How long will it take to get my business on the first page of Google?

Most businesses here within Bristol, South West England, and also within Bath, England will undoubtably want their website to appear on the first page of Google.

And this makes perfect business sense, as the benefits of investing in organic SEO and the right marketing agency managing to get the business on the first page of Google are clear.

The most obvious advantages are:

·        Can increase the volume of organic visitors to your site

·        Can help to increase your businesses visibility for a few keywords or for many different keywords

·        Can ultimately help a business to gain more customers

White Hat

However, with that said, there’s one condition that overrides all of this, that is the work must be white hat. That’s to say the work must be of top quality, if its not, and you hire the wrong SEO agency here in Bristol, well, this could mean that the business incurs a penalty.

And a penalty such as an algorithmic or a manual penalty, such as a Google Penguin penalty, well that could mean the business is removed from Google altogether. This is why it is absolutely crucial that you partner with a white hat SEO agency.

This is so when Google indexes the work (Googlebot), the work should be white hat. If are unsure what white hat means, then you should read Googles Webmaster Guidelines.

 

So, first things first, tell me a bit more about the advantages of investing in organic SEO

The advantages of investing in organic seo are that once your business gets ranked on the first page more people will see your business, so the volume of calls or sales could increase.

That bit is the easy bit that everyone can understand. Yet, what a lot of business owners find it a lot harder to work out is how the organic seo process actually works.

And we don’t mean the complicated seo stuff, like building backlinks.

What we mean is some businesses still struggle to work out how SEO the process works in terms of how long it takes and how much investment is needed.

So, often various businesses will ask us questions like, so how long does the SEO process actually take?

And, this is another very common question businesses do ask us, is once they reach the first page of Google, can they stop paying?

Well, we think that these questions require a rather detailed answer, in order to answer them correctly. So, here’s our best go at answering these questions:

 

Yet before that, if you haven’t got the time to read the whole article, here’s everything in a nutshell, well bullet points actually:

·        Organic seo often takes a great deal of time to see results

·        This is due to the fact that your business must beat your competitor’s standard of seo

·        If your direct competitors have been investing for many years, then it will often take a long period of time for a new business to catch-up and to overtake your direct competitors

How long does it take for a business to get onto the first page of Google?

Here’s what it often boils down to, and that is the level of competition that your business faces.

If you have hardly any competitors at all, well the seo process is going to be an absolute piece of cake.

Yet, with that said which businesses these days do not face stiff competition?

Exactly, most businesses do, and that’s why SEO is never that easy.

And here’s the thing, you direct competitors may have been investing in SEO for many years before your business starts to invest.

So, to beat your direct competitors, your businesses website has to be better.

Think of the process kind of like building a brick wall, and your business may well be just starting to lay your first bricks.

Yet, when you look over at one of your competitors walls, well it may appear like a giant wall, as they have been building for that long.

Ranking signals

You may have read about “ranking factors”– or as some SEO companies refer to them as “ranking signals”.

In a nutshell, there are over 200 ranking signals, these range in terms of importance from your meta descriptions, right through to the more important seo signals, such as backlinks.

Now Googlebot is what Google uses to spot improvements, or changes that a business makes to its website.

That’s to say if your business adds a new blog post, its Googlebot that will spot this, and then Googlebot will inform its algorithm that your business has made an improvement to your site.

However, with that said, Googlebot is not just monitoring just one signal, such as your businesses meta titles, its monitoring over 200.

Plus, its then comparing these signals with your direct competitors, and then shuffling the order of the results based on which businesses have the strongest SEO.

In an area like Bristol, most businesses face a lot of competition, with that said, these businesses will be up against established competition, that’s to say competition that may have been investing for many years in white hat seo, so this is why organic seo is often a slow process, not one where most businesses can see results in just a few weeks or months.

 

So, what you saying, give up and go home?

Nope. We are not saying that at all, yet all businesses must be realistic with what they can achieve with their marketing budget, as otherwise you could meet the type of seo agency that will tell you that anything is possible, and then takes your money and actually delivers very little.

Or worse, you meet an agency and they say yes that’s possible, then implements low-quality seo, which later means that your website may incur a penalty.

Penalties for those that do not know, can be issued to a website that uses low-quality seo. They can mean that a website drops, that’s in terms of where the business ranks, or the website could be removed altogether.

So, you really do have to partner with an agency that offers quality work, which is commonly referred to as “white hat work”.

Once you partner with the right marketing agency, they should be able to tell you if your marketing goals are realistic with your marketing budget.

 

So, are you saying it can take ages?

Yes, often it does take a long time to implement white hat seo.

So, if you’re a new business, its fair to say that often it will take many months, or even sometimes years to get your business onto the first page.

This all depends on the level of competition that your business faces. Also, it will depend on how good the agency is that you choose, as some are much better than others.

However, it’s also fair to say that organic seo is often a slow process

If the process is rushed, by using low quality seo, then this could mean that the business incurs a penalty.

What do you think is the best way to invest in organic seo?

Choosing the right marketing agency can be mighty hard. So, here’s some helpful pointers when thinking about which agency to choose here in Bristol, or indeed choosing a marketing agency in Bath.

Pick a straight talking seo company

There are so many businesses that simply use too much marketing jargon.

Now, SEO is complicated enough, so you should look for a business that makes the whole process simple to understand.

As whether your website requires backlinks, meta titles and descriptions, or blog posts, your chosen business should be able to explain which work your business needs, and how this will help to improve your seo.

Must be white hat

This is an absolute must!

You need to partner with a white hat agency. There are now so many ways that the algorithms can detect rubbish SEO, and if your business pays for rubbish work, well you could incur a penalty.

So, if you don’t want your business hit by the likes of a Google Panda penalty, then we would strongly recommend that you partner with a white hat marketing agency.

 

Obtain reports

What you don’t want to do is be paying out a lot of money for marketing work, yet not be any the wiser as to how your website is improving.

That’s to say, sometimes some agencies state it will take many months before the company can improve the website to the level that more people start landing on the website.

This may well be true, but even from the very first month that you start paying for seo services, the business that you choose should be sending you an seo report.

This report should detail what the marketing agency has been working on, for example building backlinks, and it should also show you the number of organic visitors that your business has received.

Why not give us a call?

If your business requires help with its SEO, then why not give us a call?