Why is using SEO important?

SEO, also known as Search Engine Optimization, is a crucial part of online marketing. In our opinion, it is essential to give it sufficient attention. With SEO optimization, you ensure that your website is easily discoverable within search engines such as Google and Bing. Moreover, you don't have to pay per click, as the traffic to the website is entirely free. For this reason, it's also referred to as organic traffic. By focusing on SEO, your business gains more traffic (and revenue). In this blog, we discuss seven reasons why we consider SEO an important online marketing channel. 

Seo Blog

1. Why SEO? It continues to generate traffic and revenue in the long term

With SEO, you don't pay per click or impression. You do invest time in activities that make your website more visible. SEO is a channel through which you continue to attract traffic to your website for a long time. Moreover, it generates significant revenue in the long term. Once you reach the top 10 search engine results for one or more keywords, you'll get more traffic to your website. This makes SEO a highly important marketing channel.

The amount of traffic you attract to your website depends on various factors. Consider search behavior, search volume, and the size of the market in which your business operates. The achieved position in search engine results also plays a crucial role. 

By using SEO, you make yourself less dependent on the performance of paid channels. If your ads perform less well one month, SEO helps maintain your revenue. Just like investing, it's wise in online marketing to spread your time, money, and energy across multiple marketing channels. It's one of the success factors for e-commerce businesses. 

2. Why SEO is important for your other channels

By implementing SEO optimizations, you also improve the performance of your other online marketing channels. Here's why: most advertising channels use a quality score in their bidding system. This score determines how relevant your landing page is for the set advertisements. Many components of this quality score are included as SEO principles. Examples include website speed, proper application of keywords on the webpage, and having a mobile-friendly website. 

With a high-quality score, you spend less money per click. Moreover, the advertising platform expects higher desired actions (conversions) as a result. By using SEO, you save on advertising costs and improve your online marketing results. 

3. Provide visitors with a good user experience

Not only does Google want consumers to have a pleasant user experience on the websites they visit, but your company also aims for this. A good user experience leads to satisfied visitors and more online purchases. By optimizing SEO, you improve the technology and content of your website, encouraging visitors to return. You could say that SEO keeps your website healthy. This alone makes it a compelling reason to use SEO for your business website. 

4. The quality of traffic is high and reliable

When developing SEO content, include the keywords that you expect to yield the best results. This targeted approach attracts traffic that converts well, such as making a purchase or filling out a form. Traffic from social media and display campaigns is often of lower quality because it doesn't always align with the searcher's intent or lacks a clear search intent altogether. 

While a search ad appears above the first organic search results, many people often choose not to click on an ad. They click on one of the top SEO results instead. The main reason for this is that consumers and businesses have found that the first SEO search results are generally the most relevant for their search query. Consumers have a certain skepticism about advertisements. It's important to always align as closely as possible with what they're looking for, known in jargon as "matching search intent." 

5. SEO can be used throughout the entire customer journey

In online marketing, the SEE, THINK, DO, CARE model is used. This model can help map out the customer journey of your customers. At the beginning of the customer journey, people search for information in the SEE phase. Then they want to delve deeper into the topic to make a decision, which is the THINK phase. The DO phase is where the actual purchase takes place, and in the CARE phase, you ensure that the customer remains connected to your business after the purchase. Think of asking for a review, for example. 

SEO is used for both visitors who are researching (SEE) and those considering a product or service (THINK). A good example of SEO targeting the beginning of the marketing funnel is blogs. Blogs help inform readers about a question they have. By informing readers, you build trust and make them aware of your company's existence. 

SEO texts are another concept in the online marketing world and are often written for e-commerce businesses. Their goal is to inform and persuade the reader to make a purchase. 

6. Increase trust among prospects and customers

Trustworthy websites rank better in search engines. Several factors contribute to a website appearing trustworthy and credible in the eyes of search engines. Consider, for example, the security protocol your website uses and the transparency of information. The number of external links to your website and the quality of these links also contribute to increasing credibility. 

7. Make your website more accessible to people with visual impairments

A website must be accessible to people with visual impairments. With certain SEO elements, you improve accessibility. 

SEO elements that make your website more accessible include headings, clear anchor texts (link texts), and alt tags (descriptions for images). Although it may not be the primary reason for commercial purposes, it's nice that people with visual impairments can use your website. 

Conclusion: SEO is important: 'How will you implement it?'

As you've read in this blog, SEO optimization is more important for your website than you might have initially thought. It's not just one of the most relevant online marketing channels for attracting website traffic, but by focusing on SEO, you lay a solid foundation for the overall performance of your online store or website. 

We understand that after reading this article, you may be thinking, 'How do I implement SEO for my business?', 'It's a lot of work and it seems so extensive and complex.', 'Should I do it in-house or outsource it to an external party?' 

If you're grappling with these questions, you can schedule a non-committal conversation with us. Send an email to onlinemarketing@orangejuice.nl for this purpose. We'll be happy to answer all your questions and explore together how your website can rank better within search engines.Â