IT’S SURPRISING how many companies miss the point when dealing with their SEO rank.

The number of enquiries from businesses seeking help in increasing their site’s overall SEO rank is an indication their thinking is still one step short of where it should be.
Without doubt they are pondering the prospect of ‘free’ traffic heading their way from Google and believing they will then have it made. But unless your increased SEO rank is actually turned into sales, you will still not be making the progress you desire. And that can only be achieved by long term planning and tactics.
Here are a few tips on how to take your SEO rank and make that extra all-important step.
Optimize for what is converting here and now: You may be getting 200,00O searches a month for a particular keyword but still discover that your SEO rank is disappointing. The problem here is that if searchers are still not converting, there is little point in optimization. Change instead to keywords that are seeing sales conversions – your SEO rank will improve and you will achieve sales at the same time.
Consider times and places: It’s likely that if your business is seasonal, you will face peaks and troughs. There’s no point then in seeking a higher SEO rank during periods when online demand is likely to be low. You need to be driving new sales incrementally and not robbing from other established marketing channels. Think about where you are in the world too. For example, if your business speaks of sunshine and warmth you will appeal to potential customers experiencing sub zero temperatures in another part of the globe. This is the time to use creative content and link building and grow your SEO rank for current converting keywords.
Narrow your focus and hang on in there: Granted that Google’s Keyword Tool helps you refine your keyword search – estimating the number of searches, competition with the keyword and providing a quick link to Google Insights for Search. But seeking a high SEO rank and optimizing on each and every product that you sell may well be the broad brush that misses the heart of the matter. Choose instead to pinpoint the keywords you know convert and then tactically improve your SEO rank through content build, link building, blog posts and social bookmarking. Don’t expect to look up the next day and see instant results though. A reasonable time for upward and sustainable SEO rank movement is between six and 12 months.
Keep mobile: There’s a whole different set of customers here that you shouldn’t be missing out on here. The growth of mobile site traffic and conversions is increasing very significantly. Just take a look at how of your traffic is coming from smartphone and tablet users and what affect that could potentially have on your SEO rank and sales. Remember here that phones are used differently from PCs, therefore the behaviour of users varies from a desktop visitor. For example, mobile traffic tends to use fewer keywords so Google uses predictive phrases to show them relevant search results.
Here’s a test for you. Name the predictive search phrases that appear on a mobile for your top ten converting SEO terms. If you’re struggling with that one, it’s best to put in that background work right now if you wish to increase your SEO rank. For when you have the answers, you can then fix an appropriate budget to serve your mobile audience.