When it comes to SEO, most people think that the best way to measure success is to achieve excellent rankings for as many keywords as possible. While this is surely the mark of a successful SEO campaign, it isn’t necessarily the best way to go about measuring success. In fact, rankings should be the furthest thing from your mind when you execute your SEO campaign. In our experience, focusing on metrics like rankings doesn’t help create success. Here’s more information as to why this is the case:

WEBSITES SHOULD BE CREATED FOR CUSTOMERS

It is true that in order for a website to rank well in the search engines, there are certain elements that need to be in place. Google has rules that need to be followed and also a set list of ranking factors that all play a part in getting the website noticed by the customers. In order to deliver an excellent customer experience, however, you shouldn’t worry about any of those things. Website should always be created with the end user in mind, not the search engines. The reason for this is if your audience is happy with your content, your success in the search engines will increase. In other words, you are much better off focusing on creating valuable content rather than getting specific content to rank well.

CREATING A GREAT USER EXPERIENCE

Your number one priority should be to create a great user experience on your website. Search engines take into account a variety of factors when assessing which sites rank well and which don’t. The main idea is that the search engines are in the business of pleasing their own customers. They want to deliver an excellent user experience for their users, which mean that when someone makes a query in the search engines, they expect that the results will be relevant and of the highest quality. When you create a great user experience on your website, search engines will realize that you have a site that people want to see. As a result, they will have a tendency to share your pages when someone makes a relevant query. In other words, when you focus in creating a great user experience, the search engines have greater likelihood of returning your website in the search results.

RANKING ISN’T IMPORTANT

Sure, everyone wants their pages to show up well in the search engines. The reality is that ranking data doesn’t tell the whole story. In order for a website to do well, other factors need to be in place. Here are some things you should think about:

• Business Increase. You want to assess if your business has increased, this is a better indicator of your time.
• High Quality Content. You need to make sure that your content is high quality and that you post new content frequently.
• Assess Content Engagement. Are people engaging with your content? If they are, this is a good indicator that you are growing your audience.
• Organic Traffic. You also want to assess your organic traffic from a big picture perspective.

As you can see, thinking about ranking isn’t productive. It is not a metric that actually helps assess if you are getting new business to your website. We help businesses achieve their goals. Ranking doesn’t even determine if you are getting more organic traffic. Everything that we do is with the purpose of helping you increase your business, and ranking isn’t even a relevant metric to assess if that goal is being achieved.   About the author: Since 2005, Boston based Brick Marketing® has been a leading ROI focused Digital Marketing company that specializes in SEO. We have helped over 1,000 companies throughout the United States by developing and executing customized Digital Marketing strategies that get results. We know that your business and website is unique. When you hire Brick Marketing you are not just a client.  We take the time to really get to know you, your business and marketing goals.  Not only that, but we treat every client’s campaign as if it is our own. Since we are selective and only take on clients we can really help, this allows us to develop an exclusive relationship with you and your team.