Best SEO tips for small business from Dana DiTomaso, one of the world’s leading SEO experts | #438
What’s the first thought that comes to mind when I say Search Engine Optimisation? Let me guess … is it “Frustration?” “Waste of time and money?” “Pain?” Do you get a sick feeling in the pit of your stomach at the mention of this geeky acronym!? Well, however you feel about SEO, it’s critical to your website’s and business’s success. And today I have all your SEO questions answered by one of the world’s leading experts on this very dark art.
Dana is President & Partner at Kick Point, where she applies marketing into strategies to grow clients' businesses, in particular, to ensure that digital and traditional play well together. With her deep experience in digital, Dana can separate real solutions from wastes of time (and budget).
“It’s probably easier to start with what SEO is NOT! SEO has grown from being really specific, to now it covers every aspect of online marketing. The bottomline however to getting your SEO right is to start with the basics. So let’s talk about them first up.” - Dana DiTomaso, KickPoint
Now, let me guess … If you’re like most small business owners, you’ve spent plenty of time and money on getting your website live. There was probably tears involved, pulling out of hair and just sheer frustration as you found someone to design it, build it, populate it with words, pictures and videos (that you had to create) … and then finally you screamed at your webmaster “I can’t do it anymore … just hit the big green button and send it live!”
At that point, you heaved a big sigh of relief, knowing your work there was done and you could get on with much more pressing business matters like attracting great people, calling in outstanding debt and deciding which coffee machine to get for the staff kitchen.
But here’s the thing ...
Whilst having a website is important for any business … getting it live is simply the start of an ongoing process. You see, your website is a needle in a gigantic haystack called the Internet, and your next (and ongoing) challenge is to ensure it gets found by the right people who are ready to buy.
And that’s where SEO (AKA search engine optimisation) steps in … a dark art for most small business owners who either don’t understand it are frustrated by it, have spent money hand over fist getting others to implement it for them or … all of the above.
Well, I’m putting a stop to that here and now. Get your SEO right and your website can all of a sudden become an enquiry-generating, money-making machine. And who better to help us do that than Dana DiTomaso who I was kindly introduced to by past guest and SEO legend Rand Fishkin, who was the founder of MOZ, one of the world's leading SEO agencies.
With Rand no longer operating in the SEO space, I emailed him a few weeks ago asking who I should chat to get an update on SEO tactics for small business owners as we head into 2019.
His immediate response was Dana, a Partner of the Canadian-based digital marketing agency Kick Point.
Now, when Rand Fishkin recommends someone, there really is no need to look elsewhere … so I emailed Dana asking her to appear on the show, and she immediately came back with a “Hell yeah!”
I then sent a simple email out to my list asking you, my precious listeners, for your most pressing SEO questions. And boy oh boy, was I inundated.
So, thanks for your responses, your questions have formed the basis of this and next week’s episodes.
DANA DITOMASO INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPTION
Tim
I want to start off by asking you what is and what isn't SEO?
Dana
I think it's probably easier to start with what it does not because SEO over the years I've been working in this field for 18 years now SEO has really grown from being really specific technical and content changes made to a website so you improve your rankings and Google and now it is everything that encompasses so many different aspects of online marketing...
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