Launching New Websites
A Step-By-Step Guide to Small Business SEO
So far my SEO guide has covered all of the steps that small businesses need to take before a website goes live. The fact this is now the fourteenth chapter gives some indication of the importance and precedence that should be given to SEO planning and preparation. I hope that, so far, I have shown how small business SEO strategies can be reasonably cost-effective to implement; dependant, of course, on how much of the process you choose to develop in-house and how much you outsource to an agency or consultant. Launching new websites doesn’t necessarily have to be expensive for smaller businesses, but preparation and planning is essential. As a result, it would be useful to recap here the stages taken so far plus an outline of the final considerations before you launch your site. This article follows on from Part Thirteen: Sitemaps. To go back to the start of my guide click here.
Overview of SEO Planning
Small businesses and internet start-ups planning on launching a website for the first time should give consideration to the following steps. The links within each step point back to the relevant sections of this guide.
1. Choose a reputable web hosting company
2. Choose a domain name for your business
3. Define your SEO Planning model
4. Define your key-phrase integration and website design brief carefully
5. Ensure that site architecture directives are central to your website build
6. Ensure that you implement an SEO friendly content management system
7. Consider WordPress as a cost-effective CMS for small business SEO
8. Conduct thorough key-phrase research before you brief a web designer
9. Target long-tail and local search key-phrases for short term wins
10. Conduct competitor analysis before committing to a key-phrase strategy
11. Install effective web analytics on your website
12. Install a sitemap on your website
Final Considerations
Also give some thought to the following before launching new websites:
1. Technical. Ensure you have given unique META titles and descriptions to all of your web pages (more on this in the next few chapters). Also ensure that you are happy with the URL structure of your main pages. Once your site launches you may start to receive inbound links straight away (depending upon how much you’ve invested in general marketing). Changing your URL structures at a later date means implementing page 301 redirects.
2. Offline Marketing. SEO is not just about technical adjustments to your website, content development and link-building. Really effective SEO strategies are ones that are integrated with your other marketing activities. Before your website launches, give some thought to your offline marketing. Press advertisements, flyers, posters and outdoor media should encourage people not only to visit your website but to engage with and share it. If you offer great, free content on your site, make sure this is clear in your offline promotions. Encourage people to sign-up, share or comment on your website content. This will help you to build “natural” links into your site. Although small business budgets can be prohibitive, you should avoid the trap of focusing all your efforts online. Targeted offline campaigns such as flyering, need not be overly expensive.
3. Public Relations. Again, give some thought to how you intend to “announce” your site to the world. Draw up a list of press and industry targets that are most likely to show some interest in your niche. Devise a range of unique and eye-catching press releases featuring genuinely newsworthy or topical information (a press release simply stating that your new website is now online will get you nowhere). Make sure you follow up your press release distribution with phone calls to the journalists, editors and industry professionals that you have targeted. Consider using a site announcement service such as Eric Ward’s URLwire.com. Also give thought to on-going online and offline PR campaigns (this could be a whole guide to itself, so perhaps visit the Chartered Institute of Public Relations for further advice).
4. Social Media Engagement. Consider setting up accounts on major social networking sites, video sharing sites and content syndication portals. Enable your site visitors to follow you on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other popular social media channels. Enable people to comment on your blog and sign-up for your updates. Link out to other related bloggers and established, authority sites. I will cover more on social media in a later chapter.
5. Maintenance Strategy. Make sure you have a plan in place for content development, general marketing, public relations, link building and general web development. Once your site is online you will need to work hard to build its profile and credibility. Good SEO results will not occur without on-going work and maintenance.
Launching New Websites Checklist
- Ensure that you’ve considered and/or implemented all the recommended SEO planning stages
- Make sure you’re happy with the technical set-up of your site prior to launch
- Remember to integrate your SEO objectives with your other marketing activities
- Ensure that you have a website development plan in place that will keep your site fresh, relevant and up-to-date
Part Fifteen
In part fifteen I will offer an overview of the on-page optimisation techniques that you can implement once your website has launched. SEO requires a lot of minor tweaks and on-going adjustments. The next few chapters of this guide will cover the key areas for improvement. Click here to go to part fifteen.
