Step-by-Step Guide to SEO for Surrey Small Businesses
Search engine optimisation (SEO) is crucial for small businesses in Surrey looking to drive more website traffic and increase visibility online.
Implementing SEO best practices takes time and effort, but following core optimisation steps can help your Surrey business improve its search rankings and gain more qualified website visitors.
In this comprehensive guide, we walk Surrey small business owners through the key steps they need to take to optimise their website and content for higher Google rankings and more organic search traffic.
Follow this SEO checklist to start climbing the search results for your top keywords.
Conduct SEO Keyword Research in Surrey
The first step any Surrey small business should take when optimising for SEO is to conduct thorough keyword research.
Keyword research allows you to identify high-volume, low-competition search terms that real website visitors are using to find your products or services online.
There are a few ways to perform keyword research:
- Use Google Keyword Planner to discover keyword search volumes and competition data. Look for keywords with at least 1,000 monthly searches and medium or low competition.
- Use Google Trends to identify rising keyword trends in your industry. Try optimising for up-and-coming terms.
- Analyse your competitors’ websites to see which keywords they target. These are terms people search to find companies like yours.
- Look through your website analytics to see which existing pages perform best. The keywords driving traffic to those pages are winners.
As a Surrey business, be sure to include local keywords like areas such as Woking, and Guildford.
“SEO Services Surrey” will be far more effective than just “SEO services.”
If you fancy watching the video below, this helps summarise everything on here.
Optimise Website Pages for Target Keywords
Once you compile your list of priority keywords, the next step is on-page optimisation.
This involves optimising individual web pages to rank well for specific terms.
To optimise your website pages:
- Include your target keywords in strategic places like page titles, headers, content, image names, meta descriptions, and URLs. But avoid over-stuffing!
- Create compelling, useful content that answers searchers’ questions and meets their needs. Engaging, original content will earn links and social shares.
- Make sure page titles are under 60 characters and meta descriptions under 160 to keep search snippets concise.
- Include related keywords and synonyms in content so pages address multiple aspects of a topic.
- Optimise page load speed by minimizing large images, enabling compression, and fixing broken links. Faster load times improve SEO.
Remember – optimising for local Surrey keywords on pages targeting those terms will help your visibility.
Include keywords like Dentist in Surrey, Farnborough, Richmond, etc.
Build Quality Backlinks for your Surrey Business
The number and quality of other sites linking to your website is one of the strongest ranking factors in Google’s algorithm.
That’s why building backlinks is crucial to Surrey SEO success.
There are many link-building tactics suitable for small businesses:
- Create and claim your Google My Business listing to get your website linked from Google Maps and Search.
- Get listed in niche directories and citation websites relevant to your Surrey business category or location.
- Identify locally influential Surrey media sites, blogs, and resources to pitch as a source for articles and expertise.
- Request partnerships with complementary Surrey businesses to swap backlinks on your respective websites.
- Develop and distribute helpful Surrey-focused resources like whitepapers, infographics, and guides to earn backlinks.
- Participate in local organisations and sponsor Surrey events to build community connections and get referenced online. i.e. Surrey’s Make it Happen.
- Publish and share engaging, useful content on social media to drive visitors back to your website.
Focus on acquiring backlinks from reputable websites with authority in your space.
The more quality links, the better for SEO visibility.
Improve Local Surrey UK Ranking Factors
To maximise your SEO impact in the Surrey market, be sure to target these key local ranking factors:
- Create and optimise Google My Business and Bing Places listings with complete details like address, hours, photos, services, and proper categories. This helps you rank in local pack and map listings.
- Earn reviews on your Google My Business page to build trust and social proof for your Surrey business.
- Ensure your website has schema markup and structure data for your address, contact info, business info, events, etc. This helps search engines understand your content.
- List your business on popular Surrey directories like Yelp, YellowPages, Brownbook, etc. to strengthen your local signals.
- Host events at your local Surrey business location and get attendees to check-in or share on social media.
- Sponsor local organizations, events, teams, and causes in the Surrey community. Be socially involved.
By truly embedding yourself in the Surrey market both online and offline, your website will rank better for local SEO. Overall it’s good to keep your website active for ranking.
Track SEO Progress
The final crucial step is to monitor your SEO efforts and track your search ranking progress over time. Use these tips to track your Surrey SEO success:
- Use Google Search Console to monitor your indexed pages, fix errors, check links, and see keyword ranking data.
- Check rankings regularly for your target keywords to see if you’re gaining ground. Tools like SEMRush, Ahrefs, and Moz can help.
- Analyse your website traffic sources in Google Analytics to see your organic traffic growth.
- Compare domain and page authority growth over time via Moz or SemRush.
- Monitor your local pack rankings for Searches related to your Surrey business name and location.
- Check review sites to see if your star rating and number of reviews are increasing.
Adjust your SEO strategies based on the metrics and progress you’re seeing.
Be patient but persistent – SEO takes time and consistency, but following this Surrey SEO guide will point your business in the right direction!
Work to Improve SEO for your Business in Surrey UK.
Optimising your website for SEO doesn’t have to be complicated if you take it step-by-step. Conduct keyword research, optimise website content, earn backlinks, strengthen local signals, and track your progress.
With this checklist guiding your efforts, your Surrey small business can start gaining more organic traffic and visibility in local search results.
Stick with it – the long term rewards of higher-ranking SEO are well worth it!
If you need assistance with any of the above, do reach out to our Surrey Digital Marketing Agency.
