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Why Search Engine Optimization Never Ends

By Snap Agency June 28, 2017

Marketing never stops. Studies show that when you stop advertising, customer awareness drops almost instantly and continues to decline.

Even the largest companies in the world, with very few competitors, need to keep marketing. It’s the only way to continue to sell product and defend against competitors.

Unfortunately, some people don’t extend that same understanding to SEO. It would be great if you could do SEO for one year and then never touch it again. But you always have to be working to improve your SEO.

More companies move onto the internet every day, and this is only going to make it more competitive. By starting now, you have a huge advantage. However, even if you’ve already worked on your SEO, it’s important to continue.

SEO never stops, at least if you don’t want profit to fall!

Your competitors aren’t standing still

Just as with traditional advertising, your competitors are also working on their SEO. If you stood still for a year or even a couple months, there a good chance they’ll surpass you.

When they are producing content and building links, you need to do the same to stay ahead. If you don’t, they’ll begin to rank for keywords that you aren’t, gaining traffic that you’re missing. But just as importantly, they might rank above you on your existing keywords, reducing your current traffic.

The only way to maintain the current search traffic that you have is to keep working on your SEO.

Links disappear

One thing that many of us forget is that websites go offline every single day. The owners might have gone out of business or decided to stop running their website. That means that all of the links that you had from that site are now gone.

There is some suggestion that lost links still hold some value. However, it’s likely that they won’t retain anywhere near the full amount that they did when they were online. This loss of links means that if you’re not always building links your ranking power will degrade. At a slow rate, admittedly, but it’s still decaying.

There’s always more keywords

Studies suggest that 15% of all daily searches are new searches. Your industry is constantly evolving, and there are always going to be new keywords that you want to rank.

Each of the new pages that you publish to target those new keywords will benefit from SEO. It’s not enough to just build links to your old pages and stay stagnant. You need to be moving to capture new keywords. Otherwise, your competitors will take them instead.

Old products and keywords disappear

Just as there are always new keywords appearing, old keywords will also lose volume. In the early 2000’s if you ranked #1 for the keyword ‘blockbuster coupons,’ you’d be rolling around on a bed of $100 bills.

Now that Blockbuster is almost extinct, that keyword has little value. Products are always becoming extinct, and techniques are becoming redundant. If you’re not trying to rank for new keywords, it’s likely that your traffic will decline.

Take it to the next level

Some keywords are harder to rank for than others. As you continue building links and optimizing your website, you’ll create ‘authority’ in the eyes of Google. This ‘authority’ will help you to rank for more and more competitive keywords.

These more competitive keywords are higher volume and can be valuable. If you don’t keep working on your SEO, you’ll never be able to unlock the ability to rank for these competitive terms. That means that you’re leaving a lot of money on the table.

If you want to continue growing your business and expand into other sectors or locations, you need to build this ‘authority.’ This ‘authority’ is what allows the biggest companies in your industry to dominate the most important keywords and what keeps their market share high.

Secure your position

Even if your competitors are completely stationary, which is unlikely, you want to defend your position. Eventually, you will face an opponent who is fast moving and is looking to compete for your spot in the results pages.

By being preemptive and continuing to work on your SEO, you’re preparing for any competitors. Eventually, you’ll get to the point where it will be difficult for other companies to compete with you on certain keywords.

Conclusion

We want your company to grow just as much as you do. SEO is part of a greater marketing strategy that should never stop. It’s crucial that you don’t just maintain your current traffic, but that you are constantly trying to grow.

The SEO landscape always seems to be shifting and staying ahead of the curve is the only way to ensure that you’re still thriving next year. SEO has made companies across the world millions of dollars and ignoring it has caused the failure of many businesses. Don’t neglect it, keep pushing to improve your rankings and acquire new keywords.