Bringing in New Traffic: What You Need to Know About Google Rankings
SEO is becoming increasingly important as more people shop online.
The easier it is to find your retail business online, the better the odds of growing your business. While Google rankings have been part of the digital strategy for years, it's becoming increasingly important for small businesses, as more and more people do their shopping online, or search for local businesses online before visiting a brick-and-mortar store.
In this blog, you'll learn how to boost your online rankings, and how some of Celerant's retail clients accomplished it.
Google Rankings: A Few Basics
Increasing Google rankings can get kind of complicated, but here are a few basic steps you can take right now that aren't too difficult or time consuming.
1. Google Account
If you don't have a Google account, get one. It takes just a few seconds. Google offers many free tools to help you rank and monitor your website's progress, including Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Google My Business, Google Shopping, Google Reviews and YouTube.
2. Google My Business
List your business with Google. Not only will it help people find your store and get directions, but you can also list your hours, add pictures and link to your website. Google My Business also enables Google Reviews, and a Google Map after you verify your physical address.
3. Web Navigation
Take a few minutes to make sure your site is easy to navigate, both on desktop and mobile. Look at your site from a user's perspective. If needed, update the menu. User-friendly websites have a greater potential to rank higher on Google.
4. Web Content
Keep your site updated with relevant information. It could be as simple as updating hours, or updating your web pages/blogs/products & descriptions to cater to your audience. Remember, users that search on Google are Google's customers; and Google wants to give their customers good information.
5. Social Media
At a minimum, you should have an account on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Even if you don't socialize, you should reserve your social URLs before loosing them to someone else. After setting up your profile (logo, banner, about us), share content from your website with a link to that page.
Long-Term SEO
If you made it through the basics, you're ready to go long-term. The best way to approach this is with a professional SEO strategy. Inconsistent SEO work may get you results occasionally, but it's not enough to consistently grow your audience and increase traffic; riding the SEO 'rollercoaster' can also have adverse affects on your business. Be strategic and ALWAYS be one step ahead of your competitors!
If your eCommerce site was built by a 3rd-party company, we suggest asking if they provide SEO services; after all, they know the structure of your site inside-out, and are already familiar with your business.
Celerant is an eCommerce software provider, and offers SEO services for their retail clients through an in-house digital marketing team. Celerant helps clients by providing a strong, ongoing SEO strategy with the goal of increasing traffic, conversions and sales- both in store and online. With industry-leading SEO analytical tools, along with our familiarity with the eCommerce platform, Celerant's SEO team is able to preform website audits, analyze SEO data, make instant SEO updates directly on your eCommerce site, and continually look for opportunities for improvement. At Celerant, we don’t just make recommendations; we actually jump in and do the work for you. And you can be involved in as little or as much as you want.
Success Stories: Retailers increase web traffic and conversions
Learn how Celerant helped this retailer increase web traffic and conversions. Download case study »
“
I had been working on optimizing SEO on my own, but it’s a huge job ,and partnering with an expert was definitely necessary to do it right. … Since I was already using Celerant for POS and eCommerce, it was very easy for them to see exactly what I was doing and hit the ground running.”
Tim Stouffer, Director Piragis Northwoods Company
Now's the time to evaluate your current technology, and build a strategy to capture the surge in online sales. Switch to Celerant to strengthen your business in 2021 with mobile point of sale, contactless payments, eCommerce, curbside pickup app and digital marketing services.
