SEO or Search Engine Optimization should be a main component of all online business marketing plans. Every day people ask me the same question time and time again regarding the importance of SEO nowadays.

Actually, it is perhaps more significant now than ever, so my answer is: yes! Don’t just agree with me but have a look at these figures.

The Use of Search Engines

As per eMarketer.com, 81% internet users around the world use search engines to seek for information as reported by TNS Global. Simply put considering approximately 230 million internet users are in the US, then 186 million people use search engines to look for products and information

Let me give you an example: Let’s create a hypothetical company by the name of Health Shoes Inc. and see how SEO affects them and if it is worth the investment. In order to determine the potential market for Health Shoes, they have conducted a research and found out roughly 5.6 million consumers use the internet. Now it is safe to assume that 3.76 million of Health Shoes potential and current clients in a given year will use the internet to perform a search.

Should Sport Shoes disregard search engine optimization as unimportant in their online marketing plan, then there would probably be 3.76 million prospective clients who will never know what Health Shoes has to offer.

Let me give you some more facts to make my point.

Position Matters

More than 89% of the clicks arise from the search results’ first page while less than 10% clicks happen on the second page as determined by researchers, even though search engines necessarily do not reveal click percentages on the basis of position. It goes to show that under 1% of clicks take place on the second page of any given search result. This fact only proves that if you can’t be found within the search results’ first two pages, then this simply means a thousand of missed opportunities.

Let’s try to consider this. More than 42% of the clicks take place at the very first position of search results. Clicks drop to below 12% at the second spot and that already gives you traffic that is three and half times less. 8.5% for the third spot, 6% for the fourth spot, and down to 2.99% for the tenth position which is 14 times less already compared to the first spot.

Now this means, for example, according to Google Adwords that a targeted term like “kids playhouses” gives you roughly 22,200 searches a month. So if you have your site appearing on the first spot when this term is searched, then you could garner just about 9,300 clicks for your site each month.

What To Do Now

The answer to our question originally regarding the importance of SEO to a profitable online marketing campaign is an absolute yes. If you don’t optimize your site with terms that potential customers search for, it greatly diminishes the chances of your site being found by customers when they perform a search for products and services that you have to offer yet all because your site can’t be found.

Basically it’s like making a great brick and mortar store complete with everything out in the middle of nowhere. Only luck will play its part if anyone would chance upon finding you.

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