‘Smaller brands can increase equity with SEO’
Adegboye Niyi, Head, SEM Team, VTNS Solutions, speaks on the importance of Search Engine Optimisation in brand building. Adegboye who studied Microbiology in Unilorin and now certified Google Adword expert said though SEO is important in Google ranking for brands but good content is key to getting Google rewards. Excerpts.
What is SEO?
SEO in a layman terms is the strategy and process of improving the visibility of a website through organic means on a search engine result page.
Your company is rated first on Google search, as an SEO company, what does this tell your customers?
Our being rated first on Google says two things: first, we know exactly what we are doing. We have ranked position one for two years consecutively which means we must be doing something right and secondly anyone can rank on Google. But ranking on Google is not the most important thing. You must rank on Google for the right keywords so that your traffic is not wasted. Unfortunately, it is this same fundamental that differentiates the best from the good. When you are doing something right, Google will rank you but it is the ability to do something right all the time without compromising. We have maintained this position consistently for the last 2 years and withstood different Google algorithm (panda, penguin etc). We are a completely white hat SEO company and we are proud to say that unlike most of our competitors.
How can brand leverage SEO to sell, build market share?
A lot of businesses today depend on organic traffic or what is called SEO to grow their business. So to leverage SEO, you need to understand the fundamentals. SEO is much more than simply creating a website or having a blog. It is a whole strategy of putting together a marketing strategy that uses SEO to drive traffic that can convert to sales and growth for the business. It is a lot of work, it takes time but it pays for itself eventually.
Can small brands fight bigger brands using SEO?
There is a fallacy that Google rewards bigger brands when it comes to SEO. In fact there are no other places; small brands have a fighting chance when it comes to marketing through SEO. With SEO, it does not matter if you have a big budget or a small budget. What matters is that you can follow the rules. But what has been playing out is that because the big brands have enough budget, they can afford to invest in SEO long before the smaller brands wake up. Most small brands think of SEO when they become desperate for sales or traffic to their website and this is wrong. SEO is a mindset and until small businesses have a shift in the way they see SEO, they will continue to play second fiddle to the big brands.
How many brands do you handle as an SEO firm?
As a company, we remain lean and that is the way we are built. We do not handle more than 10 clients and we do not work for a competitor in our clients vertical.
What value does your firm bring on board?
As a white-hat SEO company, we know how important traffic is for any business online. But we offer companies much more than traffic, we offer businesses the kind of traffic that translate to conversion which means your website grows and your business grows.