Jill Kurtz, Owner, Kurtz Digital Strategy

Google now processes around 63,000 Google searches per second. That's 3.8 million per minute and 228 million per hour. When people search for the product or service you offer will they find you?

Every business needs to take an intentional approach to search engine optimization (SEO) to make sure they are seen online. Organize your valuable information in a way that makes it easy for search engines to find and you will earn higher rankings. This means more visitors to your website.

Start with research.

Understand all that you can about your business: your goals, your products and services, your differentiators, your competitors and more. Understand what people are looking for and how you fit in.

Identify your keywords.

What words, terms, and phrases are people searching today that should lead them to you? You need to know your keywords so you can structure your online presence to use them.

Make your web pages search-friendly.

Structure your website and key pages for SEO. Search engines take clues from page titles, heads and subheads, image tags, content, and link text. Make sure all of these make your value clear.

Remove any blockers.

Search crawlers get hung up when sites aren’t set up properly. Google Search Console and Google webmaster guidelines will let you know if you have any technical issues. They will also guide you on how to fix them.

Stick with it.

Search engine optimization is never done. Your SEO will be influenced by changes in search algorithms, user search behavior, competition and more. For example, the trend toward more searches being done on mobile devices has led Google to add mobile-friendly and speed factors to search rank.Regularly revisit your SEO set up. Recheck keywords. Read up on any changes in Google’s approach.