This article may be aimed at small business owners looking to gain an understanding of SEO but if you are however an SEO or digital marketing consultant who has just clicked through to this article because the title has aroused your curiosity, you are probably wondering something like – What the hell is this guy talking about?
I get this all the time as I am not your average SEO expert who is so bogged down in the technical and data stuff, who talks to his clients in a language that might as well be Mongolian. Over the past 16 years, I have worked on thousands of websites, from a small local hotel to major National brands you see advertised on TV every day. I have had a damn good success rate as well for securing top rankings and helping my clients to drive new business. My ability to stand out from the crowd and secure results has been contributed to one key ingredient – logical thinking!
So all I have to do is to think logically to secure a top ranking
No. Obviously, a lot of aspects of SEO are very technical and should only be performed by someone who knows exactly what they are doing. What I am saying is, logical thinking is what I use in every step of an SEO strategy to gain a competitive edge over my clients’ competition as I know that their SEO consultants are putting technical before logic.
I will very briefly explain the two main ranking factors
Firstly, the two main factors in securing a high ranking on Google are:
Content
Links
There are many more things to consider but these are the two main ones. In a simplified nutshell, the content on your website must be top quality so it satisfies the users intent and provides a fantastic user experience plus the third party pages that link to a page on your website must be related and also be of a certain standard.
Thinking logically about content – On-page
We already know that quality content is the No.1 ranking factor so in order for me to explain how logical thinking comes into play, I am going to use an example of a company who sells ink cartridges to a National audience through their eCommerce website. I do like a challenge.
Now thinking logically, if I was looking to replace the ink in my printer, I would not search Google for the term ‘printer ink’. In a logical world, I would search for the specific ink cartridge related to my printer. In my case, it would be a term like ‘ink for Epson XP 235’, which is one of my printers.
Even though the term ‘printer ink’ receives a UK average monthly search volume of 15,000, it is just not a targeted ‘money’ keyword but I know that around 200 searches per month are performed for the term ‘ink for Epson XP 235’ and people who search this term are ready to buy and just looking for a supplier to buy it from.
Now the first step in making sure your page relating to ‘ink for Epson XP 235’ ranks higher than the pages already ranking on the first page for this term is to ensure the quality of your page is far superior to theirs. It’s not rocket science, it is just logical thinking.
A little experiment
If you are struggling to secure that all-important ranking, go ahead and search your main targeted money keyword into Google and compare the top ten ranking pages against yours. Now ask yourself:
Is my page a lot better than any already ranking?
Does it load faster than theirs?
Has the content been written to satisfy the user intent?
Do the other sites have reviews (trust aspect) but mine doesn’t?
Google will rank websites that provide the highest quality and the best user experience so again, logically thinking, you can be pretty sure that the sites already ranking at the top are considered as quality by Google. It is your job to just make sure your page blows all of them out of the water.
Thinking logically about links – Off-page
Getting other websites to link to yours is something that most SEO consultants struggle to do, so they just don’t do it or they simply buy links which is something Google have a zero tolerance on and should never be done as it could do more damage to the future success of your business than good. If it does have a positive effect, it will only be a short term gain.
I have a very simple logical rule when securing links. I think to myself:
“Would securing a link on this website drive real targeted visitors to my clients’ site, increase their brand awareness or even generate new business?”
If the answer is yes, I want that link. If it is no, then it is probably not worth it. You need to have a reason to why the third party site owner would and has linked to your site. If it doesn’t sound logical to you, it certainly isn’t going to sound logical to Google.
Logical thinking MUST always play a big part in the link building process as that is what stops you from receiving a manual spam penalty from Google.
It’s not just about content and links
Every single ranking factor and every single SEO technique should include logical thinking at the forefront as this will probably not only secure you against receiving a manual penalty from Google but give you that little bit extra over your competition.
If I have made you think or if you think I am talking garbage, it would be great to hear your views. Just post your comments or questions below and we can chat about it.
