The holidays are the biggest time of the year for retail, and are also very busy times for many other types of businesses. For this reason, most businesses want to make sure they’re properly promoting their business during this time of the year. One of the most important things to do to market your business is to consider search engine optimization (SEO) to make sure your business’s website comes up on Google when a potential customer searches. Because the holidays are such an important times for businesses, many people wonder if they can take advantage of holiday-specific searches people perform during this time of the year. We’ve compiled a list of tips to help your business rank for holiday-related searches to drive more traffic to your site and close more sales this holiday season.
Do Keyword Research
If you already have an SEO strategy in place, you’re probably familiar with keyword research. However, we’re not talking about keyword research for your business. To develop a holiday SEO strategy, you’ll need to research holiday keywords. During this time of the year, searches will rise for terms like “Christmas gift ideas” and “winter vacation packages.” It’s important to do your research to know what people are searching for and how competitive each keyword is. Once you’ve found the best keywords, you’ll need to figure out how to relate them to your business. After all, a plumber can’t create a post around “winter vacation packages” without some creativity. However, there is a way for every business to relate their industry to the holiday season with some creativity.
Determine the Worth of Seasonal SEO
If your business is very seasonal; you might do new SEO work constantly. For these businesses, it makes sense to rework your site with holiday-related keywords during the holiday season. However, for most businesses, they’ll want to add holiday keywords as a secondary strategy. For these businesses, the best place to incorporate holiday keywords is through your blog. You can create holiday blog posts that will incorporate these new, seasonal keywords, which will improve your rank for these terms without giving your entire site a rewrite. A full seasonal rework of your SEO can be a daunting task, but adding keywords into your blog will give you similar benefits without the hassle.
Start Early
It’s important to remember that SEO is a slow-moving process. For this reason, it’s important to start your holiday SEO work as early as you can. If you want to rank for a search term the day after Thanksgiving, you’ll need to have that content on your site well before that day. In fact, SEO experts follow the 45-Day Rule, which states that creating content 45 days before the date you want it to rank is ideal for participation in search traffic. Starting a week before your target date will give you about 50% participation, while 45 days before will leave you at 90%. For this reason, it’s important to start your holiday campaigns as early as possible to ensure keyword rank during the holiday season. However, if you haven’t started yet, don’t worry! There’s still plenty of time! You’re certainly not out of the running for search rankings, but you should definitely start today!
Showcase Your Products or Services
One of the first steps of developing your holiday digital marketing strategy is to figure out how to relate your business to the holiday season. However, after that you’ll need to decide which products or services are best to showcase during this time of the year. If you have products that can be part of a gift guide, these are a good option. If you have a winter service that you can emphasize during this time of the year, that’s another good option. You can choose whichever products or services you like, but it’s important to consider which ones can be showcased and most easily related to the holiday season.
Create Holiday Offers
Holiday offers and calls to action are an important part of your holiday digital marketing strategy. These offers have less of an impact on your Google rank, but are essential for conversions. You can also introduce your offer with text, which Google will index, improving your rank. Holiday offers are a great way to add value for your customers. You can create holiday gift guides, a winter vacation planner, or a guide to finding the best place to have a holiday meal. A holiday offer is a great way to give your customers something they want, showing them you care and building trust in your brand. Additionally, these offers can be used to convert leads and close more sales.
ImageWorks, LLC | CT Digital Marketing
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