An interesting article on how much a good Google placing is worth to companies (from 2005 but still relevant today):
http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/2005/02/66485
"Although my hunch was that the results would show benefit to cracking Google's top 30, I didn't realize just by how much. In fact, it is extraordinary. Oneupweb found that the first month a site appeared on the second or third page of Google results, traffic increased five times from the previous month, and in the second month, traffic was nine times greater. The number of unique visitors tripled when a company moved up from page two to page one, and in the second month doubled again to more than six times the traffic it received before it broke the top 10. More importantly, Oneupweb discovered a correlating impact on sales: 42 percent more the first month, and nearly double the second month."
The figures speak for themselves.
If you, as some companies do, choose not to focus on Google ratings, feeling that you should focus on your tried and tested methods of marketing and word-of-mouth PR but then you're not maximising the investment in your Website.
I suspect that if you go back to your original objectives for having a Website, "increased sales" was somewhere near the top of the list. If you didn't achieve that then your Website isn't working for you and you have to take a step back and see how you can fix it.
Gregor Spowart is a partner in Mass Media Design, a website design and Internet Marketing company based in Reading (Berkshire), Swindon (Wiltshire) and Cardiff. Gregor is an SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) specialist.
Print | posted on Friday, April 11, 2008 12:53 PM