We snuck the February SEO EMACC workshop in on a nice afternoon before the impending snowstorm. I had the pleasure of sitting with Rose Grossman of Despo Law Group, to talk SEO for their brand new website for Bill Despo and his business. You can learn more about his offerings at the site. With a new business, there are unique challenges I was able to help Rose with. Though it can seem daunting starting from scratch, there are some benefits and easier paths when you are starting with a clean slate.
The Basics
I explained the basics of SEO, including on page, off page, and in page issues. Being a new site, they did not have any links, which prove to be the fuel and the strength of your site to start ranking. We talked about using current off line relationships and converting them to links. We got her chamber profile link updated right there in the office and she wrote down some other opportunities she believes she can take advantage of. For some of the competitors in her local market, it may only take a few good links to pass them in the rankings.
Getting a New Site Indexed
One of her major issues was that the site hasn’t been indexed yet so it wasn’t showing up anywhere. Many new businesses run into this and it can be quite a headache if you don’t know what to do. If there aren’t any sites out there linking to you, how does Google even know that you exist. I took Rose through creating a Google account, setting up Google analytics and Google search console. Once you have this set up, you can “tell Google” you are out there by requesting a crawl in Google Search Console. Doesn’t hurt to get a few links from sites that are already being indexed too. That helps with site strength and with getting indexed.
Title Tagging for Important Terms
We discussed some of the on page content changes she can tweak to “aim” the content at keywords. Her initial challenge is just for Bill to get found by the people that already know him and may be searching for him. That shouldn’t be as difficult once he is indexed. I explained how to title tag a page for his name as well as each of their services, and how they can expand their content more and more for each individual service they help people with. I explained that her WordPress site could use a plugin like Yoast to help better manage title tags and other SEO factors. It will also help you set up your analytics easier.
Local Business Setup
Another benefit of a new business is we were able to get her set up with a Google local listing. Well, she is waiting on the postcard to verify her business but we got the ball rolling. One of the most common and costly issues I see with local businesses is that they have may different combinations of their name, address, and phone number scattered across the internet. This confuses the search engines and can get you lost in the muddle of businesses. A new business gets you that clean slate to start spreading your information in a consistent manner that leaves you better off in local search.
We got a lot accomplished in the time we had together and I look forward to helping Rose down the road, once she gets things settled and is ready to move to the next step. Sometimes it is daunting when you have created that new site but it seems like the world doesn’t seem to be finding it. There are some basic steps that need to be taken but that most don’t realize need to be done.
It was such a pleasure meeting with you. You are very good at what you do and I left the meeting filled with a wealth of knowledge only to help our business grow. I look forward to working with you In the future.
Thanks Rose. It was great to sit down and work with you. I look forward to hearing from you.