Investing in a Website During Economic Crisis

NICOSIA, Cyprus - Oct. 8, 2013 - PRLog -- Since 2008's Global Financial Crisis, the economy in most of the developed world has been unstable. Especially in Europe, with a slowdown in growth and general business activity - recession in many countries - increasing unemployment and in turn dampened consumer and business confidence and purchasing power.

This has been most significant in what they call the peripheral countries, such as Spain, Italy, Greece, Portugal, and Cyprus.

When business is slowing, companies are then forced to downsize and cut back on expenses. Sure, this saves some money in the short term, and hopefully until the economy kick-starts again. However, when business is slow, wouldn't you rather find new ways to stimulate new activity?

It is also true that whilst developed economies have slowed down, emerging markets are growing, namely BRICS nations - Brazil, Russia (as well as CIS countries and Eastern Europe), India, China, South Africa, as well as many other countries following close by are sustaining most global economic activity. So there is still vast potential here. Plus of course some sectors in developed economies are still performing well.

How a website can actually increase business activity during the economic crisis

Enter the Internet. We all know how it has significantly changed our lives and changed the way we do business. Think of how many people and businesses are now searching online to find something. This is only going to continue and grow. In emerging countries, Internet connectivity and usage is growing by the day. So naturally, more and more will be online to conduct business or to search for things to buy.

But a business must not only have a website that is nice and functional, but it must also have very good "online presence" and what we call "search engine optimisation" or SEO. In other words, when someone searches for the products or services you provide in search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo or other search engines, your website must appear somewhere in the top pages. Ideally in the first page.

Think about it. What's the point of having a website if no one can search and find it online?

What is search engine optimisation (SEO) and why is important?

Everyone is now talking about "online presence" and what we call "search engine optimisation" or SEO. In Cyprus, this is a relatively new thing, but it has been around for a while now. Think of it like a massive directory of the internet. And one that everyone is using to find products and services, or for general research and browsing.

To keep it simple, search engine optimisation (SEO) is optimising or developing your website in a way that makes it easier for search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo to find it. Technically speaking, search engine's spiders (the technology and algorithms they use) crawl (search) a website and then rank it according to relevance.

Now, these search engines are very advanced companies. Everyone knows Google, Yahoo and Bing (owned by Microsoft) and how big they are - other countries such as Russia, China and India also have their own major search engines. They all offer a specific service. This service to filter all the millions and millions of websites in the world and provide you with the most relevant results. Otherwise no one would use them.

So, they create certain criteria and specifications to determine which websites are most relevant to the searching process. The more a website meets these certain criteria and specifications, the more likely the website will rank highly.
Essentially, this is what we at Web-Conceptions specialises in. To create a nice-looking, creative and functional website that has top-rate online presence and ranks well in search engines - search engine optimisation.

And here is the secret to our success: We write all the content, and write it in a way that achieves excellent search engine optimisation.

See, search engine optimisation is a combination of technical web development/programming and content writing/marketing. This is what we are at Web-Conceptions. A combination team of these two fundamental elements.

Content, key words and phrases and how to rank in the top page of search engines

Again, another new notion that everyone is talking about; that this is the secret to search engine optimisation.

Consider this: there is no point to rank in the top page of search engines with only your company name. If your company's name is Thraki and you deal in construction and property development, how would a Chinese business person know this? They have never heard of the company name Thraki, and especially that it deals in construction and property development. Thus, when they jump online and go to a search engine to search for the services of construction and property development in Cyprus, what will they search? Well, more than likely it will be "construction and property development".

You see, your website must be "optimised" to rank well with these very key words: construction, property development, and Cyprus, among other. And not Thraki. So what you really must do is the following:

- Make sure you analyse your business sector and its key feeder markets, as well as potential emerging markets and determine what are the primary key words and phrases they are searching in search engines to find websites with products and services such as yours. Although there would be some obvious key words and phrases, each market has indeed a slightly different approach to searching. For example, in Cyprus what do you think is the number one key word for when people search for a psychologists or therapists? Well, it's actually "depression".

- Make sure your website's content meets the requirements to these above search key words and phrases. And in great detail. But don't spam your website with meaningless content just to feature these words as many times as possible. Search engines will black-list you and your ranking will suffer. Remember, they are trying to offer the service of the most relevant ranking. If you try to cheat them, then they will automatically penalise you - automatically because their technology does this.

- Make sure your website has the necessary key words, titles and descriptions to match.

- Make sure your website's code is technically well prepared and up to the required standards.

- Make sure you have many links on other relevant websites pointing to your website. The more links you have the easier it is for search engines to find and crawl your website's content. The more these links are on credible/reputable website, the more credit your website gets from search engines and the higher it ranks.

It's actually a simple procedure. Of course it takes a lot of research, dedication and work. To achieve best results, knowledge in website development, business and market research, online marketing-communications, and content copywriting is of course beneficial.

Speak to Web-Conceptions for a no obligation consultation in web development and search engine optimisation.