SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation, is the method of increasing the visibility of a website by helping them reach a high position in search engine results pages like Google so that you get that traffic that you need.
Whilst there are ways to pay for this privilege through pay-per-click ads, SEO specifically focuses on how to improve your construction website’s ‘organic’ searches – in other words, how to ensure that people who search for what you offer are landing on your construction website and not others.
This is important because search engines like Google are essentially the main gateway which people go through to search for (and buy) products and services online.
The reason why Google is the number one player in the search engine game is its thorough algorithm that is constantly scanning through pages and pages of information online in order to provide the best possible information to its users.
Read more: SEO vs. SEM: What is the difference?
The whole point of SEO, therefore, is to take advantage of the way that Google works and ensure that it sees your construction website as the ideal place for your customers or target audience to land.
A well-designed, SEO-enhanced website has the potential to take a brand to new heights in terms of search engine ranking, and consequently the volume of potential customers.
Unless you’re SEO geeks like us, it may come as unfortunate news that an effective SEO strategy is just as complex as the Google search engine machine.
If you’re still reading, however, you must be somewhat interested in SEO strategies, so I won’t keep you waiting any longer. Let’s dive into the deep world of SEO:
Content Writing (Part 1: Keywords)
A cornerstone of SEO is written content. Once Google recognises that your construction website exists on its search engine, it will begin to crawl each of the website’s pages in order to determine what the website exists for.
If your construction website has enough of the appropriate written content on it, Google will then determine how relevant it is to your chosen audience – but how does it know this? Keywords.
Whilst it’s fun to talk about Google like it exists as a physical being in its own corner of the internet, the “Google” we’re referring to is really just an AI created by technical engineers to execute certain tasks on the Google web page.
One of its main tasks is to match the words on a page to the words that people are typing into Google search bar, this is where the importance of keywords come in.
Essentially, if Google sees that a website has words written within it that people are actively searching for, it will consider it a useful website for its users and rank it higher in its results pages.
Read more: How SEO has evolved over time
Careful keyword research involves two similar steps for your website:
Knowing the words that customers are already typing into Google in order to land on your website.
Knowing the words that prospective customers will search in order to land on your website.
When approached by a client, digital marketing agencies like Framework do heavy research into which keywords that construction company should be focusing on.
Once you have a good knowledge of your construction company’s key words (which can and will change over time) agencies then start on the appropriate SEO content that will work best on that site.
As alluded to, keywords are liable to change over time as and when a company changes and evolves; whether this be through new products or a shift in markets. Agencies can also provide SEO audits to see if the keywords and phrases being implemented within a site are still translating into traffic and conversions.
Read more: How to Market Your Company Effectively and Free of Charge
Content Writing (Part 2: Quality, Readable Content)
Let’s imagine the owner of a construction marketing agency has been reading up to this point, and has learned that a good way to drive traffic to their website is to fill it with keywords that they know or think customers will search for on Google in order to reach it.
It would be wise, therefore, to create a page on the website with the words “construction marketing agency”, “construction marketing” and “best construction marketing agency” scattered all over it like digital graffiti so that Google sees it and puts it higher on its results page, right?
“Framework themselves said that this “Google” is nothing more than code. Well I’m a real person and I could easily trick Google into doing what I want from it, right?!”
Wrong. Google’s algorithm may just be lines of code, but when you’re on their grounds, you play by their rules. Those behind the algorithm realised that the keyword-scanning AI could be easily cheated if dozens of keywords were arbitrarily stuffed into a page.
Therefore, it takes a lot more than a set of keywords and phrases to grab Google’s attention (some SEO experts question the importance of keywords at all), and so the algorithm is now at a point where it can recognise how readable the written content on a website is and whether any “keyword stuffing” has taken place.
Remember, Google’s search engine mission is to provide the best possible information for its users, so it wouldn’t be doing its job well if it ranked highly a website that had nonsensical content – this helps no one, especially yourself.
Read more: Digital Marketing Trends You Need to Look Out for in 2021
What’s most important to consider when writing content for your construction company is how much it can help your readership as opposed to how much money each piece of content will make you directly.
The ‘blog’ section of a construction marketing agency won’t necessarily be the page that drives most sales, but if you can provide content that teaches those who land on your website a little about what you’re providing, they’re more likely to trust your insights and see you as a genuine part of the (in this instance, construction marketing) industry, and therefore more likely to buy from you.
For informative, insightful website content that Google will love, email one of our specialists at seo@frameworkmarketing.co.uk
A couple of bonus tips:
- Longform posts between 1500 & 2000 words perform best with Google’s information scanning algorithm. These are usually the best length to provide the most appropriate amount of written content with the optimal number of keywords.
[It’s understandable to think that a consistent stream of longform, quality blog posts is not something that you can commit your time to. That’s why digital marketing agencies like Framework hire experienced writing boffins like yours truly to help write them for you. To us, 2000 words is the equivalent of a nursery rhyme – brag over.] - Useful, informative content isn’t restricted to the written word. Multimedia like infographics and video can often relay information much better and quicker than words can. And it doesn’t hurt that Google takes multimedia into account when scanning your website.
For those businesspeople with less altruistic motivations for their construction website, it will please you to know that well implemented website content with the correct tone and messaging can quite effectively push your readership into going along with your money-making calls to action.
Content Writing: Recap
If you’ve made it this far, good job – your patience and willingness to learn is admirable. Here’s a brief recap of what we’ve learned so far about content writing.
- Google’s search engine algorithm exists to scan information online and promote the websites that provide the most appropriate information for each specific enquiry made on its search engine.
- The higher your website is on Google’s search results page, the more visible you are to potential customers, and the more likely you are to gain traffic and subsequent revenue for your company.
- A (debatably) important aspect of getting your website to the top of Google comes from using keywords as part of it scanning algorithm, so it knows you are providing what people are looking for above anyone else.
- The most important part of content writing for your website – the part that gains the most trust to you as a brand – is to write content with the intention of providing useful, relevant information for those landing on your page.
- Once trust is established amongst your readership, they are more likely to buy from you in the future or follow your implemented CTA’s.
- Google cannot be cheated on its own playing field. Work alongside its algorithm and it will only reward you for your efforts.
SEO & Link Building
From one metaphorical business to the next, let’s suppose that you’re the manager of the best Tapas bar in town. Unfortunately, in this town there are a dozen other Tapas bars within a mile of yours. You know yours is the best Tapas bar, but how do you let people know?
In the realm of local business, a huge part of driving new custom is through word of mouth recommendations.
If your Tapas bar is recommended by a bunch of previous customers, they’re solidifying your authority as the best Tapas bar in town, making it more likely that new customers are going to come to your Tapas bar rather than the other dozen.
They will then (in theory) enjoy their time there and recommend it to people they know, continuing the flow of revenue to your business.
This strengthening of authority through a web of word-of-mouth recommendations exists within the online space too and can be done for your construction website via backlinks.
Backlinks (sometimes known as ‘hyperlinks’ or just ‘links’) are clickable pieces of texts that allow users to crawl the internet by acting as a bridge from one website or page to another.
In the world of SEO, backlinks are votes of confidence between websites and they tell search engines like Google, “This is a trustworthy website that other people would benefit from visiting.”
The more backlinks received from other trustworthy sites, the more a website becomes recommended to the Google algorithm, the higher it will rank in its results page, making it easier for your target market to find you online.
If you want strong, dependable backlinks to your website, email one of our specialists at seo@frameworkmarketing.co.uk
A couple of bonus tips
- Providing links between the pages of your own website can provide a smoother experience for your own visitors and add relevancy to your website’s every page.
- Don’t forgot to use your social media pages as avenues for your website’s backlinks – make sure your website’s link is available on all your socials to make the transition to your site that much easier for users.
SEO & Website Audits
Website audits are a less-than-glamourous aspect of the already-dazzling world of SEO, but that doesn’t make it any less important.
Audits can be made at any stage of a website’s life (both before and after a site’s redesign) and are done to assess its current SEO effectiveness. They are a bespoke process done by digital marketing agencies in order to determine which areas of a site may still need attention regarding optimisation and performance.
They reveal aspects of a website that aren’t immediately apparent, such as how robust its technical infrastructure is, how well it gets on with search engines, and how easy users can navigate it.
Website in need of an MOT? Let our specialists know at seo@frameworkmarketing.co.uk
One common website audit is the technical audit. This is done to ensure that any quality content that would otherwise rank well with Google is not marred by technical errors and issues within the website itself. These focus most on site visibility and ensure that the website meets the requirements needed for proper search engine scanning.
Technical audits tend to pick up on issues like broken internal links, inadvertent content duplication, bad keyword practice, and poor backlink profiles.
SEO audits focus more on how well a website is optimised for searching; from keyword analysis, link profiles, traffic behaviour, and media optimisation.
If you’re having a content audit, you can expect to have the written content of your construction website reviewed on whether the tone and messaging that is being delivered is actually converting sales and maintaining a consistent brand identity.
In Conclusion…
The world of SEO is as deep as it is wide. It’s a complex machine made up of smaller yet equally important parts. I hope this dive into just a few of those parts has allowed you to see how important optimising your website to the whims of Google is for customers as well as your bottom line….
…and of course, if you need help with your SEO then email one of our specialists at seo@frameworkmarketing.co.uk
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