Best Practices to Generate Traffic With B2B SEO

Hi,
Search engine optimization is able to help almost any business with a web presence gain more views and, when done well, more customers. While optimizing a business-to-business website follows many of the same rules of SEO that other sites follow, there are a few pieces more important to B2B SEO. However, the most critical aspect of any marketing strategy is to be honest with customers and to provide value -- otherwise customers will take their business elsewhere and, in the case of SEO, search engines will penalize you.

B2B SEO Dos and Don'ts

To make the most of your web presence, consider these tips on B2B SEO:

Do know your audience. Your target audience is the biggest difference between B2B websites and other types. Aim your content at the kind of customers you want to attract.

Do create a plan before jumping in to SEO. One suggestion from Harold Davis' Search Engine Optimization for narrowing down your focus is to create an elevator pitch - convey in two or three sentences what you offer, who you offer it to and why it is valuable. Use your pitch to determine which keywords are most important (plus you can draw on the pitch to create meta information).

Do research. Check out your competition for keywords by Googling phrases you use and variations of your phrases. Hire Strategic eMarketing to find alternate ways your target businesses could be searching for what you offer. Surveying your customers and competition is also a valuable activity.

Do leverage your network resources. Using the groups you are already a part of, such as dealer networks or even local networks, can help you get more inbound links.

Do regularly add content. Blogs are a perfect example - just make sure the blog provides value to the reader in some way. The best content does not just rehash other content available online. Add something new to the conversation using your own perspective.
As with any strategy, there are a few tactics you shouldn't use in B2B SEO marketing:

Don't neglect meta tags and descriptions. Here are a few suggestions: Rewrite title tags so the first three words are keywords, use keywords in your alt tags for images and make sure description and abstract tags are informative and enticing.

Don't keyword stuff your content. Keywords are important but don't overdo it or search engines will penalize you. Your keyword phrases should sound natural in your content. For blog posts and articles, keyword density is usually safe at 2 percent.

Don't have full blog posts or articles on the home page. If you do, it may prevent your individual posts from being indexed.

Don't be overly aggressive with your optimization tactics. This mostly entails being honest about your intentions and not tricking users into clicking your link.