Getting higher in Google with search engine optimization

Getting a high ranking in Google with your website doesn’t just happen. The answer is SEO. Search Engine Optimization. In other words, search engine optimization. It’s a question every company is dealing with. Because, the higher up in Google, the more potential visitors will interact with your business. Ultimately, this brings more customers, thus more sales and profits.

The main goal of SEO is to get a landing page or website to rank high in Google search results. The process of SEO includes three major components. These are: content, technology and link building. Based on text or website speed, various optimizations take place around the website.

Another easier and faster way to rank high in Google is SEA. Search Engine Advertising. This is not free, so as a business or website you do need budget for this. You pay for an ad, choose which audience gets to see it, and you end up at the top of Google search results almost immediately. The downside to this is that SEA costs money and it is primarily a short-term strategy, unlike SEO. SEO focuses primarily on the long term. SEO results also take longer to come in for this reason.

SEO focuses on three components:

• Content. Write relevant, useful text of quality. Tip: Write about only one topic on each page. That way, Google won’t get confused, but neither will your visitors.

Write texts that match the search intent. Think about what questions the visitor wants answers to and incorporate those answers into your text. And use intermediate headings. This makes the text more readable for the visitor and also leads to better search results in Google.

Make sure each text is unique. This is essential for Google. Otherwise, Google chooses only one page it finds relevant and will ignore the others. In addition, the user also likes this more. The length of a text is also an important point to consider. The longer the content, the better the quality score with Google. Finally, use long tail keywords in your texts. These are very specific keywords (with multiple words) for which there is little competition. Using these specific keywords will land you high in Google with the right audience.

• Technology. In addition to relevant, quality content, a website’s technology is also an indispensable component for ranking high in Google. You may have written such strong content, but the moment the website does not load fast enough, the visitor clicks it away. And that in turn affects a high ranking in Google. So make sure the website loads quickly. You do this by removing unnecessary plug-ins or resizing the images, for example.

Provide a mobile version of your website. After all, there is a lot of Googling via mobile devices. The structure of a website also matters. You do this by clarifying titles and headings using headers. Website structure greatly affects your place in Google.

• Link building. Link building means referring links from other websites to your website. Google then frames your website as a trusted source, which means another step up in search results. The quality of the backlinks is important here, though. This is because Google checks the reliability of these websites. A bad website affects its ranking in search results.

Provide diversity among backlinks. Don’t let all links come from just one source. This, in turn, may be seen as spam. Link building can also be generated from your own network. Ask people within your network if they would like to post a reference to your website.

The answer is no. SEO is a long-term strategy. In fact, within a month is already unrealistic for many websites. Google says it takes an average of 4 months to a year for you to potentially reach the No. 1 position. According to a survey by Ahrefs, it takes even longer. Namely, nearly 95% of all newly published pages fail to achieve a top 10 position within a year. Only 5% did achieve this position.

Getting high in Google organically takes a long time. And patience. Want to be right at the top? Then the only answer is SEA. But even then, your ads must meet certain quality standards if you want to end up above your competitors.

Getting high rankings in Google is achieved through the use of SEO and/or SEA. SEO takes a lot of time and patience; you won’t see the results of this for a long time, but they are often permanent (if you don’t let go of SEO). With SEA, you see results almost immediately, but this costs money. Moreover, the moment you stop paying, you also lose your spot right away.

SEO includes three components:

• Content: writing relevant, useful, quality text.
• Technology: the website should load quickly and the structure of the website should be clear.
• Link building: these are links from other websites that point to your websites (backlinks). Google then sees your website as a reliable source. You gain authority with this.

By applying the above components for your website, it is possible to land high in Google over time.

Research has shown that over one in three of all Google users click on the first link. Therefore, this is a major benefit of ranking high in Google. High in Google simply means: more visitors to your website and therefore generating more sales and profits.

But why rank high in Google? Google is the most widely used search engine in the Netherlands and actually around the world right now. Nearly 40,000 searches are performed on Google every second. That’s 3.5 billion searches a day and 1.2 trillion searches a year. This number is growing by the day. In fact, in September 2020, 97.37% of all Dutch people used Google as a search engine. Compared to Bing and Yahoo: Bing’s market share in 2019 was only 4.69%. For Yahoo, it was even less, at 1%.

These days, SEO is indispensable for just about every business. Some companies do better than others in this area, securing high rankings in organic search results. Examples of websites that spend a lot of time on SEO and get high rankings are:

• Bol.com. Bol is capitalizing on the visibility of all its products. They optimize product content so that the right audience can find the product.
• Coolblue. They do well on the SEO front. With this, Coolblue generates high authority in the online world.
• Marketplace. A key SEO objective for Marketplace is: good user engagement, user experience and lowering the bounce rate. Bounce rate means the percentage of visitors who click away from the website almost immediately.
• Choice. With over 170,000 visitors per day, Kieskeurig is one of the largest consumer sites in the Netherlands. A comprehensive information page is written for each product. This involves mapping the reader’s train of thought.
• Zalando: Zalando does a lot of SEO, but at the same time they never lose sight of the value for the visitor. Usability and relevant content are very important to them. In many countries, Zalando’s website is an authority.
• Albert Heijn. AH is the leader within the online search market in terms of supermarkets. In addition, they also score high on customer experience.
• Omoda. Omoda opts for a clear navigation structure on the website. The main navigation is very broad, but is becoming more specific. For example, the boots category is divided into short, long and fur boots. This hierarchical structure ensures a good findability on Google and contributes to usability for the visitor.
• Better Bed. Beter Bed wins on SEO in terms of the bed and mattress industry. Ikea and Leen Bakker were hot on their heels. The reason for this is that Better Bed sells only items of their own brand. Just like Ikea. Better Bed scores high on link building combined with lots of keyword-rich anchor text.
• Leen Bakker. Together with Goossens, these home furnishing stores dominate search results in Google. Every month, 1.3 million search results take place on living room-related products. Of this, Leen Bakker pulls in a whopping 6.40% on their website. This amounts to hundreds of thousands of visitors a year.

When you partner with an SEO specialist, he or she performs search engine optimization work for you. These optimizations relate to the three pillars of seo: content, technology and link building. The goal of an SEO specialist is to make your website more findable in search engines, primarily Google. An SEO specialist additionally provides measurability and therefore insight.

Of course, you can do your SEO yourself, but remember: SEO is a profession. An SEO specialist is on top of the latest developments and has a lot of knowledge. In addition, an SEO specialist has access to all the important tools to take your SEO to the next level. Another benefit of working with an SEO specialist is that you have more time for other things yourself.

Understanding your website is very important. In fact, based on this information, you can optimize your website. Through various SEO tools, you find out where you rank in Google. A very well-known one is Google Search Console. This tool is from Google and is free. Another tool is Ahrefs. This tool costs money, but it offers you a lot of insights.

In Ahrefs, you can see the keyword you are scoring for and the number of people searching for it each month. In addition, you gain insight into the traffic you attract with this keyword and you see the URL of the keyword. Finally, you can also see when the results were last updated. The benefits of Ahrefs are:

• provides accurate results;
• provides insight into all key metrics for keywords;
• Can pretty much track all aspects of SEO.

Landing at the top of Google with a website does not happen overnight. Basically, Google determines your position based on a variety of factors. Nevertheless, you can influence this through certain tricks.

You exercise this influence through SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SEA (Search Engine Advertising). SEO is about the free, organic search results. SEA is about paid search results.

SEO is a lot more time-consuming, but a more sustainable way to land high in Google than SEA. With SEA, you pay money to Google to rank at the top, and you rank this almost immediately. But the moment you stop paying, you also immediately disappear from your position.

With SEO, it takes a lot of time and effort to land high in Google, but in return, your results are lasting.

SEO consists of three components that you need to invest in with your website:

• Content: writing relevant, quality text. These texts contain the keywords your target audience is searching for.
• Technology: this includes a fast loading time (no more than a few milliseconds) and a clear website structure.
• Link building: these are links from other websites that point to your website. You gain online authority with this and that is something that is highly valued by Google.

We all want to rank high in Google with our website. After all, this means more visitors, more potential customers and therefore more sales and profits. This takes a lot of time and effort.

When you don’t provide this, you are likely to have a lower ranking in Google. A low ranking in Google can have several reasons.

• You are not relevant enough for the search term. It is important to use keywords that are relevant to your product or service. In addition, you need to incorporate these keywords multiple times in a text of at least 400 words.
• Your website is not mobile-ready. Google takes into account the mobile suitability of a website. When this is not the case, Google may place you down in the rankings.
• You have less online authority than the competition. Make sure links on other websites point to your website. This gives you authority and that is appreciated by Google.
• Your website has a mediocre user experience. For example, your website is slow, complicated or even irritating to the visitor.
• It depends on the individual. Search results may vary from person to person. This is because it depends on personal factors, such as your search history or where you are searching from.
• Your texts are not unique. When you copy text, Google puts you back a few spots. Or conversely, when you have an overly frequent keyword in the text. This is all counterproductive.

As for organic search results through the use of SEO, the answer is yes. As for getting high in Google through SEA, the answer is not always yes.

Of course, being high in Google is very important today. In fact, more than 90% of all Dutch people begin their search for a business in the search engines. If you are currently present in the search engine, you can obtain potential customers to your website.

Nevertheless, the conversion rate of organic visitors (SEO) is a lot higher than that of visitors from ads (SEA). This, then, is why getting higher in Google through the use of SEA is not always better.

Also, a high, unpaid position in Google always appears more credible to the visitor than a high, paid position in Google. So the bottom line is: investing in SEO is always worthwhile, investing in SEA is sometimes worthwhile.

The moment SEO and SEA are combined, more data can also be exchanged. So SEA can certainly help you get higher up in Google. If I have done a SEA campaign, then I can analyze this data to determine the relevance of the keywords. It does involve a lot more than just this. Getting higher in Google is not done with SEA alone or SEO alone, all factors are interrelated.

SEA does allow you to get a better position in Google with your website, but you have to ask yourself whether it is for the short or long term. As long as you keep paying for ads so for SEA, you may continue to rank well in Google, but if you stop, your position will quickly be taken by a competitor.

That’s why I recommend you look beyond SEA. After all, you don’t want to pay a lot of money just to get a higher position, you want it to be permanent and can be done in a different way, combining it with SEO is a good idea!

Several factors are considered when ranking in Google:

• Website/page speed, it is important that you have a website that can load the pages quickly. After all, visitors do not like having to wait a long time to get information. If it takes them too long they will go and that can cost you customers (a shame).
• Duplicate, stolen or unique content. Google looks at all texts, do they have good titles? Were intermediate headings used? Is the text completely unique? Did you not post duplicate content or plagiarize?
• Backlinks, there should be links to and from your website, this will also give you a better position in Google. Your website will then be seen as more trustworthy. The issue is not the quantity of links, but the quality of the links in question.
• Responsive design, nowadays a website must also be mobile friendly. Many people use a mobile device to do a quick search or order something. If your website matches this, you will also rank better in the search engine Google.

If you want to rank higher in Google, it doesn’t have to be expensive. It depends on what optimizations you can do yourself in terms of SEO. Hiring an SEO specialist does cost money, of course, but that often pays for itself in no time. If you want to get higher in Google through SEA, you can do that too, but you should also know that you have to pay for an ad again.

So it’s up to you whether it’s going to cost you a lot to get higher in Google. You could also go through the SEO steps and then you can often go a long way yourself to rank higher in Google. Of course, this work can also be completely outsourced to me. For a flat rate per hour, I will go to work for you and explain what you can expect from me.

It is particularly important that you engage with your site on a monthly basis, such as adding landing pages or blogging. This way, Google can index the site every time and also sees that you have added new things.

Your goal is often to get higher in Google, but there’s more. After all, you want to achieve an intended conversion, and you do that through organic traffic. It has to be measurable and because of that you need goals. Typically, from an SEO path, the possible objectives are considered.

Some people have a budget available for a certain time to then get higher in Google and then use SEA. They then pay for the ads and that can be an expensive joke. But the advantage you then do have is that you are immediately visible at the top for certain keywords. The downside is that when you stop SEA, your position in Google also disappears. Therefore, it is better to invest in your position in Google with SEO so that it works for the longer term.

Most visitors will look on the first page of Google so if you want to be found there you have to work for that. That way you can be relevant to searchers, but remember to use the right keywords.

An SEO specialist like me can help you get a website higher in Google. For that, I will structurally perform various optimizations around the website or a particular page. I pay attention to content, technology and link building. For example, I can write a weekly blog, or I can improve site speed and put out articles on other sites (so that links go to your site).

It is possible for you to work on your website yourself to get higher in Google. You must know enough about it and be able to take the right steps. Fortunately, you can learn all that by taking a course online. You can then put what you have learned into practice immediately on your own site.

You can already start with small changes, such as applying keywords in your current texts, adding new pages, making sure links point to your website, etc. If you need help with this I can always help and also provide you with advice.

I’m sure you hear many people say it, I want to get higher in Google, but then there’s the question of how do you do that? There is a lot involved in that I know from experience. Basically, though, any website can rank high in Google, but some require more than others. It depends on what position the website is currently at, for example.

What goals do you have in mind? Do you already score very well on certain keywords, but do you have more words you want to be found on? You may also not be visible in the search engine at all yet. Then it is important to act on all possible factors to get your website visible in the search engines such as Google first.

So what the process will look like is very personal, and also depends on your goals and where you are now. But I’m happy to help you get your website high in Google, and that includes a web shop.

A website can rank higher in Google by actively optimizing SEO. You then don’t pay for every click, which you have to do with SEA. SEO is all about content, technology and authority (link building). If this combination is right, then you can rank higher in Google. But there will often be some work to be done before your website will actually rank well in Google and other search engines.

It is valuable anyway to regularly add relevant content on your website. In that, you can incorporate the right keywords and from there again look at ranking in Google. How is the competitor doing? Do they have more links? Then you will have to invest in that too, I can help you with that and provide good link building.

These are all small steps that together move you forward to strengthen your position in Google. After all, you want to be found well quickly, but you also want this to be okay in the long run. Therefore, you will have to keep investing in this and I can help you do that.

You need to know your target audience and what words they search on and respond accordingly. But you also start looking at the competition, what are they focusing on? I can explain this to you using an example. You sell frames, this competition too, but what is your specialty? Wood or plastic? Are you posting them as well? Do you do customization? All additional points that you can name and then create landing pages from, for example, custom plastic window frames.

It’s about getting specific keywords that your target audience is searching for, but also of what you have to offer them. Are you active in a particular region? Then you can think about window frames (place name). If you operate throughout the Netherlands then you can create pages with frames (province). Therefore, what keywords belong to your website is very personal.

Conducting or having a comprehensive keyword research will give you an idea of this and allow you to translate it into practice. I can support you in this, but I can also take all the work off your hands and make sure that you and your website rank high in Google with certain keywords.