73
E-BRANDING 8: SEARCH ENGINES
Search engine optimisation (SEO) aims to get your website to appear high up on the front page of Google and other search engine sites. Each search engine has an algorithm, a list of rules it uses to decide who gets promoted and who gets dropped. It’s better for your brand to be towards the top of the list, so it’s good to know what will help you get there. Beware SEO specialists who try to change your brand’s writing style to “optimise” your text. You can still write in an interesting way and use their other skills to boost your search engine rankings.
The idea Search engines’ customers are their users. A search engine must keep its customers happy so they continue to use it, rather than a different one. A search engine’s brand identity is based on its ability to find what you’re looking for. So the job of a search engine algorithm is to find websites they think their users will want hello and put them at the top of the list. If your website is updated regularly, then search engines make the reasonable assumption that they are more interesting than those which never change. So if you have a blog on your website and you add to it each day or every week, or you post your tweets from Twitter straight onto your website, or have customer comments pages so other people or updating your website for you, this will help you get a leg up the search engine ladder.
152 • 100 GREAT BRANDING IDEAS
100 Great Branding Ideas 14dec.indd 152
12/14/11 11:14 AM