4 SEO Tips for Denver Small Business Owners

Marketing on a normal day is hard enough as it is for small businesses. Add a global pandemic to the mix and business owners like you in the Denver area might feel like you’ve been sent up the river without a paddle. Fortunately, SEO is a powerful tool that just about any small business owner can master. Here are four essential SEO tips to put into practice if you’re a small business owner in Denver.

Get Your Technical SEO in Order

Technical SEO might sound like a lot at first. Truthfully, there are multiple elements that make up the bulk of technical SEO work. Fortunately, almost all of them have to do with your business’s website. For starters, make sure you have a website. When almost 48% of consumers start research with a search engine, you can’t afford not to. If you already have your website in order, that’s great! Now the technical SEO work begins. Here are four technical SEO steps you’ll need to take.

Create a sitemap and submit it to Google. If you’re using WordPress, Yoast SEO can create a sitemap for you automatically. It also keeps your sitemap up to date when new pages are added or other site layout changes are made. To submit your sitemap to Google, you’ll need to use Google Search Console. This tool will also help you manage your SEO in the future.

Get rid of outdated pages on your site. If there’s a page or two on your site with outdated service information, get rid of it. The more streamlined and relevant your site is, the better it will perform.

Fix broken links and remove irrelevant links. If you consistently send your readers to broken pages, Google isn’t going to take kindly to that. Similarly, links to irrelevant pages aren’t going to leave readers (or site crawling AI) wanting more. Additionally, links to your site shouldn’t lead to broken pages.

Optimize images on your site. If you already have images on your site, you’re off to a great start. To optimize them, make sure they’re all relevant to what’s on the page and that they have accurate descriptions.

Make Local SEO A Priority

If you’re running a small business, odds are that most of your customers come from the immediate surrounding areas. To make sure you pop up on search results when a potential customer searches for “restaurants near me” or “photographer near me,” it’s important to make sure your business is as visible as possible to Google. The first thing you can do is create a Google My Business page. You’ll need to claim your business and add all of your business’s information, including address, phone number, and other important contact information. In doing so, you’re making sure Google has your location data to show to customers in Denver and in the surrounding areas.

Optimize Your Content

Content is key to attaining SEO success. A few factors to consider when you’re creating content for your site are content length, keywords, and relevance. First, let’s talk about content length. Organic search results on page one of Google typically average about 1,447 words in length. If you’re producing SEO-friendly blog content, try to hit at least 1,200 to 1,500 words! Next, you’ll want to include relevant keywords naturally in your content. You can use SEMRush or Ahrefs to look at search volume for a particular keyword that’s related to your business. Make sure you’re going after keywords with a moderate amount of search volume — if the search volume is too high, you may not be able to make any headway on that term because bigger businesses already have the top spot. Finally, and perhaps most obviously, make sure your content is relevant to the services you provide and to the needs of your customers. When content answers a question or solves a problem, more people are likely to pay attention.

Utilize a Variety of Marketing Channels

While doing all of this SEO work can certainly help boost visibility for your business in search results, it’s not the only channel you should be working with. For example, most dental practices can sell within 150 days of listing. But if a business trying to sell only relies on one listing, it’s probably going to take a little bit longer than the original estimates timeline. The same thing goes for marketing your small business. SEO and digital marketing go hand in hand, so don’t ignore other channels of traffic for your site! Social media channels like Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram are excellent options to help you promote your business with different types of content. Not to mention that your reach with social media can skyrocket in a short period of time if you play your cards right.

When you’re running a small business in Denver, SEO and online marketing can feel like a foreign language. Fortunately, taking a few simple steps in the right direction can make a world of difference for your company.