Writing for SEO and Your Customers....Proper Balance

Have you ever Googled a product or service you were seeking information on only to arrive on a home page for a site that was just overloaded for SEO and yet almost unreadable to users? Did you go on and purchase something on that site or pass it by? I often wonder what these website owners were thinking when they built these sites. If they were building a brick and mortar business would they have loud red signs overwhelming the appearance of their store? I doubt it. Then what business 101 class makes them think it will work on the Internet? A website owner does not need to create a cluttered environment to create a site that is both user friendly and well structured for SEO.

A few key elements that must be considered include:

• Well written page copy...be direct and sell your message, this is YOUR business!
  
• Copy that is well positioned for SEO vs the competition. Here is the science....you need to analyze the competition and the marketplace, determine what users are searching and how you are positioned vs. the competition for those keywords and phrases. Seed them into your "well written" copy, but don't overwhelm. Use all best SEO tactics, boldface, underline, titles, etc., but DON'T OVERWHELM the user.
• Page and website Navigation....be sure that the navigation is well thought out for the user. Recently we analyzed a new clients' website and discovered that while content was well built and the overall look was solid, one of the least clicked links was "buy now." What this meant is that despite a large click volume and already successful sales many potential users are leaving from the home page.
• Don't just go by your "gut feel." On the Internet the reports rarely lie. USE the research available and trust it. If you are selling European hair wigs, yet users are only searching"wigs," then unless your site appears when "wigs" is searched you will not be found. So you say you are number one on Google when "European hair wigs" is sold? Big deal, no one is searching it.....trust the research!

So remember, write well, don't oversell or over-SEO and continue to monitor and update your content for your category. My comments in this post represent only a portion of what is needed to achieve overall success, but provide a good foundation of where you need to begin.