If a website goes live on the internet and no one ever visits it, does its existence matter? Ninety-nine percent of the time, the answer is no.
Websites are made to provide people with a way to access your business/brand/platform from wherever they’re at in the world. In some cases, a website may exist to serve an existing audience that visits it directly. But more often, a website’s preferred goal is to attract new people to whatever it is you do.
While social media can help drive website traffic, the best way to do it is through search engines. Search engines account for over half of all website traffic. Social media, meanwhile, only provides about around 4% of traffic on average. Every day, countless people are out there searching for a website just like yours. They’re looking for the services you provide. They want to hear the message you have to share.
There’s just one problem: you’re not appearing in search engines.
Don’t panic just yet. It happens to a lot of websites. More importantly, there are things you can do to fix this situation. But first, you’ll need to understand why this is happening. Is it because you didn’t spend enough money on your website?
Generally, no.
The Cost of Your Website Doesn’t Matter
Despite what some salespeople may tell you, spending more money on a website does not guarantee traffic or search engine rankings. Some businesses pay a lot of money to have someone else build their website. They spend hours and hours collaborating and giving feedback and refining until it’s just perfect. This process can take up to a year, if not more.
Meanwhile, an individual can go to a platform like Squarespace or Wix and create a website for virtually no cost in less than a day. Sure, these websites probably won’t look as good or unique as the expensive sites. They may not have complex functions and custom features. They may not even load as quickly* or scale as elegantly across different devices.
But they both face the same battle when it comes to getting search engine traffic. A cheap website can rank high in search results and get a lot of search engine traffic. An expensive website can fail to appear in any relevant searches, resulting in little-to-no traffic. Whether your website is cheap or expensive, you have an opportunity to rank well and drive traffic to your site.
If you find you’re not getting any search engine traffic, it’s probably related to one of the following reasons.
*Note: Site speed/performance can impact your search engine performance. The same goes for mobile-friendliness, though virtually all major website platforms are responsive now, so that’s less of an issue.
Your Website Isn’t Being Indexed
In order for a website to show up in a search engine, it needs to be indexed. What does that mean? Search engines have something called “crawlers.” These are bots/scripts programmed to find websites on the internet and “crawl” through the content. They make note of the content that’s present, what it’s about, how it’s structured, etc. They then “index” this information so that it can be displayed in relevant search results.
If your website isn’t indexed, you will not appear in search results. Even if someone searches your exact name or URL. As you can imagine, this is catastrophic for most websites.
Thankfully, crawlers are great at finding websites automatically when they go live on the internet. However, there are ways you can accidentally block crawlers from scanning and indexing your site. For example, WordPress (the most popular platform on the internet) has a setting that specifically blocks your entire website from being crawled.
Why would you want to keep your website from being indexed?
If you’re building a new site, and it’s not ready for public viewing, this can be a useful way to keep people from accidentally finding it. For those who are wanting people to actually find their website, you must ensure your website is indexed.
How can you ensure your website is indexed?
Go to Google and enter your URL into the search box. If nothing appears, you’re likely not indexed.
Fixing this will depend on how your website is built. When in doubt, it never hurts to manually submit your website to Google Search Console. Search Console is a helpful way to monitor your website’s crawlability, discover errors that may be affecting your appearance in search results, and more. You can learn more about Search Console in this article.
Your Website Isn’t Search Engine Optimized
If you have a website, and you’re trying to show up in Google, you’ve likely heard the term SEO or “search engine optimization.” Depending on who you ask, you can hear a wide variety of definitions. In the broadest view, SEO is a collection of strategic actions designed to improve your website’s ranking for relevant search results.
You may theoretically be indexed in search engines, but if you’re never showing up on the first page, it doesn’t really matter. After all, over 70% of search engine traffic comes from the first page. And over half of click-throughs go to the first three results. This is where SEO is critical.
You may currently have a website that was billed as being “search engine friendly.” While that’s a great start, it’s not the same as being search engine optimized. It simply means that the site is capable of being effectively optimized for search engines.
How do you optimize your site for search engines?
It starts with having a well-structured site filled with original content that’s useful to your potential customers. But that’s just the beginning. The topic of SEO is large enough to fill countless posts. If you’d like to learn more about how you can optimize your site, this video provides a fairly succinct overview:
If you’d like direct guidance on how you can optimize your site and improve your search engine rankings, I’d be happy to provide a consultation. Click here to get a conversation started.
Your Website Lacks Content
Content is king when it comes to getting traffic to your site. If you have four pages, each of which contain a total of 100 words a piece, you’re likely going to struggle when it comes to appearing in search engines. The general recommendation is that each page has at least 500 words on it. Each service/topic/group you’re trying to rank for should likely have its own page.
And once you have these pages created, you’ll want to create fresh, ongoing content that’s relevant to your target market. This is often in the form of a blog, though it could also be through YouTube, Instagram, or a variety of other avenues. These would then link back to your website in various ways.
That doesn’t mean you should find the first AI program you hear about and start generating generic blog content and social media posts. Search engines have become surprisingly sophisticated when it comes to determining the quality of content. All content on your site should be unique, well made, and to the point.
This content should also be optimized for search engines. If you’re not sure how to go about doing that, or you simply don’t have the time/will to make it happen, it’s best to collaborate with an experienced content strategist.
Your Website is Brand New
Search engines can be fickle. Sometimes, brand new content will shoot to the top of relevant searches. More often than not, it can take a while. SEO is a long-play strategy that requires consistency and patience. Anyone who promises guaranteed results in a month or less should be avoided. It’s possible to see results in a month. It’s more likely that it will take multiple months, if not a year.
All that to say, if you just launched a brand-new website, and you’re not seeing the search engine rankings you were expecting, you may just need to give it some time.
You’re Doing Shady Things
There was a time when the search engine algorithms could be easily manipulated. This isn’t the case anymore. And yet, many people still try to utilize bad and outdated techniques. Even now, they may achieve some initial results, but you shouldn’t expect that to last. Shady tactics (often called black hat SEO) aren’t just ineffective. They can actually result in your website being punished and outright blacklisted from search engines.
What are some examples of this?
Keyword Stuffing
Let’s say you want to rank for the phrase “fuzzy pink bunny socks.” If you proceed to create a 500-word page that says “fuzzy pink bunny socks” 100 times, you’re likely keyword stuffing. Alternatively, you may try to shove “fuzzy pink bunny socks” into a page that’s about BBQ pulled pork. This is also a form of keyword stuffing, and it’s just as bad.
Essentially, if you’re trying to rank for a keyword with a specific page, that page should be about the intended keyword, and the keyword should be used as naturally as possible. Even if it’s not in the exact order. Maybe you say “pink bunny socks that are soft and fuzzy.” That’s better than trying to force an exact keyword into a place where it doesn’t make sense.
Paying for Links
If anyone ever comes to you and says “if you pay me $1000, I’ll link to your site from 100 other websites,” say no. External links are great but only if they’re earned naturally.
Hidden Text
This is an old tactic, but people still try to use it. Again, let’s say you want to rank for “fuzzy pink bunny socks.” Rather than place this within your page content, you place it in your footer. The footer’s background is white, so you make the text white. To anyone visiting your site, they can’t see where it says “fuzzy pink bunny socks,” but search engines can see it.
This is bad, and it can result in your site being punished. Anything you do in terms of SEO should be for people first and search engines second. If a person can’t see it, search engines shouldn’t be able to see it either.
What Can You Do to Improve Your Search Engine Performance?
To start, you should ensure your website is search engine friendly. If it’s built on platforms like WordPress, Squarespace, Shopify, or even Wix, you should be set in this department. If it’s cobbled together with ancient custom code, or it’s built on your hosting platform (ie: GoDaddy’s web builder), it’s probably not very friendly with search engines.
Without a search engine-friendly site, you’re fighting a losing battle right out of the gates. Before you get too deep in the optimization process, take a look at the platform your site is built on and consider if you need to do a rebuild.
Once you have a website that’s search engine friendly, ensure that it’s being indexed by Google. The simplest way to check this would be to go to Google and enter your URL. If your site appears, you are being indexed. The better way to confirm this would be to get set up on Google Search Console.
From there, you can begin the true SEO process: optimize the current content, make sure everything is properly tagged, research some keywords you want to rank for, expand and create content, etc. If you stay consistent and follow the appropriate steps, you should see your rankings increase along with your organic traffic (search engine traffic).
Of course, ranking and search engine traffic don’t mean a lot if your website’s messaging doesn’t connect with your visitors and lead them on distinct pathways. Does your brand have a distinct voice? Does your website tell a story about your customers’ problems and how you’re uniquely positioned to fix them?
If not, we can help with that. Contact us today for a free consultation. Together, we can create a distinct, effective brand voice that will change the way you communicate with your audience and help you help more people.
