In layman’s terms, Search Engine Optimization, or "SEO", is a system of methods designed to attain a high ranking in search engines and directories via changes to your site content to make it more search engine compatible.

Optimizing your title tags, meta tags and your body text for search engines gives it a much better chance of ranking highly for particular words or phrases that you would expect potential visitors to type in to search engines to find your site.

For example, if you are a Charlotte area landscaper, you should have logical search phrases such as "landscaping", "Charlotte Landscaping", "lawn care Charlotte" and even such terms as "Charlotte landscape design", "Spring yard clean-up" etc. peppered throughout the visible text of you website as well as in your title and meta tags. This way, if someone should type in those phrases in a search engine, your site is more likely to appear higher in the results than your competitors that have not optimized their websites.

The Carolina Web Company has been developing and designing websites full time for nearly 5 years. We admittedly have not always recognized the need for a strong marketing campaign to go along with the websites we design for our clients.

A few years ago, we set out to discover a way to make our clients websites have more of an impact on their bottom line. While we have always had nothing but praise for our professional designs and how we are able to take a clients vision and successfully capture that in their websites, our clients were just not getting the bottom line impact they waned or expected from a new website.

Imagine for a moment that you were to commission The Carolina Web Company to design a full page print brochure highlighting your products and services. Imagine we did just that; arrived at a kick-ass, eye catching design that was well read and really made your products shine. Now imagine you took that beautiful brochure (if we do say so ourselves) and put it in the top, left drawer of your desk. How effective do you think our efforts, and your hard earned money would be sitting there next to your ruler, scissors, and big pink eraser?

Obviously it would not be very effective. This whole scenario is practiced over and over again more often than we would like to think about with websites and the new marketing strategies developing on the internet today. You see, we can design an award winning website, but if no one is going to see it because of the enormity of the internet itself, what good does it do?

That's why Search Engine Optimization is not just a good idea, it is absolutely essential.

We understand the key differences between Search Engine Marketing and traditional print/radio/TV advertising. That difference is that in SE advertising, your competitors set the cost of obtaining the highest rankings in most Search Engines.

Why wasn't your site optimized for search engines when it was first built? Depending on who developed your site and how it was built, you'll find plenty of reasons for this. Many web developers believe it is the site marketer's job to ensure the site is found in search engines and vice versa. Most don't bother submitting your site to the important search engines, assuming you or your marketing department will do it. Or perhaps it wasn't in your original development budget.

Not many web design firms know how or have time to optimize a site successfully, no matter what they tell you. They might feel it is outside their core business, or they might believe it is not part of the design process. Worse, some don't even realize it is necessary!

As a result, your site can be on the internet for a long time without the search engines even knowing about it. Some web development firms don't include even the most basic META tags in your site code when building it. Some of those that do include META tags and optimized text without close consultation with you garner results in the wrong search terms used and an overall poor performance. This is quite typical! Remember that search engine optimization is a relatively new science and requires both client interaction and constant monitoring to be successful.

Most “website design only” firms don't have the knowledge or discipline to get your website ranked high in the search engines and keeps it there. It takes long term vision and constant tweaking to maintain your ranking positions once you've achieved them. In this type of marketing scenario, you are only competing with your competitors. Meaning, If you are ranked say #3 in Google for “handheld widgets” and your competition at rank #4 decides to jump you and get ranked higher than you, all he or she has to do is slightly more “optimization” than you have on your website. So you see, you cannot optimize your website once and be done with it. You must maintain an honest effort to keep your well deserved ranking positions.

Other SEO companies work with, but are not part of your website design team. At The Carolina Website Design Company, we do it all under one roof. From initial design concept and layout of your website, to in-depth keyword analysis and detail oriented copy writing. The Carolina Web Company truly is a full service web solutions provider.

Remember, search engine users generally only explore the first 10 or 20 sites in the search results. If you site isn't in the top 20, you won't be found, it's as simple as that. You should always include search engine optimization in your website budget or your site could be as effective as a billboard at the end of a dead end street. So what are you waiting for? Give us a call today @ (704) 969-0976 to get started!

The Carolina Web Company has developed a winning strategy of careful analysis of our clients companies, in depth reviews with key staff, industry research to develop the most valuable and effective search terms for our clients.

We establish attainable and productive goals and set out to meet those goals as soon as possible. Call today and speak with Frank Cecere to find out more about how Search Engine Optimization can help increase sales.