The Internet is now considered a contributing factor to the growth of the creative economy. Television and paper ads still play a part, but existing on the Internet is crucial if a business wants to survive in this era.
However, a business must do more than just exist. They need to thrive on the web and have a strong online presence. Every new and existing business now considers Search Engine Optimization as a key marketing tool for success.
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Having a website doesn’t only help businesses – it helps others as well. It can act as a hub for resources and is a great way for users to connect with businesses.
Even for small businesses, investing in SEO is important to work that needs to be considered periodically, whether they have a big budget or not, in order to do it properly.
The folks at Milkwhale did comprehensive research on this and created a list of facts in the form of an infographic for Small-Businesses to know more about SEO. Below, we dive deep into SEO and why it’s important.
The Importance of Google
When it comes to websites, Google is a big deal. This is because they are the biggest search engine. Compared to other search engines, Google is the market leader with 81% of all global desktop search traffic. Meanwhile, other search engines such as Yahoo, Baidu, and Bing only account for a fraction of global desktop search traffic.
Google is highly popular. Everyone has heard of it and most people use it regularly. In fact, it has become an integral part of our lives. Whether we’re doing some research or looking for the next recipe, Google is the first search engine we turn to.
According to research, Google gets over 57,000 searches per second. They get 100 billion searches in a month and in 2017, they handled at least 2 trillion searches per year.
When Google started having ads, businesses all over the world seized the opportunity to promote their products and services. In fact, Google had a 40% share in all U.S. digital ad spending in 2016, which was huge compared to Facebook, who only had 8%.
Google has the upper hand when it comes to helping businesses reach out to their market. For many years, businesses have worked hard to appear on Google’s top search results because it increases and optimizes their SEO, which in return increases traffic and eventually conversion rates.
“Google only loves you when everyone else loves you first.”
- Wendy Piersall
Why SEO Matters
SEO – is known as Search Engine Optimization, plays an important role in cultivating a business’ success in this era. Great SEO consists of many things, such as fast loading speed, active social media presence, and ideal keywords that appeal to the target market.
Before we jump into the details of what makes excellent SEO, let’s talk about why it matters and why businesses should invest in it.
Around 89% of customers begin their buying process by searching online about the product or service they are considering purchasing. When searching about their potential purchases, it’s rare that they scroll through the first page. Most likely, users will click on the top 3 search results.
When it comes to small businesses, many people research a company online before dealing with them in real life. A lot of consumers who do a local search actually visited a store that was within 5 miles of them and a majority of CMOs say search engines are an effective marketing channel.
The truth is, people depend highly on reviews and a business’ online presence. Nowadays, if you own a business and don’t have a website, it can decrease your chances of gaining customers.
Speed is Everything
If you’re the majority of small businesses nowadays, chances are that you own a website. However, traffic isn’t coming in as you expected, so what gives?
Speed might be an issue here. Google considers page speed as an important factor. In 2010, they announced page speed to be a ranking factor on SERP. Slowing search results by just 4/10ths of a second can reduce the number of searches by 8 million per day.
It’s not just Google though. People will abandon a site if the loading time is too slow. 40% of users would abandon a website if their loading time is more than 2 seconds.
Page speed doesn’t just cost you customers – it also costs you money. Walmart increased its revenue for every 100 ms of page speed improvement. Huge companies can lose billions from a slowdown of a page load time of just 1 second.
A mere one-second delay can reduce conversions by 7%. Due to this, many companies have invested highly in improving their page speed. An example of this is Mozilla Firefox. They increased downloads per year by 60 M by making their pages 22 seconds faster.
Nowadays, the accepted loading time for desktop websites is no more than 3 seconds, and for mobile websites, it’s expected to load in no more than 2 seconds.
SEO and Mobile Use
Mobile use has grown throughout the years. Ever since smartphones existed, accessing the Internet is just a tap away, making them highly convenient compared to a desktop computer. Due to its convenience and portability, nearly 40% of people search only on smartphones on an average day.
Mobile phones have contributed a lot to increasing traffic to sites. Around 51% of people have discovered a new company or product when searching on their phones. They might come across a company on social media, a video on YouTube, or an ad on Google. Either way, mobile phones play a role in increasing the site’s SEO.
However, it’s important to keep in mind that a website needs to be optimized for mobile. You might have great content and fast loading speed, but if your site has tiny letters and zero readability on mobile devices, then it might result in more people leaving the site.
One of the few things you can do to fix this is to make your site mobile-friendly with bigger text, faster loading speed, and a simple interface that users can maneuver around.
For more facts and tips about SEO for businesses, feel free to scroll down and check out this infographic!
