The Top 3 SEO Factors

When you want to turn users into conversions.

What matters?

There is a ridiculous amount of factors that can go into ranking your website on Google but what are the biggest factors? That is a question I get all the time and so many “SEO’s” tell a whole long speel and don’t really answer that question.

Let me answer it quickly.

Speed.

Content.

Design.

This is overly simplified but all 3 can make your website convert or not.

Let’s take a short dive into each topic. I will have an article later on each of these that go into much further depth that can help you to fix these items.

Speed

It’s so surprising to me how many business owners and website owners, in general, underestimate a slow website.

Though what is a slow website?

Anything over 3 second load time is irritating to the user.

Check that out. At around 7s-8s seconds bounce rate averages around 50%. ?!?!?!?!

Losing half of your leads before they ever saw your product. Ouch…

Statistics state 47% of buyers viewed 3-5 pieces of content before engaging with a sales rep. (Demand Gen Report, 2016) (Source: https://www.hubspot.com/marketing-statistics). If it takes even 5 seconds to load every time then they are going to be waiting an additional 25 seconds just for your website to give them information. That’s ridiculous in our instant world.

“BUT IT’S ONLY 5 SECONDS”

….

How long does Amazon take?

How long does Google Search take?

How long does your news company take?

How long does Substack take?

Let me tell you…wait..let me show you.

Amazon = 299ms - https://gtmetrix.com/reports/www.amazon.com/5LEdHgj9

YouTube = 1.6s - https://gtmetrix.com/reports/www.youtube.com/HScqSezK

New York Times = 279ms - https://gtmetrix.com/reports/www.nytco.com/LqmI9N0E

Google Search = 306ms - https://gtmetrix.com/reports/www.google.com/u9iipr7w

Substack = 0.8s - https://gtmetrix.com/reports/substack.com/VeJH9I5V

But, those links say differently? Go to Timings Tab and look for Contentful Paint. This is when the user sees a loaded page. The rest is loading in the background, but contentful paint is what matters.

We are not used to waiting. So when browsing for information and we click a link and it doesn’t’ load. Then we wait…and hit that back button. Because we don’t have time for that crap.

You do it every day, then give your own website an excuse? No. It’s avoidable.

Content

Next is content, of course, the H2 tag says that. What? H2 tag, yes that thing that says “Content” above this text box here. There are two main pieces of content, the structure and the actual words in the page.

Content Structure

Those H1, H2, H3 tags are just there for sizes, right? Decoration and making the font bigger.

….no.

We all wrote essays in school or at least had a project that included writing at some point. Remember having titles and subtitles? Well, your website requires it.

It’s how Search bots like Google scan your website.

The H1 tag is your title tag of the page, it tells Google. *The topic of the content of this page is ______*.

The H2 tags go below this and are subtopics of your main topic.

This can go much lower to H3, H4, H5, and even H6 but most pages don’t go this low.

So what happens when you use it as design?

Well, maybe your footers “Contact Us Now” is the H1 tag of the page…

Yeah…

I’ve seen it many…many times in my years of doing this. Please structure your content properly.

The Actual Content Wording

Please be blunt, don’t assume that the robots scanning your website know what you are talking about. This takes finesse honestly because we need to satisfy the users without annoying them but you must be blunt.

I once had a website that asked why they didn’t rank for “Carpet Cleaning”.

On their website, it said “Carpets”, “Cleaning Products”, “Expert services” and all sorts of information with pictures that obviously implied they were carpet cleaners.

The problem is….Google…as much as many people want it to be (or fear it to be) is not a human. It is a robot, and when you don’t literally say “We do CARPET CLEANING” Google can only guess what the heck your talking about.

Don’t abuse this, this will just damage you further. Just make sure to say instead of “We provide quality cleaning services” to change that to “We provide quality carpet cleaning services”. Boom. Easy fix.

Next is the length of the content. This requires a lot more information but let me sum it up in the easiest way.

Analyze your competition. If your competition ALL has 2000 words on their ranking pages then you most likely do. If they don’t, you most likely don’t. Don’t guess and go by average statistics. Go by YOUR competition statistics.

The average Google first page result contains 1,890 words. (Backlinko, 2016) (Source: https://www.hubspot.com/marketing-statistics)

Don’t let that frighten you. That doesn’t mean the average content for “Washington, GA Carpet Cleaning Service” is 2000 words…

Design

Design is very subjective. Though we all know a crap website when we see one.

The fact is, your website is now your ONLINE STOREFRONT.

People will see that before they see your office, store, location, home, face, whatever. Your website is what your business is.

A bad looking website will not only not convert users but will HARM your business.

How many times have you looked up a company and seen a just horrid website and go “Are these guys legitimate”.

Yup…you know what I’m talking about too.

It doesn’t matter how professional the company is, that website questions EVERYTHING. Don’t let this happen to you.

Your website’s design and usability will deter users and make them judge you greatly. If you have a $3000/month lease and you spend $700 bucks to a college kid for your companies website. You are doing something very wrong and you clearly don’t understand the value of a good website.

Summary

Make sure your website is at least 3s-5s load time or less.

Make sure your content is relevant, quality, and structured properly.

Make sure your design represents your business and matches your brand.

Paying a quality designer/SEO/Developer $100-$200 an hour depending on your area is worth it. Though make sure to check their previous work first! A pro who charges these rates and has no previous work or no good previous work is highway robbery.

Keep in touch and I’ll be diving into all of these topics in even more depth.