If you've ever done any kind of research regarding online marketing techniques, you've come across the term "SEO". SEO stands for search engine optimization, and simply put, it helps position your website so that you can easily be found online when people are searching for local optometrists. Knowing the details of SEO, and how it affects your position online is a complicated process. In fact, larger companies have hired professionals who solely handle their SEO marketing. We understand that hiring someone to take care of SEO is not an option for many independent practices, so today we want to discuss the basics, and give you some tips for how you can begin to improve your standing online.

How Does SEO Affect My Eyecare Practice Marketing?

The purpose of SEO is to communicate to search engines what your website's intentions are so they can recommend your website for relevant searches. Optimizing your website correctly is so important in getting found online. The more optimized your webpage is, the more likely your practice will be found when a patient searches for an eyecare practice in your town. SEO has the goal of creating a seamless user experience online. Search engines have the same goals as your practice - to provide what the customer needs - so it is important to work with, not against search engines.

What do Search Engines Want from Me?

Search engines work to define what your website's pupose is. Here is what they look at:

• Content: The theme of your website. This includes all the text and titles on your page as well as the descriptions given.
• Performance: How fast and well your website works.
• Authority: Is your content good enough for other sites to link to? Do authoritative sites reference or link to your site?
• User Experience: How does your website look? Is it easy to navigate? Does it look safe?

What Should I Avoid When Trying to Improve My SEO?

• Don't overuse keywords on your page. Search engines can tell if you are stuffing your page with keywords just for the sake of having keywords.
• Don't waste money purchasing links.
• Avoid having a website with poor user experience.

What Can I Do to Improve My SEO Standing?

• Utilize Social Media: Your social media pages influence your website's SEO so try to naturally use keywords on your platforms if you can.
• Pay Attention to Your Meta Descriptions: Meta descriptions are HTML attributes that provide explanations of the content of a web page. These descriptions help search engines determine the type of content on your site, they also appear as the preview for your page on the search engine result page.
• Monitor Your Standing: Tools like the Google Toolbar monitor your postition online. Utilize these tools to track what tactics help improve your SEO, and which ones have little or no effect. 
• Use Keywords Appropriately: It's important to include keywords in your title, content, URLs, and image names. However, don't over-do it. Choose a set of specific and relevant keywords for your practice to focus on for the best results.
• Link Back to Yourself: Throughout the pages of your website, link back to other pages. You can also use social media to link to your homepage.
• Include a Site Map on Your Website: A site map is a page that lists and links to all other pages on your website.
• Add ALT Tags to All of Your Image Descriptions: ALT tags are the text alternatives for the images on your webiste. If the image is unable to load, the ALT tag appears. The tag also describes to search engines what the image is. Search engines can't always accurately tell what is in an image without an ALT tag, so make sure you inlude them.
• Regularly Update Your Content
• Link to Other Websites and Ask Them to Link to You

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