Do you know that old saying “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”? Surely you’ve used it a few times, but do you know what it means? Roughly, it says that having good ideas, dreams, or plans is not enough for something to happen. It is necessary to do, to act (with all the effort, work and risk that might imply) to achieve something, to be ‘successful’.
“Alright, understood! But what does that ‘intentions’ business’ has to do with the internet, websites and their content? ” (emoji rolling his eyes, looking contemptuous).
At first glance I would say, nothing; particularly if you look at it from a digital marketing point of view, right? But let’s have a look then: one has a business, creates a website for it (plus the Facebook page, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Tik Tok and all the social media we can no longer live with, but without which we can’t seem to be able to survive!) and goes about advertising on all available online platforms as “one of them will sell something”; or does nothing of the sort for “they are all very expensive and sales will come anyway.” Of course, on that website, one puts some beautiful images, in a well thought out structure, with lovely copy (“because Jane, who does the budgets, is quite good with words”) and it’s done. “We’re all set! Now we just have to wait for customers to find us on Google. ” And you tick that box!
It just so happens that customers have to find you in the middle of the 1.5+ billion websites that ‘populate’ the internet today and, for that to happen, Google has to ‘show’ you on one of its search results pages. And, just between you and me, when was the last time you went past the second one (OK, third, so you don’t say I’m too demanding) of these pages when searching for anything? Well, there you go…! And we’ve come full circle to the ‘intentions’ business’ we started with.
Did you know that Google and its AI are becoming so good (or so bad, depending on the point of view!) that they are already trying (and succeeding!) to assess and differentiate the searches made by users according to their intention?
The way we search for something online, the search terms we use and the infamous keywords we type in are indicative of what we want and of when we want it.
However, the truth is that the simple act of googling something, does not mean that we necessarily want to buy it or get it (or at least not immediately). Google knows that the user’s intention may be purely informative (he or she is only looking for some information on that matter); navigational (he or she wants to find a specific website); or transactional (he or she is looking for a website to perform some type of interaction – such as obtaining contact information, buying a product or service, subscribing to a newsletter, etc – that can be accomplished within it). And any business owner will tell you how important it is to be able to distinguish people (or users) who are just looking for information, from those who are ready to make a purchase (or ‘further down the sales funnel’, as the marketing people say). And do you know who else knows this? That’s right, our dearest Google (that almost omniscient ‘being’!).
So, going back once more to that part where, after the website is built (structure, pages, images and texts, everything wonderful and fantastic, and in to which one poured so much love, care, sweat and tears) one rubs his hands and, with a proud look and that feeling of accomplishment, waits for customers to find it on the internet. However, it is easy to imagine that said waiting might probably be a little bit longer than what you initially anticipated.
Unless you do Google Ads. If you do Google Ads, you’re off the hook! And so long as you hire someone who truly knows what he or she is doing. And that you don’t have a super specific client niche. And that your competition is not very wealthy. And that… “OK, OK, we get the idea, miss smarty-pants – there is no miraculous digital ‘one drop and that’s it’ medicine! But is there a solution or not?” (emoji with a monocle and an inquisitive look).
Well, there is no escaping it: SEO – that 21st century digital Holy Grail!
And the relevance of the website’s page to the user’s real need has to be the pillar on which that SEO strategy will be based. Believe us when we say that, however complicated it may seem, in practice it turns out to be relatively simple. By analysing the intention of the pages listed as the 10 first results, for each keyword, in Google search, right now, you can see which keyword is already associated with each intention. From there, you can adjust the content of a page and the keyword chosen for it, depending on the user’s intention – page by page, on each website.
It’s quite simple: do you want organic traffic on your website, the kind you don’t have to pay a penny for to anyone? And clicks and sales, or leads generated from it? Then you have to work on your SEO and inevitably on your content.
But beware, as ‘working on your website’s SEO’ does not mean to fill in the meta tags for each page with the ‘keywords’ that you think are the most important or most appropriate for your business because “you have a special ‘feeling’ and have been doing it for many years” (and, of course, if you can’t hire a professional to help you and thus have no other choice, this will be better than nothing at all).
It is essential to do a proper keyword research for each language to be used on the website (yes, one for each language, no translations!). Create a database with these keywords and analyse their potential, not only in terms of search volume, but also from the point of view of competition and user (or search) intent. Choose the most promising keywords and map the pages of your website, assigning each one of the keywords previously chosen to it (without repeating them on different pages, as you’ll already have to deal with other websites’ competition and thus don’t need to worry with having your own pages competing amongst each other). And finally (yes, now!) create the meta tags and content for each page using the keyword you have chosen for it.
Oh, and don’t forget that, when we now say ‘keyword’, we’re actually talking about ‘keyphrase’, for it has not been just ONE word for quite a while now (crazy looking emoji with mouth open, tongue out and eyes rolled, slightly squint-eyed)!
So, this being said, tell me: is the (your) internet road paved with good intentions? (inquisitive looking emoji scratching his head!)
