Google. Need I say more? There are 2 million searches performed on Google every minute. Each of these searches uses up more computer power than it took to send Apollo 11 to the moon.
On August 16, 2013, Google went down for 5 minutes and in that time the global internet traffic went down by 40%. Proof that Google is the most used search engine in the world and is the most visited website of all time.
In order to get visitors to your website and ultimately generate leads or sales you want to rank on Google and you want to rank organically.
Paid versus organic ranking
To understand why your business website needs to rank organically, it’s important to understand the difference between paid ranking and organic ranking on Google.
Paid advertising or ranking is the Google Adwords you see on the right and on the top of your search results.
These are paid per click and work on a keyword basis, each time someone clicks on your advert you pay google, these click costs vary by keyword, product and industry and can be as little as R5 per click or upwards of R300 per click.
Google currently makes US$20 Billion per year through these and other paid adverts on their site.
Organic ranking are the search results that appear below these. These are generated through a complicated algorithm that Google created to ensure that the most accurate page and information appeared for that particular search.
Google takes over 200 factors into account to deliver the best results for any query in a fraction of a second. There is no cost associated with these results, and you do no pay Google anything when someone clicks through to your website.
Why organic ranking?
Studies have shown that organic search results on Google are clicked through 8.5 times more than paid results are. Why? Users believe that organic information is more accurate and trustworthy.
In the long term organic good organic rankings will bring you consistent website visits, leads and sales at no direct costs as you pay nothing when your website link is clicked.
For example on a monthly basis there is an average of 14000 searches for “cleaning company” or slight variation on this phrase. So if you are the number one organic result you can expect to have a steady flow of traffic and visitors to your website.
So how do you get your website to the top of organic rankings?
A technique called Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is used to improve website rankings for key products and services. This is done through a variety of techniques including accurate meta tag titles and descriptions, up to date sitemaps, responsive, easy to navigate websites and valuable, keyword rich content that is informative and shared often.
For your website to be the most accurate search for a particular term requires your website to become the authority relating to your industry.
Where to start?
If you are just starting out and have a limited budget a combination of Google Adwords and SEO will work well.
As organic rankings improve so the Google Adwords spend can become less and less, until your website is generating enough visitors through organic ranking.
There is no quick fix for SEO but with the correct approach, consistent monitoring and hard work natural ranking and ultimately leads will improve dramatically.
This article was written by Magooze (Pty) Ltd, a leading Internet Marketing company.