7 Important SEO checks for Small Business Owners

Getting ranked on Google is challenging for a small business. SEO is one of the best ways to get found online because you are placing yourself right in front of people at the right moment when they might need your services. Here are 7 important SEO checks for small business owners should do to rank higher online-

1. Test for mobile friendliness

– It’s the best time to optimize your website for mobile devices as 55% of Google searches worldwide take place there.

Google penalizes sites that don’t load on mobiles optimally and even desktop sites that are not mobile-friendly.

You can use this to test your website and improve the same by following the suggestions it provides regarding where your current website stands in terms of mobile friendliness.

2. Test for speed-

In 2022, 58.26% of global website traffic was generated by mobile devices and 53% of them leave a website if it takes more than 3 seconds to load. Even if your website becomes mobile-friendly, it should load quickly so that they do not switch to your competitors easily. It’s clearly visible how important it becomes to optimize websites for mobile devices and keep a regular check of the loading speed there.

If you want to do a website speed test, here’s a trusted source where you can check how fast your website loads, and as it gets a little technical, make sure you share the results with your developer so that the team can implement the changes and you pass the website speed test.

Must read: A Few Quick Ways To Make Your Website Faster

3. List your site in directories-

Listing your website in all the relevant local and business-specific directories is going another step ahead in your SEO. Every category has its own set of reputable directories which helps Google see you are a real business out there.

43.7% of pages ranking #1 on Google contain backlinks and by listing your business on directories, you end up generating more quality backlinks. So, as a small business owner, this is your opportunity to expand your network via directories.

4. Optimize social and review profiles-

Let’s accept that this is the era of social media. Even Google ranks your social media profiles higher than your website. But this is possible only when you have well-optimized social media profiles for your brand.

Creating solid profiles on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google My Business is no longer a choice but a way to grow the brand faster. Additionally, listing yourself on review profiles, and featuring your brand story on well-known platforms like YourStory, TechCrunch, and INC42 increases your chances to get into your customer’s eye.

5. Keyword ranking is never gonna die-

Whatever you do to rank yourself higher, keyword ranking will be the most effective way to get increased conversion rates and add to the graph of click-through rates (CTR).

Auditing on-page SEO, finding relevant keywords, mapping your keywords to the right place, adding them correctly to your site, and at the same time not stuffing keywords and keeping your target audience in mind are some of the best keyword optimization techniques.

6. Optimize landing pages by Topic-

Another important SEO check for small business owners is to optimize landing pages. Gone are the times when you have to stuff the same keywords again and again on your website to rank higher. Now, Google has become smart in analyzing landing pages with closely-related keywords.
You no longer need to stuff digital marketing again and again in your blogs, you can use social media marketing, content marketing, meme marketing, and search engine marketing to make it high-quality content to be consumed. And relax, you don’t need to brainstorm and come up with the words because you have websites like this to help you get the right keywords.

7. Optimize your search listings-

Ranking higher in the Search Listing is what you are making efforts for. And the title tag and the description for every page on your website decide where you would rank and if people would click on it further.

8. Writing an enticing Title Tag

The use of Keyword phrases in the Title tag makes it more relevant for Google to rank for the same you want to rank for. Have a look at the search listings below and guess which one would get more clicks and rankings.

The second one is a better alternative because it’s the proper utilization of the character limit in a title tag. “Luxury” is a powerful word and it’s smartly placed right before “Within reach” which makes the whole headline just perfect for the target customer.

9. Framing your description (h1 tag)

Smartly frame your description under the headline. People then read this and determine whether to click on the website. Make it unique, digestible, and compelling enough to take action. Learning through a live example again, which description (h1 tag) is more enticing to you?

The second once again, right? Although the first description commands experience, the second one commands a direct action to the customers.

They are not ready for such heavy words at the beginning itself. Optimizing the h1 tag space to make the search listing reach wider is the key.

Although there are a bunch of other SEO things that one must follow to rank higher. But these are the basic SEO checks for small business owners.

We understand that following these practices can be time-consuming for you and may not end up with the best results that you aspire for. We at Arista Systems optimize websites for our clients where we keep these and many other SEO checks in mind and make the website rank higher.