Importance of Search Engine Optimisation and Rankings

I was working for a Manchester Web Design and SEO company when I met a friend (call him Mr. X) who owns a website that sells car parts in Manchester and asked him about his website ranking. He told me that search engine ranking is not a concern for him because he operates a very niche market and that those who look for the parts that he sells "know how to find him". He was quite happy with the number of visits to his site per day and the sales generated as a result. I wanted to emphasize on how he can improve his current ranking and maintain a better search engine ranking by just spending a very small amount. However, he was not very keen about it as he insisted that his customers "know how to find him".



If you are a Manchester Web Designer this conversation might remind you of someone who had spoken to you about how to improve your site’s performance on search engines such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, Ask etc…



Mr. X was so convinced that he does not need to consider about Search Engine Rankings and his customers knew how find his site on Search Engines. He may be correct if his customers have all the patience on earth to search page by page until they find his website. How many customers will have that much of patience? Suppose you are a customer and when you are looking for car parts and you type in "car parts" and you do not find his site, what would be your next step. Instead, wouldn’t you look for another car parts seller or type in a different search term? I would. I’d look for the first 20 or so results and either type in "car accessories" or switch search engines.



Think for a moment each day how many customers would be searching for what Mr. X sells using different terms and search engines. Visitors may search the same product using various words i.e. car radiator, vehicle parts etc…Imagine how much of sales Mr. X is missing by not optimising his website for Search Engine Ranking. A few improvements would have had his Return on Investment (ROI) increase higher and stand out from the competitors. Return on investment simply means that if you spend £100 on marketing and as a result of this investment, you increase profits by £1,000 then you would have a 900% ROI. This percentage is calculated after subtracting the initial £100 spent on the marketing campaign, then dividing the remnant by the £100 invested, and finally multiplying your result by 100 to get your ROI value.



So, would you like to make £900 by spending £100? I would. Mr. X failed to realize the potential return on his investment, because he did not want to invest his cash in hand on the future of his business. Most successful website operators have realized the importance of marketing and search engine rankings. They know that they need to be listed in the top 10-30 results if they want to get the clicks, and they know that keyword optimisation can help them to achieve these high rankings.



Ask yourself if you want to make "some" money like my friend Mr. X? Or, do you want to dramatically exceed your current profit margins by increasing your website traffic? Just as it was with him, it is up to you to decide if you want to make ends meet with your online business or if you want to really make more money by investing in your marketing.



"The man who stops advertising to save money is like the man who stops the clock to save time"