7 Ways Ignoring SEO Could Affect Your Business Badly

SEO sometimes is undervalued by a number of business owners, they may opt for PPC or social media as an alternative and sometimes they may even have figures to back their assertions. In theory, this may seem okay and your business may carry on without SEO, though there is a lot happening that you may not notice.

If you are ignoring SEO or thinking about paying it the least attention, here are 7 ways ignoring it could affect your business badly, hopefully after reading this you will make a better-informed decision on the matter.

Missing Local Leads

One of the most common ways customers are finding businesses near them is by using local SEO. If you are not paying attention to SEO then that means you are ignoring local customers who may be searching for your product or service but they never see you in the search results.

Local SEO would increase the number of people near your business who would come to your store physically. If you are comfortable not getting this opportunity, then, by all means, ignore SEO

You are Losing Credibility

If you are only paying for visibility, you are actually attracting suspicion. Customers today are aware that businesses can pay their way into the top results page so they also would like to see you in the organic search results. Not appearing in organic results raises suspicion about your business reputation.

Customers believe that businesses that can dominate the first page in their industry organic search are the ones with better expertise and probably worth paying more attention to than those that are paying for the attention.

Missing out on Increased Traffic

SEO is a way to increase the amount of traffic that visits your site, by using keywords, you cast a net and bring in more people looking for a particular word that you are using in your SEO. There is also traffic that mainly comes from mobile users, without SEO you cannot attract mobile users who are searching for particular words.

SEO would ensure that your site is responsive so that people with mobile devices can access the site and the content is adapted for their devices. Without this, even if they discovered your site, they are likely to leave because the content does not look good on their mobiles or tablets since it will not fit the screen.

You are Getting Irrelevant  

If you are not actively engaging in SEO, that means you are not listening to what your visitors are saying which in turn will mean the content you provide is irrelevant to the visitors. Keeping abreast with keywords that people are searching for helps to give you insight into the kind of content you should have on your site and that will mean you are meeting the content demand of the visitors to your site.

Ignoring SEO is likely to see you get more bounce backs because people do not find what they want on your site and eventually you have fewer visitors to the site which naturally will affect your ranking. This can happen even when you are concentrating on PPC and social media.

You will be Taken by Surprise by Google’s Updates

When Google performed the Medic update, a number of sites that were not following SEO best practices were affected. The update targeted medical sites that were considered not to be authorities or relevant in the field that they were operating. Google algorithms removed some sites that had content it felt was not trusted. These sites had not paid attention to creating relevant content in the medic field so they were removed from the search results.

These updates may stretch beyond just medic sites and if your business has not taken the time to provide content that is an expert, authoritative or trustworthy in your industry niche, you may also be affected by such an update. Following SEO best practices, however, can protect you from the adverse effects of this.

Implementing Wrong Site Redesigns

Sometimes you may want to update your site’s design to make it more attractive, if you are ignoring SEO, you can very easily have the wrong kind of design which in the end affects your Google ranking. Many site designers are ignorant about SEO so they may design for you a website that looks good and does cool stuff but really it is not a website that will do you justice when it comes to being found and user experience.

One common wrong design is using Java for the entire website which will affect loading time and lead to increased bounce rates and make Google start to ignore your website just like you are ignoring SEO. It is best to have the advice and input of an experienced SEO expert when planning a site redesign.

Ignoring Lucrative Niches

SEO gives you exposure to niches that you would never be aware of. Sometimes you may even misunderstand them especially since you are concentrating on the basic keywords yet keywords tend to be dynamic so people may be searching for something else that you are not aware of.

Industry experts suggest that you use keywords after doing complete research on which ones are the most searched for in your particular business type otherwise it would be compared to flying blind in the dark.

When all is said and done, it is a grave mistake to ignore SEO. When you get into the business, usually you are hoping to make money, ignoring SEO is working counter to that goal. A lot of quality leads are lost, potential traffic is not tapped into — so in the end, you will see less money than you have the potential to make.

You do not have to choose between PPC and organic traffic to your website so simply embrace SEO and use it along with other inorganic strategies. Your reputation as a business and the extra money it makes should be incentives enough not to ignore SEO.

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