Member-only story
What I tell clients when they ask to be number one on Google
(Non Medium members can read this article for free here)
I’ve designed and built a few websites for small to medium sized businesses. These businesses often don’t have a marketing budget or any marketing at all. They believe a new website is the golden nugget, that people will be flocking to it the minute it goes live. But when the website does go live, they have a hard time understanding why they are not appearing at the top of a Google search. This is when they come to me and ask to be number one on Google. This is my response to their question…
You now have a live website and want to be at the top of Google. Your website has been built with SEO in mind (meaning Google can easily read and trawl through your content), and Google is going to start looking at it and ranking it in its search results.
If you’re not in the top search results, chances are no one will find your website.
There are millions of websites out there, so how does Google decide who appears first in its search results? The short and simple answer is, the most relevant, trusted website content will always be at the top. What does this mean for you? The more relevant, valuable content you have, the higher you will appear on that list. Being relevant in some ways also relates to the most recent content. The easiest way to do this is with a blog, publishing content of value that talks to your target audience and relates to your business. Publishing regularly and consistently is key, and when you reach around 60 of these published articles, Google will start to regard you as an authority in your industry and start ranking your website higher in search results. This is the basic of concept behind organic search engine optimisation (SEO).
