them once or twice. For example if your root word is “Hotel,” a keyword with a strong latent semantic relationship is “Accommodation.”

·         Draw on your business relationships
Receiving positive links pointing to your website that come from companies you do business with are rewarded by Google. These quality links build your website’s trustworthiness and improve your ranking on a Google search. Reach out to everyone you are currently doing business with and ask them for a link. The best links come from their home pages or one of their main navigation pages. Links that are deeply buried in their websites or links which come from a “links” page on their website are less trusted by Google.

Attaining links from unknown sources, purchasing links from offshore providers or gaining links through low quality online PR campaigns will now result in a Google penalty being applied to your website. Google used to ignore bad links but under the latest algorithmic updates this year, Google now applies significant penalties to websites that have bad links. This can completely eliminate your online lead generation. Does your website have bad links? Are you being penalized by Google? Good news — in October 2012 Google launched a new service called the “Disavow Links Tool.” This empowers you to disassociate your website with bad links that point to you. Using this tool can save or resurrect penalized websites by eliminating the skeletons in your closet.

“With about three billion online searches being executed on the web every day and over a trillion individual web pages to sort through, it’s critically important for companies to put their websites in the right position to reach the top. These simple strategies will help and you won’t need a computer science degree to follow them,” Wilson says.

About RankHigher.ca:Based out of Burlington, Ontario, RankHigher.ca was formed in 2004 under the parent company eMotion Picture Studios. The firm of 20 identifies Internet opportunities, builds SEO optimized web sites, runs Google AdWords campaigns, optimizes Google Places & Google+, writes and shoots internet marketing & training videos and provides a wide range of other new era internet services for clients like Apple, Pepsi, Gerber, Siemens, Cadbury, Jack Astor’s, Speedy, 1800GOTJUNK and more.

For more information, please contact:
Stephen Murdoch
Vice President, Public Relations
63 Church Street | Suite 503 | St. Catharines, ON, Canada | L2R 3C4
Direct: 905.346.1232 C: 289.241.3997 F: 905.682.7481
E: smurdoch@enterprisecanada.com
W: www.enterprisecanada.com

Bio:Scott Wilson is the leading web sales and marketing expert using Search Engine Optimization (SEO). PROFIT magazine ranks him as an essential speaker and resource for the CEOs of the fastest growing companies. His dynamic presentations provide practical, proven strategies for increasing sales and winning new customers, all in a highly cost-effective way. His strategies are unique, because of his focus on the financial pay-back of web sales. By drawing lessons based on scientific experimentation and from fascinating real-world examples, he educates decision makers and the medai. His captivating presentations are designed to empower audiences with the necessary knowledge to make the best business decisions utilizing proven strategies.

Share this post