SEO, or search engine optimization, is the backbone of how any business is found on the Internet.
The best analogy I’ve heard for internet search marketing and SEO is that they’re like a popularity contest that you’re always trying to win. If you make the cut, one of the search results pages will appear at or near the top of the page. The higher you are on that all-important first page, the more traffic you will generate.
By winning the perpetual popularity contest, you’ll earn a continual stream of new leads from all the traffic you generate. This is the prize for winning the popularity contest.
Hence, the first task is knowing how to win the popularity contest. Only then can you afford to worry about the second step, which is how to convert the most new leads into paying customers.
One of the key facets of SEO is link building. A main ingredient of any high ranking website is the “authority” of other websites that link to it. This is why the popularity contest is such an appropriate parallel.
Let’s say you walk into a bar, sit on a stool and order a drink. People will not pounce and start talking to you. But what if you walk into a bar with Donald Trump? Do you think people will go out of their way to try and strike up a conversation?
Why? Because Donald Trump is well known; he is an authority figure. The same with internet links. The higher the authority of the websites that link to his site, the higher the authority of his site. It is guilt by association. As a result, he will rank higher in Google search results.
The value of backlinks, that is, other websites that “link” to your site, is based on hundreds of variables. One of those variables is called “page rank.” An unknown site has a page rank of zero. A site that has credibility in the eyes of Google is ranked from 1 to 10. The higher the page rank, the higher the authority. So the trick is to get good and valuable backlinks.
It is these types of factors and variables that make SEO a bit tricky. There is no such thing as a do-it-yourself, quick-start, step-by-step SEO solution. That’s why it makes sense to outsource your internet search marketing campaign.
It’s not like other media where you just buy ad space and measure the results. Once you see the big picture, outsourcing usually makes the most sense.