Search engine optimisation can do great things for your business as well as your site. A reputable SEO firm will optimise not just for increased traffic on your site, but increased retention and conversions. Many SEO techniques integrate seamlessly with internet marketing, producing marketing results while boosting your site’s visibility. This is just how it should be.
Despite the intricate, recognised relationship between SEO and marketing, it’s quite common that very basic marketing opportunities are passed by in the course of an SEO campaign. There are many small touches you can easily add to your site that generate marketing juice. These should be kept in mind when you approach SEO.
Grab their email
If there is one point at which marketing meets SEO, it is generating leads. Requiring a contact email address should be a basic part of any form on your site. Don’t forget to also include a disclaimer that the user may be contacted by email for marketing purposes.
Once you have a user’s email, you need to know what to do with it. Most businesses use the emails gathered from contact forms and registrations to simply spam the user with periodic sales offers. This method swiftly gets tiring for the user. With thought, you can use the information you have on your target users to develop a relationship with them that will deepen with time. Things like invitations to special events, newsletters and viral campaigns may prove more effective than general advertising. You can talk with our consultants at SEO Consult about researching your target users and developing relationships.
Match user groups with the right pages
One of the basic mistakes businesses make in both SEO and pay-per-click is to direct clicks to their site’s home page. Your home page is not the best landing page for all users. The inbound links you manage to generate as part of your SEO campaign will have quite specific user groups. When you have gone to the trouble of sourcing an inbound link, it’s not that much more effort to pick a page that addresses that specific group’s needs.
Matching user groups to landing pages sometimes means putting your high-sell pages further back. A user who enters your site from an informational blog and lands on a page advising them to ‘buy, buy, buy!’ is likely to feel spammed. It’s often better to try to draw the user in, developing a relationship and accepting the risk that a marketing message might not get through.
Don’t scare the customers
Many online businesses make the mistake of over-marketing to their users and lose their trust as a result. Just as SEO requires a delicate touch, the marketing side of your website needs to be subtle to be effective. Internet users are becoming increasingly cynical about obvious marketing methods, mainly due to the abuse of the internet with spammy marketing tactics.
Marketing is a valuable addition to your SEO campaign, but only if it doesn’t scare users off. Concentrate on user needs, rather than your marketing message, as a guide.
