You have a website, now what? In a perfect world search engines would have a giant flashing sign that alerted the world your website was live, they would show your site first for all searches related to your products or services and millions of visitors would flock to your site. You are automatically king or queen of the mountain. If only it was a perfect world.

With search engines constantly making updates and changes to compete with each other for users, plus the sheer amount of information online in the forms of websites, blogs, directories, networks, etc., the web is more competitive than ever and it takes a solid search marketing strategy to improve search engine rankings. You have to climb that proverbial search mountain step by step if you want to rule your space in the web.

Base Camp: Discovering the Path to Improved Search Rankings

The first step into your climb is charting a course and prepping your website for the hike. In order to improve search engine rankings, your website will need a solid search engine optimization (SEO) strategy in place. Finding the right path involves research and analysis.

You need to perform keyword research which will help you map your strategy. Find the keywords that are causing your prospects to act. Then, like any traditional marketing strategy, you’ll want to check out your competitors and see what’s in their pack. What terms are they using? How is their website performing? What strategies are they using?

You will also want to consider your own website analytics. If your site has been live for a while, analyze your users’ behavior on your site and the keywords that are getting them to you. From all of this research you can now create and build a strategy that will get you started on the trail to improving your search engine rankings.

The Ridge: Engage Your Customers to Improve Search Engine Rankings

You’ve left base camp and you’re on the right track to improve search engine rankings. Next you need to reach the ridge and put your strategy into action. To conquer the ridge you need to implement your keyword strategy.

Start by creating compelling title and description tags that integrate the keywords you have chosen. These two elements will have a huge impact on your click thru rate (people clicking your listing in the search results over other listings) so carefully consider how you write these tags.

Next, update your page content with keywords that will not only get you search traffic but engage those potential prospects. How do you do this? When creating your website’s content, speak to your prospects as if you are having a conversation and give them useful information about your product or service offerings.

It is quality content that will separate you from your competition. Clear, compelling content that is enriched with a strong keyword strategy will not only help attract prospects but the search engines will take notice as well. When you combine these two, you will be well on your way to improve search engine rankings.

The Summit: Your Search Engine Marketing Comes Together to Improve Search Engine Rankings

Your website is established. You’ve finessed your on-site SEO, you’re engaging your prospects but reaching the summit can be the toughest part of the climb. To make the final push it’s time to gather your strength and start to work on those elements you have less control over.

To truly improve your search engine rankings you will need other websites to give you a stamp of approval – in this case that means a link. If you created compelling content that was informative for your audience, some links will occur naturally as people find and share that great content with others. But you will also need to be proactive.

Go back to that competitive research and see what sites are linking to your competitors. For those sites that are a good fit, contact their webmaster and explain why a link to your site will be an added value to their users. Step by step you will increase your link popularity and all of your hard work will be rewarded.

A solid keyword strategy, quality content, link building efforts, integrating social media, and being proactive in updating your website will all help propel you to the summit. Here you will be driving more traffic to your site and turning users into leads because you have hiked the path to improve search engine rankings.