Search engine optimization is more commonly known as its acronym SEO. Optimization is the basis of all SEO practices. Once your brand’s presence (website, content and social media platforms) is optimized across the internet, you increase its online visibility. Your website will find its way to the first page of the search engine results pages (SERPs). Your online customers will find your business much quicker too.

There are subtle differences between the various search engines. However, you can usually focus on Google in your SEO strategy, since most of your target market will make use of this leading search engine. Also, the majority of organic traffic is from Google.

This is entirely dependent on your goals and the search campaign tactics you employ. Most SEO experts will estimate four to six months before you begin to see results. Bear in mind this is when you begin to see the results not when you achieve your identified goals.

SEO is a multifaceted practice that requires many different actions to be taken on a website for it to be optimized for search. Many people correlate SEO with high-quality content as search algorithms have highlighted content as an important ranking factor. Algorithms are looking for content that answers the users’ search intent. If your content speaks directly to your audience, your website will be served up to users by Google. But content alone isn’t good SEO practice. You need links from authoritative external sites pointing to your site in the form of a backlink and these external sites need to have a good domain authority score.

Also, best practice entails full blown on-page optimization which means optimizing your meta content, images and tags. And then, consider the technical aspect of SEO – does your website have great architecture? How’s the User Experience (UX)? Is it easily navigable? And have you made sure to link your pages internally?