Small Business SEO Guide for Smart Business Owners [2022]
The family-run small business battling for visibility in a world of goliath corporations. However, where bottomless pockets for advertising and brand recognition have always been small businesses’ biggest threats, there’s a new digital front that’s evening out the playing field.
Small business SEO, or search engine optimization, is an often overlooked and misunderstood tool that every entrepreneur has access to. It takes time to nurture and see real results — sometimes up to 12 months — but SEO has lasting benefits that can completely overhaul a small business’s bottom line.
“Content is where I expect much of the real money will be made on the Internet, just as it was in broadcasting…But the broad opportunities for most companies involve supplying information or entertainment. No company is too small to participate.”
Create a logical website structure
In plain English, that means that your site should make sense to navigate. Your homepage should link to your other important pages (about, content, services). Your services page should list and link to pages describing individual services. And so on.
How do you fix this? The trick is to try to look at your website with fresh eyes and make sure it has a logical structure. Start at your homepage and see if you can logically find—and navigate to—all your important pages quickly and easily.
This is a prime example of what I said about things starting logically and slowing disintegrating over time. I know these guys are filming weddings regularly, which they then blog about. This menu has clearly gotten out of hand without them realizing, and is definitely something to fix.
Your website may not have this same issue but there are probably other similar ones. So the best thing to do is grab a pen and paper and start mapping out an ideal structure for your site. You could also use a free visual sitemap creator like this one.
NOTE. This is just an example to show how quickly and cheaply you can find freelancers to solve such issues. Always shop around and make sure to check reviews and feedback before hiring anyone.
Keep your site free of broken pages and links
Think about it: what does a website with broken pages and links say to you? Most likely that it’s rarely updated, neglected, and that the site owner doesn’t care about keeping their website functioning properly.
While it’s normal to have Not Found (404) errors, you’ll want to address errors for important pages linked to by other sites, older URLs you had in your sitemap and have since deleted, misspelled URLs for important pages, or URLs of popular pages that no longer exist on your site. This way, the information that you care about can be easily accessed by Google and your visitors.
WebFX’s SEO Services for Small Businesses
| Features | Silver | Gold | Platinum | Diamond | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Number of keyphrases optimized (Keyphrases with less than 1M results) | Up to 150 | Up to 200 | Up to 250 | Up to 300 | Custom |
| Pages Optimized | Up to 30 | Up to 40 | Up to 50 | Up to 60 | Custom |
| Technical Website Analysis & Opportunity Report | Custom | ||||
| Keyword research & selection | Custom | ||||
| Keyword mapping to target pages | Custom | ||||
| Title Tags & Meta descriptions | Custom | ||||
| Robots.txt optimization | Custom | ||||
| XML sitemap creation & submission | Custom | ||||
| Quarterly Earned Media Content Assets – Content, Linkbuilding, Consulting, or CRO Assets | 6 Content, Outreach, UX, or CRO Assets | 12 Content, Outreach, UX, or CRO Assets | 15 Content, Outreach, UX, or CRO Assets | 24 Content, Outreach, UX, or CRO Assets | Custom |
| Google Business Profile optimization (if needed) | Custom | ||||
| Information architecture audit | Custom | ||||
| Canonicalization analysis | Custom | ||||
| Initial external link analysis and disavow | Custom | ||||
| Link redirect audit | Custom | ||||
| Internal linking restructuring & optimization | Custom | ||||
| Duplicate content analysis | Custom | ||||
| Header Tags Optimized (Ex. H1s) | Custom | ||||
| Setup of website sitemap | Custom | ||||
| Image optimization | Custom | ||||
| Custom 404 error page setup and optimization | Custom | ||||
| Schema Implementation (JSON-LD) | Custom | ||||
| Google Analytics setup w/ conversion tracking | Custom | ||||
| Google Analytics traffic analysis | Custom | ||||
| Google Data Studio Reporting Dashboard Setup | 8 dashboards | 8 dashboards | 10 dashboards | 10 dashboards | Custom |
| Initial visitor profile report | Custom | ||||
| Ongoing quarterly keyword ranking reporting | Custom | ||||
| Ongoing monthly traffic, goal & CPL reporting | Custom | ||||
| Ongoing user experience reporting (bounce rate, device category, etc.) | Custom | ||||
| Ongoing quarterly competitor conquest reports | Custom | ||||
| Keyword rank checker access with weekly updates (if requested) | Custom | ||||
| Ability to check location data accuracy across 40+ local directories | Custom | ||||
| A/B Testing of SERP title & description to improve clickthrough | Custom | ||||
| Notification of new reviews (major review platforms) | Custom | ||||
| CalltrackerFX access Learn more | Leverages  | Leverages | Leverages | Leverages | Custom |
| Analyze your leads to project the # of leads competitors receive on a monthly basis | Custom | ||||
| Predict your and your competitors’ market share on a monthly basis | Custom | ||||
| Competitor intelligence login to view competitor data | Custom | ||||
| LeadManagerFX access Learn more | Leverages  | Leverages | Leverages | Leverages | Custom |
| CompanyTrackerFX access Learn more | Leverages  | Leverages | Leverages | Leverages | Custom |
| ContentAnalyticsFX access Learn more | Leverages  | Leverages | Leverages | Leverages | Custom |
| Dedicated Internet Marketer | Custom | ||||
| Online Project Management Platform | Custom | ||||
| 450+ SMEs behind campaign driving results | Custom | ||||
| Website conversion analysis implementation | Custom | Custom | Custom | Custom | Custom |
| Initial campaign investment:(Two month duration) | $7,750 | $12,750 | $15,750 | $18,750 | Get Quote |
| Progressive monthly optimization:(6 month commitment – Subsequent 4 months) | 5000,500 | $5,000 | $6,500 | $8,000 | Get Quote |
Small Business SEO Tools Comparison Table
| SEO Tool: | Strength: |
|---|---|
| Google Analytics | Understand website visitor sources and behavior |
| Google Search Console | Optimize website presence in Google Search |
| Google Business Profile | Manage business presence in Google Search & Maps |
| Google PageSpeed Insights | Check page loading speed and related performance |
| Google Trends | Analyze interest trends for search queries in Google |
| SEOquake | Check basic SEO page metrics in your browser |
| Semrush | Full-feature SEO platform with features including competitor research, site auditing, daily keyword tracking, and more |
| SE Ranking | Affordable SEO platform with features including competitor research, site auditing, flexible keyword tracking, and more |
| Ahrefs | In-depth SEO software with features including competitor research, site auditing, extensive keyword tracking, and more |
| Nightwatch | Affordably and accurately track many local keywords for your site and competitor sites with daily updates. |
| Screaming Frog SEO Spider | Analyze many website pages quickly for issues, opportunities, and understand a website’s linking structure |
| Keyword Tool | Discover related keywords for a primary keyword |
| AnswerThePublic | Discover related keywords & questions for a given keyword |
| Google Keyword Planner | Find keyword ideas with estimated search volumes |
| BrightLocal | Basic local SEO tools & services, affordable citation building, managing reviews, basic keyword tracking |
| Whitespark | Local SEO tools & services, extensive citation building, managing reviews, keyword tracking |
| Moz Pro | Reputable all-in-one toolset for site audits, rank tracking, and local SEO reporting. |
| Rank Math | Large feature-set to configure SEO settings for WordPress, adjust technical settings, get content optimization suggestions, track keywords |
| Yoast SEO | Solid feature-set to configure SEO settings for WordPress, adjust technical settings, get page optimization suggestions |
| Surfer SEO | Optimize written content based on 500+ on-page signals |
Comparing Top SEO Tools for Small Businesses
What is Small Business SEO?
What is Small Business SEO Software?
Why Use Small Business SEO Tools?
Are There Free SEO Tools for Small Businesses?
Which is the Best Tool for Small Business SEO?
Resources:
https://markitors.com/small-business-seo/
https://ahrefs.com/blog/small-business-seo/
https://www.webfx.com/seo/services/smb/
https://www.boostplanner.com/best-seo-software-for-small-businesses/