SEO & Small Business Coronavirus Survival

It’s been a tough year so far, especially for small businesses, suffering from the fallout from the Coronavirus pandemic. The effects of which have devastated most industries in the UK, with business closures, staff layoffs and considerable reductions in spending. In this article we look at Small Business Coronavirus Survival through SEO and online marketing.

Online Shopping – The Exception

As lockdown began in the UK, more and more people turned to online shopping as a means of getting their products while remaining at home. At the height of lockdown, online sales in the UK were growing approximately 129% week-on-week.

The lockdown forced may UK businesses to re-evaluate how they do business, with many having to adapt and move over to an e-commerce solution to keep the sales coming in. Businesses already trading online with an established website had a clear advantage, but others who perhaps have always traded from a ‘brick and mortar’ shop location only, were not prepared. This meant having to put a new solution in place quickly, to harness the rapidly increasing online shopping trend.

For many, moving online or developing a contactless strategy to offer their products or services has been necessary for small business Coronavirus survival in their industry.

Growing an Online Presence

Although the lockdown has been eased considerably in the UK recently, we are a long way from how we were at the beginning of the year. The public are cautious in shopping at high street stores, and rightly so. Online shopping is still the preferred option for many, and sadly due to cut-backs and redundancies at businesses across the country, spending is lower than it’s been in a long time.

Sales online however, are steadily increasing and small UK businesses are looking for ways to replace lost custom or grow their business further, whilst remaining on a tight budget.

One of the best ways to do this, in our opinion, is to put your business in front of people who are already looking for your product or service.

When people want a product or service in 2020, they head for the internet, usually Google. Google handles approximately 80% of searches in the UK. When people search on a Google, 75% of the time they click a page one result.

That’s where your business needs to be!

Small Business Search Engine Optimisation

Now, we’re not talking about paid adverts (marked as ads at the top and bottom of Google pages), we’re talking about organic search results. These are crawled, indexed, served and ranked by Google based on many factors including relevance and authority.

What is Search Engine Optimisation or SEO?

SEO is the process of refining a website to better rank on Google and other major search engines. Through research, analysis and changes to a website, it can be optimised to achieve better rankings within the organic results on Google.

In 2020, business owners turn to social media advertising to run paid adverts. Social media is hugely popular and has a massive audience. But remember, however relevant your advert may be to their interests or previous browsing history, they aren’t there to look for your product or service. Using Facebook as an example, they know their audience want to see posts from their friends and family as a priority.

When a person submits a search in Google, they are already actively looking to use your product or service. So it makes sense to be there on page one when they do.

An Affordable SEO Solution

Having spoken with many business owners struggling with sales due to the Coronavirus pandemic, we know the challenges small businesses are facing. Small Business Coronavirus Survival is a big issue, and we want to help.

We believe getting your business ranking high on search engines, should be affordable without paying the rates that large digital marketing companies are asking.

Helping small businesses is what we do, and with small business SEO packages from £79 per month, we can help you grow online.

Conclusion

While running a small business in 2020 has been extremely challenging, and will continue to be challenging, there are solutions to drive sales to your business.

The internet and online shopping is going nowhere, and where better to have your business than where people are actively searching for it.

Get in touch to see how we can help your business thrive online.