Have you been optimizing your website for search engines? Are you using social media sites like Facebook and Twitter to connect and engage with people?
Great. How that going?
Your search rankings are up? Nice.
The number of people who “Like” your Facebook page is up 40% this year? Cool.
Website traffic is up 20% year over year? Good.
Now let me ask you…
Are those your goals?
Did you really start optimizing your site just so you can see it on the first page of the search results? Are you really doing Facebook just to see how many people you can get to “link” you? Did you create that website to see how many visitors you can get?
No, no, and no. Right?
Keep your eye on the prize
It’s good to track SEO, social media, and traffic metrics, but don’t be deceived into thinking just because those numbers are up your SEO and social media are working. Remember, SEO and social media are means to an end.
Search marketing pro (and my bro), Kurt Steinbrueck, kicked off a new DIY SEO blog series by making this very point in the first post, DIY SEO #1: Planning Your Objectives:
We don’t do SEO because we want to have an optimized website (gosh I hope not). We don’t do SEO because we want high rankings. We don’t even do SEO because we want lots of visitors. We do SEO because we want more (insert your ultimate objectives here) and we believe that doing SEO will lead to high rankings which will cause us to get more visitors which will ultimately result our objectives being met.
This is also the driving force behind my Let’s Figure out the Value / ROI (Return-on-Investment) of Social Media post earlier this week.
What are the ultimate objectives of your organization?
To what extent are SEO, social media, and your website helping you reach those objectives?
If you don’t know, how are you going to figure that out?
Co-founder & CEO, OurChurch.Com
Paul has been the CEO of OurChurch.Com since its founding in 1996, combining his passion for faith and technology to lead the organization.
An accomplished writer, Paul has authored over 2,000 articles on faith and technology, featured on platforms like ChurchLeaders.com, The JoyFM, and his personal blog, LiveIntentionally.org.
Beyond his professional achievements, Paul serves as an elder at Journey Community Church and is deeply engaged in his community through his involvement with the Florida Sheriffs Youth Ranch and the Safety Harbor Chamber of Commerce. He is a contributing author of the book Outspoken! Conversations on Church Communication.
4 Comments
Great questions! Is it about the numbers or is it about the witness? Something to chew on. I know what my goals are but am I staying focused on those goals are letting the numbers rule?
Blessings,
Mel
Please feel free to stop by: Trailing After God
Based from my research social media is effective in ranking your keywords. Mel : yeah I also agree with you.
That is so true. We may get lots of visitors, but will they be targeted ones? At the company where I work our target is to get sales, not visitors. Which is harder. So we do SEO, social media and CRO (conversion rate optimization – we analyze which keywords bring more conversions and optimize websites for them). It works pretty good, but only when you do a combination of all.
Alex
and about google+ ?