Social media and blogs significantly help SEO. A website that looks great but ranks on page two is akin to being exiled to Siberia; anything lower than page two and you might as well advertise your practice on Neptune. So how to you get to and stay on page one of Google?
To keep up your rankings, you need to post a regular blog and then push that same content out to your social media accounts.
What is a blog?
The term “blog” is an amalgamation of two words: web and log. Blog is an unfortunate term because it sounds like a Soviet housing project. Linguistic prejudice aside, I can define a blog as an article written to inform. Think of a regular newspaper column on sports or politics. On the Internet, the columnist would be called a “blogger.” Use your blog to as your personal column in your own publication (your website) to tell people what you do and invite them to come to your office so you can solve their dental problems.
How long is a blog?
Unlike newspaper columns that have rigid length requirements due to space considerations, a blog can be almost any length. However, Google wants blogs to be at least 300 words in length, because Google does not want to reward frequently blogging with higher search engine rankings if a blog is only one sentence long. Some “long form” blogs are thousands of words in length and they can greatly help SEO, but those types of blogs will be discussed at another time. For now, think 300 words.
What does the blog live?
The blog should be visible or at least accessible on your website. It’s a simple matter for your webmaster to install a button that people can click to access your blog. Blog hosting can be handled in many different ways. Many blogs are hosted by WordPress, a service that makes posting very easy. In fact, if you can copy and paste text in Microsoft Word, then you can figure out how to copy your article into WordPress to create a blog.
How does a blog help SEO?
Two ways. First, by posting regularly (once a week or at least several times per month), you continually add new content to your website and that helps SEO. Second, you can push the blog out to your social media accounts, such as Facebook and Twitter. When someone clicks on the headline content on Facebook, for example, the entire blog opens. If everything has been set up properly, the reader is actually now on your website, which of course means one more click. Google gives you credit for lots of clicks because Google thinks your website must be important if it is drawing many visitors.
How do I find the time to write a blog?
Writing a blog can be time consuming. Web developers are continually asking doctors for content, and doctors always say that they do not have time. I have developed a blog and social media creation service. I write all the content for an entire year based on a phone interview with the doctor and staff. When this customized content is “in the bank,” so to speak, it is easy to grab a new ready-to-go blog each week and post it. Problem solved.
If you prefer to write blogs yourself, I will discuss the elements of a good blog and give you tips in my next posting, Part 2.