Google and other search engines will eventually find your site, but it could take a long time. So why not take a shortcut and make sure your site gets indexed right away?
Doing this isn't as difficult as you might think. The key is getting your website linked to a site that is already indexed. (Later in this post, we'll discuss how to do this.) If you want to dig deeper into the details of how search engines work, Neil Patel provides a comprehensive write-up on getting Google to index your website. We'll talk about this again soon, but the following is the simple method.
Your 'About' Page Should Be Your First Page to Rank
Don't immediately start off trying to rank for competitive keywords. First, write your "About" page; it's the main place on your site that can be all about you. It should provide details about your company history and why someone should do business with you. Invest some time optimizing the page, and include photos of key personnel or your business building's exterior or interior.
The first links you want to get are the ones to your About page that use your business name as the words linked. The easiest search to rank for is the name of your business. You need to:
- Choose a keyword phrase--the exact variation of your business name that you want to have rank.
- Make sure your the page is only about that keyword phrase.
- Have another site link to you, using that phrase as the link.
Why Focus on Your 'About' Page?
The reason you should focus on your About page first is because potential customers who visit that page will be more likely to do business with you. It's also the first place journalists and freelance writers will visit if they're thinking about linking to any of your content.
Make sure the page is very clear about what your business does and how your site benefits your readers. If journalists who are looking for examples to write about are not able to quickly and easily find out the necessary information about you and your business, they will move on to another business.
As you start getting more visibility, your home page will attract organic links, and you can offer quotes that get attributed to your business and can be linked to either your About or home page.
How to Find Writers to Link to Your New 'About' Page
You will need to reach out to writers to make them aware your business exists. (Look for local freelance writers; writers from the same area can open many doors.) Thanks to social media, finding writers is not as challenging as you might think.
All of the major social networks have search options built into them. If you're searching on Twitter, you can reach out to anyone, whether they follow you or not. To begin your search for freelance writers, type your search term into the search box next to your logo at the top of the page, click on "More options," and then at the bottom right of the page choose "Advanced search." (See image below.)
To search by location, you can either put a location in "Any of these words" or, if you have location turned on and are looking for people near you, the search defaults to "near this place."
A search for writers on Twitter, will turn up many job openings in addition to freelance writers. Perhaps a better way to go about finding writers is to see who writes for blogs and publications in your industry. Read their bios at the end of their articles to find links to their websites, or try looking them up on LinkedIn.
To find people on LinkedIn, in the search box make sure you're searching on "people," and then type "freelance writer" or "journalist" into the box. (See image below.)
Once you have identified writers that you think might be interested in what your business does, start sharing their content. This can be automated to make it faster and easier. Also interact with them in the comments section of their articles.
Once they become familiar with you, reach out to them on Twitter or LinkedIn, or through the contact form on their site. Pitch them ideas to write about that includes your business as an example, or yourself as an expert to talk to.
Next, Do Keyword Research
Now that you're on your way to ranking for your business name, put some research into what phrases you want to rank for that are more generic and therefore more competitive.
Once you create a list of the most important phrases for your business, you will want to develop a page or post specifically about each phrase. Refer to "Why and How to Select Keywords; Where to Use Them" for guidance.
Publishing exceptional content on your business blog gives journalists and writers a reason to link to you. The best content is 700 to 1500+ words and includes visuals and current statistics.
If the writers you have identified follow you back on social media, and you share your content where they are active, they may include it in one of their upcoming posts.
There Is No Google Fairy
Businesses that want to be found online must be proactive. There is no Google Fairy spreading fairy dust allowing writers to find you before your content is ranking for anything.
No matter how great your content is or how wonderful your business is doing, until you have some visibility you won't garner any publication or incoming links. If you can't afford a PR agency, it is up to you to do the outreach and build relationships yourself.
Former "doom and gloom" (his words, not mine) Fox News reporter Jeff Crilley left to start his own PR agency. Fortunately, for the very small business owner, he shares his publicity tips in videos on YouTube and in a book titled Free Publicity: A TV Reporter Shares the Secrets for Getting Covered on the News. Here is his advice on pitching bloggers:
The good news is that once you find one writer in your niche, you can ask them if there are others they can introduce to you. If they aren't willing to provide an introduction, they might at least send you to a list of bloggers in their niche.
Most bloggers know each other, so the first connection will the most challenging, and it gets easier after that. When I advise small businesses, this is where I have them start. Often, I know someone in their niche whom I can introduce them to.
Advanced Strategies to Get Your Site Into the Google Indexes
This is just a start, though, on getting your site to rank well in Google. Remember that post I mentioned at the beginning? You may want to go check it out. Neil Patel covers:
- How search engines work.
- Why you need a business blog.
- How to use robots.txt.
- How to create a content strategy.
- Submitting a site map.
- Installing google analytics.
- Directly sending your URL to Google.
- Creating and updating social profiles.
- Where to share your website.
- Setting up your RSS feed.
- How to know which blog directories are safe.
This isn't a post--it's a book, which is why I can't cover all of it here. Start with what I have suggested, and then when you're ready, move on to the more complex strategies.
Don't be afraid to hire someone to implement some of these tasks for you. Here's my standard advice: If a task needs to be done often, learn to do it yourself or delegate the task to someone else. If a task only needs to be done once or once in a while, hire someone else to do it.
It is not just the time it takes to learn a new skill that makes this advice necessary; it is the time it takes to keep on top of changes in that area of expertise.
Finally, if you're a local business, make sure if you are not ranking in local, you read about how to rank locally.
