Why does it matter where your site ranks?

What could it mean to your business in terms of dollars if your website came up higher in the search engines? When you think about it – its quite a simple formula – the more targeted traffic that come to your site and do something, you generate more business. For the purpose of this article, I’ll focus on the getting more people to your site. What is important to realize is that just a small increase in rankings – or how high on the searge page your website comes – can have a profound impact on your business.

Plainly speaking, the higher your business website comes up on Google, the more customers will find you. That’s straightforward, yes? What is not that obvious is how your ranking coorelates to your bank balance. Getting your website to rank on the first page of Google for your search terms such as “dentist Austin TX” is the first step.

If you want to maximize the profit from your website your goal should be to rank not only on Page 1, but at position # 1. The way that works is if your site is #1, more people click the #1 site than the #9 site.

You might rank third on Google for a keyword. If your site can get to the #1 position for that term, you can expect your traffic to quadruple for that keyword.

You may find that statement impossible to believe, but the information comes from Google. Back in 2006, AOL, whose search is powered by Google, leaked data on 29 million Web queries collected from 650 thousand users over three months. When that data was analyzed, here’s the percentage of clicks each position got: No. 1 gets 42.13 percent; No. 2 gets 11.90 percent, or 3.5 times fewer than No. 1; and No. 3 gets 8.5 percent.

Ninety percent of all clicks went to the results on the first page, with more than 40 percent going to the top result.

So how much can you afford to spend on increasing your rank and still make money? You will need to have some idea of your conversion ratio – how many leads per month and how many of those convert into paying customers.

Your conversion ratio is how many visitors it takes to make a sale. If you get 10,000 visitors a month to your website and can attribute 200 sales to it, your conversion ratio (sales/visits) is 2 percent. (If you don’t have a site yet, use 1 percent as your ratio, just to be very conservative.)

You can use a great free tool to find out how many searches are done on a given month in Google – The Google Keyword Tool. By typing in the search term you can see how many local searches meaning in the US are done on a monthly basis. And you can even have it give you related keyword ideas so you can perhaps discover other ways people look for your service or product.

Say your research shows that there are 1000 searches a month for your preferred keyword. And you’d like as many as possible of those 1000 searches to direct people to you rather than your competitor. And say you make $500 a sale and convert 1 percent of visitors into customers.

If your site ranks # 1, about 40 percent of those 1000 searchers (400) will click through to your website. That’s 4 sales – or $2000 a month in profit. If your site ranks # 5, you’ll get about 5 percent of the clicks possible, or 150 a month. At one sale per 100 visitors, you’d average about one and a half sale per month.

So now that you see how the ranking and the numbers add up, you can get an idea of how much return on your investment of getting your site to rank higher. What you’re looking for is search engine optimization services. An improvement in where your website ranks often pays off very well; SEO in general gets a better return for a longer period of time than many online marketing methods.

If your goal in 2010 is to earn more from your website investment, look into boosting your ranking.  If you would like to schedule a no cost consultation to discuss your goals for your website in 2011, contact me today.

Vermont Internet Marketing

OK, I admit it – I love to spend a couple of weeks every summer in Vermont. And what better way to keep that as a regular summer feature than to have a client or two in Vermont who needs help with internet marketing?

Actually, what I’m really providing is a way for businesses to get more clients or business which in turn helps them live the life they dreamed when they came up with the idea for their business.

So What is Vermont Internet Marketing?

Well, it can be geared towards local business in which case it can be as simple as help with a Google listing.

It can also be a business that pulls in national or international business which might be served with an ongoing monthly program designed to get their business on page 1 of Google which brings more traffic. More traffic brings more calls or emails and then a business has a chance to really close a few deals and generate revenue.

So whether you call it “vermont seo” or “vermont internet marketing” or “seo vermont” or even “internet marketing vermont” what you’re really looking for is business that comes to you from the internet. Right?

So if you like, I would be happy to take a look at your website and let you know where you stand in relation to your competitors.

If you don’t have a website – I can show you how your competitors on the internet are generating traffic.

Then you decide if more clients and more business is what you want?

Fair?

Just provide your information below and I’ll get back with you as soon as possible. I’ll provide to you a no-cost analysis of your website or your position on the internet for your terms so at least you’ll know where you stand and perhaps from that knowing choose. Its not as scary as it has seemed. There is someone who can talk with you and answer your questions.