When we talk about making your website user friendly, the first thing that should become your priority is to have an optimized Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) in place. It is the process of improving the visibility of your website on search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc. Each engine uses algorithms that evaluate everything from your website’s content to inbound and outbound links to determine its relevance and thus where it lands in search results.
Here are a few tips that will help you optimize your site for search.
Optimize your keywords
Identify unique keywords that a client or prospect searching for you online might use - your name or group name, employees’ names, your location combined with your firm’s name, your specialties or areas of expertise, your client niches, etc. and incorporate them logically and organically into your website content.
Use more specific keywords which will increase website ranking and have less competition. However, avoid using keywords especially in unrelated pages of content.
Publish your content on social media
Ensure that your website links to all of your professional social media accounts. Also, publish your content on social media pages. Create high quality content that others find it useful and valuable. Content represents your ideologies and your concern for important issues happening in the industry as well as in the world. When your readers find your content interesting, they tend to share it on other pages. The more they share it, the more visibility your website has.
Also, regularly update unique content. Create a plan to consistently update the content on your website that is customized to your clients and niches. Start blogging as this will also increase your brand value and generate genuine customers.
Use Google Analytics
After creating a website, set up your account with Google Analytics. This gives you comprehensive report and analysis on how your website is performing. Here you can track what keywords send traffic to your site and also which pages are receiving more visits. You can also learn the number of visits from search engines as well as referring sites. These metrics will help you analyse where you can improve the visibility of your site.
Set up inbound and outbound links
Include links on your website to the websites of all the charitable and business organizations you are involved with. You can also submit your website to online directories like YellowPages.com or Justdial.com
To sum it up:
- Ensure that your website is connected with your social media accounts
- Create content with the help of words or phrases which are most searched by readers.
- Use Google analytics to understand the performance of the website.
Source: Raymond James, Advisor Websites, Financial planning
