Search Engine Optimisation

Get your website seen

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation – it refers to the process of maximising a website’s traffic from organic search results.

Our approach to SEO

We approach SEO like we do the rest of our services. We’re open and transparent. We communciate and keep you in the loop. And we don’t hide behind technical jargon and smoke and mirrors when it comes to what we will be doing to help get your site ranked by search engines.

Transparency

Spending on SEO can be daunting as positive results usually won’t yield for several months. With this in mind, we’ll always do our best to provide as much transparency as possible, to reassure you that progress is being made.

Results

We are always going after legitimate, tangible results – we have no interest in misleading our clients by padding out our stats to make ourselves look better in the short term. We want our clients to achieve real success.

Value

We’re striving for the highest possible value for our clients. This means giving you the most bang for your buck. There’s a million possible tasks on the SEO list, we will go after the low-hanging fruit.

We keep SEO simple.

At Pixel Palace we offer custom SEO packages based on your existing website and your specific SEO objectives and business goals. This means we can work to your budget monthly – with no fixed contract terms.
But first – let’s start with explaining the basics of SEO.

Search Engine Optimisation

Why is SEO important?

People use Google search. A lot. There are 40,000 Google searches happening every second! That’s 3.5 billion searches per day. Like it or not, in 2018 most people are using Google to find what they’re looking for. Wouldn’t it be great if your business could get some of that traffic? After all, more traffic equals more enquiries, sales and revenue for your business, right?

Well, it’s not quite that simple.

Here’s the catch: less than 10% of searchers look past the first page of Google search results. Appearing on the thirteenth page of search results is easy, but getting to the first page is difficult, as it’s extremely competitive. The first page is where all the eyeballs are. If it wasn’t already hard enough, consider the following: Google are very protective of their ranking algorithm and keep it mostly under wraps. This means there’s no official documentation dictating what will improve your site’s ranking.

The good news is there are SEO professionals (like us!) who specialise in getting our clients to the first page, using a variety of best practices and tools.

SEO is always evolving

The truth is, SEO isn’t rocket science. Google is smart. In 2020, Google is getting really good at rewarding ‘good’ content and punishing folks who try to game the system. But what exactly makes content ‘good’ in Google’s eyes? It’s an excellent question, and one that has plagued SEO professionals for decades as the answer often changes. 15 years ago the best way to rank for the search term ‘Brisbane dentist’ was to literally put the words ‘Brisbane dentist’ as many times as possible on your website. This made for some pretty terrible user experience. Imagine trying to read through a website when every third word is either ‘Brisbane’ or ‘Dentist’! Nowadays, this practice (known as ‘keyword stuffing’) is considered ‘black hat’ and Google will penalise it.

In 2020, The Googs has much more sophisticated ways rank pages. It’s all about user experience. Google now rewards (ranks more highly) pages that users interact with, and stay on for longer periods of time. Useful pages that provide users with exactly the content they’re looking for are also rewarded. Are users bouncing right off your site because it’s ugly and unprofessional? Are they hitting that back button when they can’t find anything of value on your site? This will be hurting your rankings.

The lines between user experience and SEO continue to blur.

Nowadays, your content needs to be relevant and valuable, as well as well-optimised, to rank. In a nutshell, this means if you want people to look at your stuff, your stuff has to be worth looking at. Throwing up a low-effort blog post with 300 unedited words about pies will probably not help your bakery reach page one.

The battle for the top three spots is no longer won by keyword stuffing – it’s by doing your research to create the most relevant, high-quality content possible. This is where we come in. At Pixel Palace, we have a strong focus on design quality, user experience and engaging content. As long as your technical is up to scratch, we believe your focus should be to create the best and most-relevant content to improve your search rankings. In 2020, if people like using your website, then Google will too!

Write for humans, not robots.

So here’s our SEO Process

Firstly, we’ll conduct a full-site audit to see exactly where you’re at. Then we’ll craft your SEO strategy. This is where we figure out exactly how to get the most advantageous traffic for your business to your website.

Now that we have a plan, it’s time to get started!

1. Technical SEO

We’ll perform a full health checkup on your site, and make sure your code is set up optimally. This includes things like optimising url structure, boosting the page speed, installing essential SEO tools, and fixing any other technical errors that may be present in your site. Note: If we built your website you’ll have a big head start here.

2. Content

Once your code is sorted, we’ll look at fully optimising key pages in accordance with your SEO strategy. We go after the low hanging fruit first, to give you the most bang for your buck. Moving forward, we perform ongoing keyword research and monitor the performance of your existing content in order to provide content recommendations, insights and feedback based on what your audience is engaging with.

3. Experience

Now that your technical is polished and your pages are optimised, it’s time to improve your website’s user experience. We’ll dig into your data with our UX specialists to execute small, data-driven tweaks that will make the biggest impact. We’ve seen conversion rates improve by huge amounts, just by changing one word in a title or the colour of a button.

Tips when getting started with SEO

Be patient

Don’t expect anything to happen overnight. Be prepared to stay with a company for a long period of time. At least 6 months and ideally a couple of years. If you’re changing SEO company every four months it will be impossible to tell who’s responsible for the results.

Understand your competition and pick your battles

You won’t beat Nike with a $1500 budget. That is to say, don’t bring your old Camry to Bathurst and expect to win first place. Start small, with low competition keywords, and build gradually before taking on the big dogs.

Don’t be afraid to ask what’s being done

Your SEO company should be able to tell you exactly where your money is going, and why those tasks are valuable. It might all sound rather confusing, but a quick Google or forum post asking for advice is a good way tell you if you’re being bamboozled.

Be proactive & invested in the outcome

You’ll get much better results if you (as the client) are proactive in the process of SEO and in particular content creation and link building. You’ll get much better results if you’re engaged with the SEO company and their process and working with them to acheive search engine success.

Finding an SEO expert in Brisbane

Always be on your toes when looking for an SEO expert! The industry is rife with unreliable companies, who will take shortcuts using black-hat (read: dodgy) techniques to get you fast results. They’ll take your money, then vanish long before Google finds out and blacklists your website.

The bottom line: SEO is always a slow grind – if a company promises anything otherwise, there’s probably something unethical (or illegal) going on.