Organic Vs. Paid: Ranking in Google Search

As a small business owner, we all know that when it comes to establishing a new business, keeping expenses to a minimum is very important. I say this because you can spend a lot of money on paid advertising, Google Ad Words, and other means to get people to know you business, or you can opt for some other less expensive strategies. The goal is the same: is to reach as many people, or future clients as you can. There are two ways to accomplish this goal when trying to have your company come up on the top ____ in a Google search, Organically, or Paid. The term Organic means not paid for, or as we like to call it, FREE!! The term “paid” is exactly that, you are paying Google, or another company, to help you get ranked and to get noticed and gain followers. When it comes to Pay per click (PPC) - - also called cost per click - - you are paying for a service such as ADWORDS, which is an advertising service by Google for businesses in which advertisers pay the publisher (typically a website owner) when the ad is clicked. It is defined simply as “the amount spent to get an advertisement clicked.” An Organic Search is achieved by convincing the Search Engines that you are more relevant for a particular keyword or phrase (that you provide). When creating your business website the easiest Organic tactic to reach your audience is to lock in on the perfect domain name, this allows the best way to maximize the traffic to your site. Investing in your own domain name with a shorter web address will make it easier for your visitors to remember and spell your site and it will appear more professional, and will stand out more. This was one trick I wish I had known before creating my business domain name.

When it comes to gaining followers, with respect to social media and blogging, each platform has its own paid service. Facebook and Twitter give you the opportunity to pay for ads to promote your page so that more people will be reached. When I launched my business Brennan Social Innovations (BSI) and created the social media and blog accounts, seeing “0 followers” at first was a frighten thing. How was I going to get anyone to follow me? Sure I can pay to acquire followers, but spending money on advertising was something that I really didn't have the funds to do. As I got deeper into researching the ins and outs of social media and blogging, I found the best way to establishing my business presence would be to take advantage of 4 things: Time, Consistency, Patience and Interaction, all of which are Organic and FREE!! I found that of all of the social media platforms Facebook was the hardest to gain likes organically because of the way the business pages are set up. Because it is an extension of your personal page it makes managing business pages and acquiring page likes more difficult if you are not paying for advertising. A good way to begin is to reach out to all of your personal FB friends and family to like your business page. This is way to start, but in the end, these folks are not your target audience. I ended up paying for advertising, but felt that it was really not worth the money. For the money I spent, the number of extra likes was minimal. Twitter and Pinterest on the other hand were much more interactive than Facebook, and I found them to be a lot easier to gain followers organically. I started by searching for anything that had to do with social media and businesses both locally and regionally that I thought could become clients and followed as many synergistic businesses as I could. Then I started posting and interacting, and before I knew it my follower base was growing. I also began blogging, which is a great way to increase SEO and up your ranking organically on Google, and I am finding that sharing my experience and knowledge is playing an important part not only in increasing my credibility as a business owner, but in allowing me to reach more people. I know you are probably thinking increasing followers on the social media platforms is all well and good but what does that have to do with driving people to my business website? Well, it has everything to do with it. The goal is to drive as many people to your website and the first line of attack in doing this is making sure that there are inbound links to your website as part of your profile on your social media accounts. Then its important to make consistent in your posting and interactions. The more you draw people in by your posts, the more interest you will garner for your business and website. It may take more time then if you spent the money to launch a PPC (Pay per click) campaign but with a little patience you will see results and it won't cost you a thing. When it comes to establishing a successful business you have to think of it as a marathon not a sprint, and this is why taking on an Organic approach can be as effective as paying for ads.

SUCCESS CAN BE ACHIEVED FOR FREE WITH A LITTLE PATIENCE!

graph credit goes to Agile impact

ABOUT WNFP Westchester Networking for Professionals (WNFP) is an organization consisting of professionals and entrepreneurs which focuses on the success of our Members. We help our Members establish lasting relationships and generate new business opportunities towards the growth of their business.

Understanding Google+ and Why You Must Get On Board

I can’t tell you how often I hear “I don’t understand Google+ and why it’s so important to use!”  I admit when I first jumped into the social media marketing arena Google+ was a bit of a mystery to me as well. It wasn’t until I started doing the research as the owner of my own social media marketing company, that I realized just how important Google+ was. When I started my research I assumed Facebook and Twitter must be the best to use because they seemed to be the most popular As I got further along in my research, I realized that like in most cases just being the most popular didn’t necessarily mean it was the “best”. I soon realized that Google+ should be up there on the A list when creating a Social Media Strategy. If your goal is to  be recognized, ranked, and increase your SEO (and of course it is!) than you’ll agree with James Thomas, a blogger for Social Media Examiner, who said “Google+ isn’t just another social media platform; it’s a powerful weapon in your SEO arsenal”.Google+, like the other platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, use the  hashtags (we used to call the number sign) to allow users to conduct custom searches via specific keywords within the platform itself. However, the thing that makes Google+ a more powerful tool is the fact that it has the world’s largest search engine behind it. Google Search users in the United States and Canada are now able to search hashtags, which pop up as a list of related Google+ posts on the right side of the page. The SEO importance of this feature is undeniable – companies that incorporate hashtags into Google+ posts and match user keyword search results can experience a significant upswing in link clicks and website traffic.

Google+ has branded itself as the social network community for making connections and collaborations within the professional community, particularly in the business and technology spheres. Google+ is the best place to reach a professional audience that ordinarily tends to shy away from Facebook and Twitter.

Google+ has experienced unprecedented growth since its launch in early 2012. Marketing professionals and business owners who ignore its potential and leave its wealth of resources untapped will undoubtedly find themselves falling behind in the ever-changing landscape of social media.  In fact, if your business has 100 followers with active engagement, your Google search engine results position can improve by 14 spots. So, as you can see Google+ is a very important marketing tool to use in promoting your business and it’s really not as scary as you might have thought. So get started today – and feel free to message me if you have any questions along the way. Brennan is a full service social media marketing and strategy company whose main goal is to help you get to the top of the search!    

Statistic Graphics are provided from We are Social! 

ABOUT WNFP Westchester Networking for Professionals (WNFP) is an organization consisting of professionals and entrepreneurs which focuses on the success of our Members. We help our Members establish lasting relationships and generate new business opportunities towards the growth of their business.