NNFP Web HELP Article: "... and I want to be at the top of Google" by Nora McDougall-Collins

NNFP Web Services are sponsored by WERC

As a web developer, here is a scenario I see on a regular basis. A colleague emailed me about a friend of hers that needs a web site for a niche business-to-business company. She said that her friend wants a small website with a counter, and she “wants to be at the top.” I didn’t need to ask what the “top” is! What those comments told me was that her friend is very new at the website business and has a long learning curve ahead of her. But, that’s my job – helping businesses learn about what it means to have a website.

So, I knew that I would have about 5 minutes to let the friend know that it’s not a one-time put-up-a-site product. The friend called me and said, “I want a few page website that will be at the top of the search engines. I told her, “Everyone wants to be at the top of the search engines. Whether you get there depends on how much work you want to do. For example, are you willing to add a new page to your website every month?” Her answer was, “But, I don’t need to have new pages on my site.” My response was, “Then you don’t get to be at the top of Google. Where you sit depends on how well you do with your site compared to your competition.”

At that point, many people are finished listening, but she wasn’t faint of heart. Actually, in trying to get my point across in 5 minutes, my answer was simplistic. Here are some of the points I will be going over with her when we meet.

1. As a website owner, learn everything you can about having a website before you start and as you go. Yes, you can put together a website in an afternoon. I have seen many of these sites do more damage than good for a business because they represented the business very poorly. However, with planning and gathering of images and text ahead of time, you can put together a site that is good for you and your viewers in an afternoon. This is called “rapid development.”

2. Understand that a website combines many business skills: user interface, marketing (search engine optimization comes in here), programming, graphic design, copywriting, and many others. Each of these major skills has many subsets. If you understand what tasks there are to do, you are more likely to get qualified people to do them. If your web developer suggests that you hire a photographer or a copywriter or another specialist, you have a web developer that is concerned about the success of your website.

3. Don’t expect to build a site and ignore it. Have you ever been to a business where it was obvious the owners weren’t putting any energy into it? Your website needs to have something new for your viewers on a regular basis. The great thing is that this is one of the main tasks you can do to “get to the top.” After you have had your site for a couple of years, when your developer suggests it needs a bit of a makeover, it isn’t just a way to drum up business, it’s good for your web business.

4. Being “at the top” isn’t as important as having a website for people. In most cases, everything that you do to improve your site for people will also help your search engine ranking. Start by listing what you like and don’t like about websites. Keep in mind that many of the people who go to your site don’t know you, have no reason to trust you and probably don’t know much about your type of business.

5. Don’t wait until your site is perfect to roll it out. When your site is “good enough,” go ahead and roll it out. You have to keep working on it anyway! You will learn more about your website by having it live and paying attention to what you need to change and add!

These 5 points are big picture concepts that will help you get started in the right direction. Now, success is in the details!