01.03
If you have a small business, you may not have the time, resources or the budget to start a full-on SEO campaign for your website.
Here are 4 ‘do-it-yourself‘ ways you can make your website more visible in Google. Although these actions will take some (minimal) time to implement, you should be able to do them yourself without the need for extra resources and costs such as web developers. (I’ve mentioned where you might need extra skills or the services of a web developer.)
1. Make sure your page titles are unique
The title is the text in the source of each of your web pages between the <title> and </title> tags. The title then appears in the top of your web browser like this:
It also appears in the search engine results pages (SERPs) as the link to your site like this:
It’s important that all pages that have been indexed by Google (i.e the pages that Google has access to) all have unique titles.
To find out what pages have been indexed and if there are any duplicates you can do a manual search of your site by typing site:yourURL into the Google search box (for example site:http://thomashallett.co.uk). You can also use Google Webmaster Tools – log in and go to ‘diagnostics’ and then ‘HTML suggestions’. Webmaster Tools will tell you if it sees any duplicate titles on your site.
If you don’t have a content management system (CMS), it’s usually quite easy to update the title tags on your site without the need for a web developer – you just need access to the page files via an FTP client (your website hosting company should be able to give you your FTP login details).
Then:
- Save the file you want to update on your PC.
- Save a backup copy (in case you mess anything up).
- Open the file in a text editor like Notepad.
- Find the text between the <title> and </title> tags and amend to something unique, then save.
- Replace the old file in your FTP client – your changes will now be live.
If you don’t feel confident accessing your files through an FTP client you could make a list of the pages you want to change then ask your web developer to send you the files. Then once you have made the changes they can do the last step, although they may charge for this.
2. Appear in ‘local’ searches
Ensure you have an up-to-date Google Maps listing for your business, especially if you cover specific local areas.
A listing on Google Maps is like an entry in the Yellow Pages. It means your business has a chance of being found when a potential customer does a related search on Google Maps. Google also sometimes display maps listing in their main search engine results pages (SERPs) giving potential customers another way of finding information about your business and accessing your website. If you have several offices or locations, include a Google Maps listing for each one.
If you have a .com website, you can also set your ‘geographic target’ in Google Webmaster Tools – go to ‘site configuration’ then ‘settings’. So if you serve only the UK, set the geographic target to ‘United Kingdom’.
To improve your site’s visibility on Google for local search queries, you can also do the following although you may need help from a web developer depending on your skills and your content management system (CMS):
- Include a footer with your business’s address and nearby locations – for example: ‘Based in Southampton, we also cover Totton, Chandler’s Ford, Eastleigh, Hedge End and Fareham’.
- Make sure your site has a ‘contact us’ page or similar, again with your address details and areas you cover.
- Try to mention your location and areas you serve in the title tag and main body of text on your home page and other relevant pages. For example, if you are a pub in Southampton, the title of your main page might be: <title>Real Ale Pub | The Nag’s Head in Southampton, Hampshire</title>
3. Make sure your home page isn’t duplicated
Do the site:yourURL search again on Google.
Sometimes you’ll find that Google has indexed two or more versions of your home page – for example, if different versions of the page exist at http://www.yoursite.co.uk, http://www.yoursite.co.uk/home and http://yoursite.co.uk, Google could index all of them. This means that any of these URLs could be used by other sites to link to your home page. So the SEO benefits of having links to your home page (‘votes’ in Google’s eyes) could be diluted across each version of the page as Google will see each version as a unique page.
Ideally you’ll want to set up a permanent 301 redirect to the page you want Google to index as your home page. But this will usually involve some work by your web developer. And some of the smaller web hosting companies don’t allow you to set up a 301 redirect.
Instead you can add the canonical tag to your home page. As with amending your page titles above, you’ll need access to your home page’s main file via FTP. Then:
- Save the file you want to update on your PC.
- Save a backup copy (in case you mess anything up).
- Open the file in a text editor like Notepad.
- Find the <head> section in the code. It should be near the top of the document and will start with <head> and end with </head>
- Somewhere in the <head> section, add <link rel=”canonical” href=”http://www.yoursite.co.uk” /> (with www.yoursite.co.uk being your preferred URL for your home page).
- Save, then replace the old file in your FTP client – your changes will now be live and Google will use your preferred URL as the page to index.
4. Ask for inbound links
You probably know that link building is an important part of an SEO campaign. And you’ve probably heard that getting good links can take a lot of time and effort.
But this doesn’t meant you can’t do your own link building. Ask for links from other websites and businesses you have good relationships with. For example, customers, suppliers and other local websites such as your local Chamber of Trade & Commerce or community websites.
Links like this will help your rankings and potentially deliver new business opportunities.
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