SEO for Businesses – Is It the Same for Different Industries?

Does SEO for Businesses & Different Industries Look the Same?

We’d say yes and no.

You see, the global market is composed of different industries that operate on different systems and principles, but the most common thing about all industries is to provide valuable goods and services to consumers in return of monetary rewards which can be great leverage to boost the economy, and most importantly, our way of living.

Now, your business may operate in one of these industries, and your company is not the only one that provides the products or services that your target customers or clients are looking for. So, you set yourself apart by narrowing down on a specific niche or by applying a unique marketing strategy.

Let us explain further using the most common areas in SEO that every business should deal with if they want to increase their visibility online, drive more leads to their websites, and convert more sales.

So, let’s dive right on to it.

Here are the 6 Most Common Areas in Industrial SEO that Determine the Similarities & Differences of SEO Practices in Every Niche:

• Keyword Research
• Content Creation
• Backlinks
• Website Speed & Structure
• Local SEO
• Shopping Campaigns

Now, before we dig deeper into each of these SEO techniques, you might be asking what exactly SEO is?

What is SEO and Why Is It Vital for Business?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization—the practice of optimizing your website so that your web pages can rank on top of the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) of Google, Yahoo!, Bing, and other search browsers that you might be using.

Ranking on top of the SERPs often makes the difference between a profitable and struggling business online, especially when it comes to e-commerce.

One website traffic study revealed that 32.5% of your ideal customers click on the number 1 search result, 17.6% of searchers go to the number 2 result, and 11.4% of your ideal clients click on the number 3 result—the traffic data only goes down from there with an often massive difference in number. This is why you want to rank on top of the SERPs.

Now, you might think that you shouldn’t really care about ranking on top of the search engines because you’re not in the e-commerce industry, and you have an actual location with a few loyal customers.

However, let’s not forget that we are living in a digitally-driven world. One consumer behavior study concluded that 88% of buyers often do a valuable amount of research online before purchasing in an online store or a physical store, and the number is only expected to grow for the years to come.

I guess Gary Vaynerchuk (one of the most trusted and well-known digital marketers in the United States) was right when he said that if you’re not letting your business dominate the digital space, you will soon lose it.

So, if you wish to let your business live long while profiting a handsome amount every month, you must invest in a website with an excellent SEO for business strategy.

Now, it’s time to dig deeper into these industrial SEO practices. Let’s start with the most basic. Keywords.

All Industries Must Perform Keyword Research

Keywords are the “building blocks” of SEO, and keyword research is the foundation of any business when it comes to creating content for their website.

Every industry that exists in the world today is supported by the needs and demands of their consumers, and every consumer that does decent research online uses key terms or keywords to find the products and services that they want to purchase.

This is why all of the search engines like Google, focus on “crawling” and indexing web pages that answer the users’ queries, especially those that cater to a user’s intent when searching using a particular keyword.

So, all industries share the same goal of performing effective keyword research to determine what their ideal customers are looking for and use these key terms to rank on top of the SERPs.

Pro Tip: Use free online keyword research tools such as Google Keyword Planner and Keywords Everywhere. Choose the keywords that have a high monthly average search but low competition. Also, you can try ranking for the terms that your competitors are paying to place on Ads because it means that such keywords are bringing in cash.

SEO for Businesses Include Content Creation

Content is KING in industrial SEO, and this is the area where the data from your keyword research is most useful.

Remember that the search engines, especially Google, love fresh and unique content such as web articles, blog posts, and videos. Plus, they also index images and infographics that you include in your web pages because these are assets that your ideal customers are most likely willing to share with other people, especially in social media.

Also, creating insightful and helpful content on a regular basis is what will make you build stronger trust with your target audience, and it can be your most significant leverage to become an authority in your niche.

So, all businesses should start publishing fresh, relevant, and useful content to pave their way on top of the SERPs.

Pro Tip: Use Google Trends, Answer The Public, and the Google Suggested Queries also known as “People Also Ask” to generate content ideas for your website that are relevant to what your target audience is searching.

All Business Websites Must Have Quality Backlinks

Backlinks are the links from different or external websites that point back to your site. Having quality backlinks is a definite ranking factor, especially for Google—it signals the search engines that you are an authority website because people are referring to your content as a source.

However, you must not forget that the search engines algorithms are smart enough to prefer quality over quantity. So, it doesn’t always mean that if you have a lot of external web pages linking back to your site, you’ll get a boost of ranking on top of the SERPs.

Search engines prefer backlinks from websites that are relevant to your industry or business niche—this means that such a website linking back to you should have been producing pieces of content that are quite similar to yours.

The best way to make this happen is to keep publishing super helpful and high-quality content that adds value to your market. Also, all businesses should have a quality external link building strategy to strengthen their website reputation in the eyes of the search engines.

All Businesses Must Have Excellent Website Speed & Structure

Everybody loves a fast-loading and easy-to-navigate website, and everyone hates the opposite. In fact, a study by Google has shown that 53% of site visitors will abandon your website if it takes more than 3 seconds to load a page.

So, having a fast-loading website is almost as important as ranking on top of the SERPs. This is even critical for businesses in the e-commerce industry—your category and product pages should load fast enough to keep the customers hooked.

Also, an excellent SEO for e-commerce strategy includes a well-structured website wherein it should only take three easy clicks for a customer to reach your product page from the landing page.

So, all business owners should make sure that their websites are mobile responsive and fast enough to keep a customer clicking and buying, especially those who own an online store.

Pro Tip: Use PageSpeed Insights by Google to know the areas you can improve on, and learn the actionable steps you need to do in case your website loads too slow.

Businesses With Physical Stores Must Bank on Local SEO

SEO for local businesses is fundamental in establishing your brand to your target market in your area because your ideal customers are often actively looking for you, especially if you are in the service-based industry such as plumbing, dental and medical care clinics, coffee shops, co-working spaces, restaurants, resorts, and many others that mainly operate in a physical location.

So, if you want to get found and become the most go-to place or service area in your city, bank on your local SEO strategies.

Pro Tip: Register your website to Google My Business, Google Maps, Bing Places, Yelp, and other local directories in your country to get your business name and address out there, especially other important details such as operating hours, contact number, website, and reviews.

E-Commerce Websites Should Have Strategic Shopping Campaigns

Unlike the actual shops, online stores don’t have a brick and mortar that they can use to attract nearby customers. So, utilizing strategic shopping campaigns and other digital marketing strategies such as Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and SEO are critical for the success of an e-commerce website.

Physical stores often rely on traditional marketing campaigns such as billboards, flyers, and television advertisements, while these campaign strategies might still be useful in some ways, shopping campaigns for online stores are believed to be the most efficient in attracting customers and converting sales nowadays.

If you haven’t noticed yet, people are always looking at their phones and are always searching for stuff online than they are glancing at billboards, accepting hand-out flyers, and sitting in front of television shows.

So, if you have an e-commerce website, it pays dividends if you invest in paid ads or online shopping campaigns.

Pro Tip: Use Google AdWords to run your advertisements on the search engine of Google—the most popular search browser so far.

Final Thoughts

SEO for businesses is not a quick-fix, and neither it is a quick ticket to get your web pages to rank on top of the SERPs. An effective SEO strategy is all about implementing the sustainable and best practices and refining them over time as your website climbs to the top results.

Also, different industries require different SEO strategies that are best tailored to their market needs, demands, and search behaviors. However, all businesses must do the fundamental SEO techniques such as keyword research, content creation, and link building which are essential to all websites.

There are plenty of SEO methods, not mentioned here that are useful in every industry. Consult the industrial SEO specialists today and get ahead of your competitors.