SEO Planning for the New Year…

And what it mean in SEO when they say to update your website content frequently.

When I conduct an SEO Audit or offer a quote on SEO services they always ask “what do you mean update my site?“ and then the question comes “how often?”.

Frequent Fresh Content

The #1 recommendation for any Search Engine Optimization campaign is to keep your content fresh. This means that web pages and blog posts should be added and/or updated regularly.

Why? It’s easier to understand what happens if you don’t update your website regularly.

If you had a brick and mortar shop you most likely have a sign outside and people will know if you are open if the lights are on and perhaps there is an “OPEN” sign. If the company goes out of business the building and the sign might still be there but it would be pretty obvious to foot traffic that you are no longer open for business.

Well on the Internet, your business is digital and the search engines are looking for ways to determine #1 if a website is a business and #2 if it is open for business. How do they do this? They check the timestamp on each of your web pages and blog posts.

Your Online Competition

If you created a website 5 years ago and have never updated it, your website would look outdated and possibly out of business. But the more common issue would be that your business’ online competition might be more active and therefore current in the digital space and would move into top search positions, therefore bumping your search results down. You might not think this is an issue if you are thinking of your competion, but in the Internet your online competition could be non-businesses who use the same or similar terminology as your business.

Before Content Management Systems (CMS) like WordPress, SquareSpace, and Wix were around, your website was probably build in html and you needed a programmer to make changes (if you didn’t have an SEO consultant). Business owners would reluctantly make changes because of the time, scheduling, and money spent to do this. However, now with all the CMS website builders it is easier than ever for business to blog and update their websites.

How Often Do You Need to Update Your Website?

Less is More vs. More is Better

In life, I lean towards “less is more” however in this situation, “more is better”! However for some small to medium size businesses they can’t afford “more” so I recommend the absolute minimum updates for SEO should be once a month. That means either a new blog post or updates to existing web pages or blog posts. This is where SEO gets creative.

Many aspects of SEO and the techniques implemented are often fairly technical. However, Content Marketing and monthly SEO work is the creative aspect of this business. Usually, we conduct an SEO strategy for Content Marketing and review it closely with clients to determine the relevance for their prospects/clients and the feasibility of developing the content needed.

Blogging for Business is one of the ways to update your website regularly. If you post a single blog post each month – that’s your monthly update. But if your blog is not integrated into your website, then you are not technically helping your business website unless you include updated links to new blog posts or include an rss feed.

How we update and optimize your website each month.

In our Monthly SEO campaigns we edit and optimize content you send us or we create content and optimize it each month. We always welcome clients to be actively engaged in their SEO campaigns by at least sending photos, testimonials, case studies, or topics. Our clients are the subject-matter-experts in their business so anything they send will be relevant. In some cases, we can research and create content for our clients. Often our clients will send us content and we reformat, optimize, and post it to the website.

The essence of our Do-it-Yourself SEO coaching service offers both brainstorming and accountability to business owners to stay on track of their SEO. A one-hour a month conversation can go a long way and keep a business on track.

Need some ideas about what to update to help improve your business’ visibility on the Internet?

Find out more about our Monthly SEO service, our DIY SEO coaching, and our SEO Consulting.