Why Should I Use SEO?
Every year people ask me why they should be using Search Engine Optimization. My answer is always the same– that’s where your new customers are looking for you!
I’ve seen a lot of marketing trends come and go from SMS Marketing (text-message marketing) all the way back to Fax Broadcasting (fax machine marketing), but there is one thing you can count on never going away – Customers will always need services and products and will search them out…somewhere. “Where” they are looking is the only change.
It used to be the Yellow Pages and Phone Books, and now it’s the Organic Search results in Google, Bing & Yahoo. It is a bit different from the Yellow Pages, yet the concept is still the same. In the phone books you had to spend $50k on an ad and there it was in the phone book for the next 6 months. With Organic Search Results you have to continue to fight for them.
My company currently sells one service– Search Engine Optimization. Why? Because that’s where people are looking for my clients. When that changes, we’ll change with it. The funny thing is that more people every year are using the Search Engines– not less. Even after the release of Facebook and all of these other miracle internet technologies, the Search Engines are still out-ranking everything else for how people are looking for you.
Forrester Research publishes an annual report on the results of their research on how people find the websites they are using. Here are the results from 2012:
- 54% of those surveyed found websites through natural search results, up from 50% in 2011.
- Social networks came in second at 32% in 2012, up from 25% in 2011 and 18% in 2010.
- Links were ranked third in 2012, with 28% saying they found websites from links on other sites, down from 31% in 2011.
- Only 18% of those surveyed said that they used search advertisements to find their websites. This is actually up from 8% the year prior, but not a flattering percentage.
Dan York, Founder