By

Norm McLaughlin

Owner, Norm’s Computer Services

Norm’s Computer Services have been a member of My Business since November 2020

SEO comprises three main activities. The purpose of these activities is to influence a site’s ranking on Google so that, for relevant search queries, it appears as high as possible in the search engine results page (SERP). The three activities are:

This means setting up your site to be found and understood by Google. The pages of your site need to be available for indexing and you need to implement metadata correctly. This includes things such as your page titles, having heading tags and meta tags on your photographs.

It should also include schema markup which enhances Google’s understanding of a page’s contents. This may not directly impact your SEO but it may well result in Google displaying more detail on your pages on the SERP.

Meaning, you’re likely to achieve higher clickthrough rates and ultimately higher conversion rates.

This involves creating outstanding content on your site which clearly articulates what needs to be conveyed to the reader.

This content should be written with the human reader in mind, rather than with a search engine in mind. The page copy should read completely naturally.

The content of your site can be world-class, but without backlinks from other respected sites, Google won’t consider the site as having much authority. Google looks for high levels of expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness in order to rank pages highly on its SERP’s.

The understanding of your expertise and authoritativeness is largely drawn from the fact that other sites with such standing have linked back to your site and is a product of your reputation across the digital world.

Google has a comprehensive set of guidelines, including quality guidelines. In the ‘Link Schemes’ section of their quality guidelines, they state the following.

“Any links intended to manipulate PageRank or a site's ranking in Google search results may be considered part of a link scheme and a violation of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.”

Taking this statement at face value it invalidates the entire link-building industry, the purpose of which is precisely this: the creation of backlinks which have the express purpose of improving a site’s ranking in Google.

THE IMPORTANCE OF NATURAL BACKLINKS

For backlinks to be truly valid in Google’s eyes they should be achieved naturally. Natural backlinks happen when other sites write about you and your products or services or refer to you naturally in their content.

In doing so they link back to your website. In an ideal Google world, the content containing these links is generated naturally by site owners without you or anyone else asking them to do so. Added to that, you should be creating such great content that other site owners want to share it and link back to you as they do so.

In Google’s own words: “The best way to get other sites to create high-quality, relevant links to yours is to create unique, relevant content that can naturally gain popularity in the Internet community.

Creating good content pays off: Links are usually editorial votes given by choice, and the more useful content you have, the greater the chances someone else will find that content valuable to their readers and link to it.”

This is unfortunate for anyone launching a small business because of the chicken and egg principle. Your competitors are likely to be occupying the top positions on Google and your challenge is to achieve similar rankings in order to compete with them. Your competitors are likely to be well enough known that they are in fact achieving natural backlinks, through news reporting, reviews, social media and so on.

You may have a website with superior content to theirs and the service you offer may even be superior to theirs, but your challenge initially is that no-one knows about you. As a result, you’re not going to be achieving natural backlinks simply because people don’t know you exist.

As your reputation builds, you’re likely to begin to achieve natural mentions and backlinks as a result.  However, in order to achieve the required rankings, you need to engage in SEO, which includes building backlinks from other authority sites. Those backlinks won’t just happen – they need to be proactively built. 

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of My Business. 

Norm McLaughlin

Owner, Norm’s Computer Services

Norm has restyled the company as Norm's Computer Services in Brisbane and offers on-site and remote computer repairs, services and upgrades. He is a certified IT Support Professional and a Google certified Digital Marketer.