DIY SEO for Small Business
How to get your site optimized for search engines without a grip of cash
If you want someone to find your work, they’ll need a map, and that map is Search Engine Optimization. Do. Not. Freak. Out. It’s not a mystical unicorn. Like anything with the power to change your business, it’s scary until you understand it.
How Keywords Work
First off, when a term, know as a keyword, appears multiple times on your page a search engine like Google, knows that term is what your piece is about. There’s a hierarchy to the ranking of relevance system too. An H1 or the heading of your post, and the H2 (sub headings) of your landing page or post, hold the most ranking power. Think chess. Your H1 and H2 are your King and Queen. Then the pawns are the long-tail keywords of the post.
What’s a Long-tail Keyword?
Long-tail keywords are the string of words you put together to search for an answer to your question. The heading of this paragraph is a long-tail keyword because I want search engines to know that this post answers that question. Things like “SEO Under $20” or “DIY SEO” are long tail keywords.
SEO and ai Overview
So now that Google is summarizing posts in an ai generated response, no one is ever going to see my page right? Wrong. If you answer a question people are asking and ai uses your page to respond, it also offers a link to your page. That’s why seeing what people search for and answering those questions is so great for search engine optimization.
Now there are other tricks to the trade, like meta descriptions, follow links, back links, and more. If you want it all broken down in an easy to follow formula, I recommend the 5-Day DIY SEO Boot Camp.
What’s a Back Link?
A back link is a site that links back to your page. An easy way to create them is to use Canva to create an image that links to your post and post it on Pinterest. When I had a formal blog, I was shocked that 80% of my traffic came from Pinterest. Pinterest is a powerhouse search engine where people are trying to find the answers to everyday problems and questions
How Much is SEO Per Month?
SEO can cost anywhere from $19 an hour, to $500 an hour for a major site overhaul by an expert. I’m personally an SEO expert and I prefer to teach small business owners how to do SEO themselves, but if they hire me directly I charge $25 an hour. I find that with the proper coaching they can create a high ranking site. My work at Harley Design Studios got their SEO score to 100, something practically unheard of. You can visit Harley Design Studios if you’re interested in hiring me to directly optimize your site. But if you prefer the DIY approach, I’d start with the DIY SEO Boot Camp or the waitlisted SEO coaching program.
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