This was a workshop delivered by Fourth Day PR to give a basic overview of SEO for a group of independent businesses in Stockport. This idea was for them to understand the basics of how to get their own websites appearing in search engines for relevant searches.

1. SEO basics workshop for a group of small
independent businesses

2. Intro: what is SEO?
Search engine optimisation is the process of
having your website found by relevant searches in
search engines.
Ensuring potential customers can find your
business online
Getting conversions and ROI from your website.
Not just focussed on just getting to number one on
Google and getting irrelevant traffic.

3. Background: research
Before you get started, do a little research.
How do people find your website?
What words or phrases do they search for to find
services/ products like yours?
Remember: it may not be what you assume they
search for.
Tools:Google’s keyword planner is now in Adwords, so
you must set up an account to access this.

4. Background: competitor research
It’s very useful to see how your competitors are
ranking and what activity they are doing.
Search for your/ their key words and key terms and
see where they rank in various search engines.
Have a look at their meta data to find out which key
words/ phrases they want to rank for.
Find out which social media channels they use and
do they have an active blog?
What backlinks do they have? (to be explained
later!)

5. Background: set some objectives
Like any project, you need to set objectives and keep
track of your processes in order to analyse your
progress.
SEO work is not a set process and varies from site to
site. It is a good idea to track what you do and how it
affects your rankings.
Initially, decide on just a few keywords to rank for and
see how you go.

6. On-site work: meta data
Meta data sits in the back end of your website and it
tells search engines what you do and who you are.
This is one of the most important things to get right
because it has to match up to all the other pieces of
information that you provide for search engines as
well as your on-page copy.

7. On-site work: meta data
Click view >> developer >> view source (in Chrome)

8. On-site work: meta data
Here is a close-up of our meta-data

9. On-site work: meta data
Meta tag: Who you are and what you do in 66 characters
Description tag: A well-written sentence encapsulating who
you are and what you do in 160 characters
Keywords tag: List of main keywords. It is agreed that
Google no longer uses these. However you can put these in if
you like.
NB. Characters includes blank spaces as well as letters.

10. On-site work: on-page copy
On-page copy is the text on your web pages.
This is read by search engines BUT also what your
customers read.
So it must be well-written, clear and informative.
Put your keywords and phrases near the top of the text.
This should happen naturally anyway.
If a search engine can’t understand what you do then
your customers won’t either!

11. On-site work: optimise images
Search engines cannot see photos so use metadata to tell them what the image is of
Make sure all images uploaded to the website are
labelled correctly with meta data filled in.
Eg. Fourth Day PR logo file:
WRONG: Image_1005_2013_10_15.png
RIGHT: Fourth_Day_PR_agency.png

12. Off-site work: Google/ Bing
Tell them your website exists!
Submit your URL to:
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/submiturl?hl=en_uk&pli=1
http://www.bing.com/toolbox/submit-site-url

13. Off-site work: Webmaster tools
Enables you to register your website with the
search engine
Submit a site map to search engine to help it
crawl your content
It will tell you if they find any errors:
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home
?hl=en
http://www.bing.com/toolbox/webmaster

14. Off-site work: Google Maps/ Places
Make sure you have an entry on Google Maps – now
called Google Places for Business.
This is useful for both customers and search engines
to authenticate and locate your business.
Submit a new entry:
http://www.google.co.uk/business/placesforbusiness/
Validate your entry by requesting a postcard or a
phone call.
Fill out all data fields including key words/ phrases
and add all contact details and website.

15. Off-site work: Google+ business page
Now with your Google map entry, you will
automatically get a Google+ page.
Google+ is a social media network and it is
widely believed to have influencing factors for
SEO (not surprising as it’s owned by Google!).
You can add people to your ‘circles’ and post
links, messages, images and other information
via your page.

16. Link-building
Inbound links/ backlinks are links to your website
or web pages from another website.
You may have heard of dodgy link building but
what is it?
Search engines, Google in particular, historically
gave preference to websites with the most links.
This led to various practices for creating inbound
links, such as link farms.
These have now been penalised in recent updates.

17. Link-building
So how do I know what to avoid now?
Easy! Search is all about creating the best user
experience.
Don’t link from a website that looks like a spammy
website, that isn’t genuine or that you wouldn’t
happily show your customers.
You should focus on getting quality links with
relevant and useful information.

18. Link-building
Find out what backlinks you have already OR see
what backlinks your competitors have.
www.opensiteexplorer.org
You can see a small amount of information with
this tool without having to pay.

19. Link-building: directories
Directories are a good way to create inbound links, but also have
extra value as customers may search them.
BOTW.org.uk (£)
Yell.com
Dir.yahoo.com (£)
Yelp.co.uk
Fourheatons.co.uk
Thomsonlocal.com
Every industry has its own directories, trade bodies and
associations, which you can list your business and website on.

20. Link-building: directories
Make sure copy is well-written and includes all key
information and your key phrases.
Ensure key phrases are written naturally into the
copy so it reads well for consumers.
If there’s an option to upload a photo/ logo then do
it.
Fill out all fields/ complete the listing.
Don’t forget to amend it if you change location,
branding etc.

21. Link-building: content outreach
Content outreach is the process of trying to build a
relationship with another blog, website or publication
so they will publish content about you and include a
link.
This is a big part of what we do in PR. We write
thought-leadership articles and guest blog posts on
behalf of our clients and place them within relevant
magazines. We also try to negotiate inbound links.

22. Content creation
Search is all about creating good content and a
good user experience.
But what does this mean?
Businesses that create content online have a
chance to prove they are experts in their field.
If they are actively doing this, it’s a good indicator
to a search engine to rank them higher than
competitors.
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23. Content creation
What type of content can I create?
Blog posts: news, how-to guides, industry
comment
Infographics: facts and figures brought to life
Videos: interviews, clips of trade shows, stopmotion
Podcasts: mini-radio shows
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24. Social media
Why is this important?
Communication tool direct to your customers
Raising brand awareness and brand messages
Social media use and shares are a signal to search
engines that your business is active and
trustworthy.
Contributes to your link-building, reputationbuilding and authority-building processes.

25. Social media tips
Find the channels that are most relevant / used by your
audience.
Fill out profiles with all details, key phrases and links to your
website.
Choose one or two channels and do them well – rather than
trying to do everything and doing it badly.
Make sure your strategy and objectives link back to brand
messages and marketing strategy.
They are not sales channels, so messages have to be subtle.
Provide interesting content to your followers – from your own
blog as well as third party content.

26. Conclusions
SEO should be part of your wider communications and
marketing plans. Make sure all messages are aligned across
any marketing channel, both offline and online.
Strive to be the best in your industry and let that show in your
online activity.
See search engines as a major customer. They want to know
that your business is trustworthy, genuine and an authority in
your industry.
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27. ANY QUESTIONS?
For more information please contact:
Nikki Scrivener / Carolyn Hughes
nikki@fourthday.co.uk/
carolyn@fourthday.co.uk
020 7403 4411
www.fourthday.co.uk
Want to find out more?
Book us for a one-to-one session!
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