An online marketer with years of experience knows the basics of a good SEO strategy. Your online funeral marketing should include proper link building, fresh content, social media activities, and on-site SEO. But within the past three years alone, a lot of changes occurred within the SEO world. The things that could have worked about five years ago no longer work these days after Panda and Penguin wreaked havoc and rid the Internet of spammy links and sites.

These days, online marketers are rethinking the way they do things and focus more on user experience and less on how the search engines are going to rank their websites.

Let’s take a look at what your funeral home website should be focusing on in terms of SEO moving forward.

Mobile-friendly/responsive design

Most experts confirmed that responsive or mobile-friendly websites rank higher in search. And we’re not talking about mobile versions of a website. We’re talking about a website that conforms to the screen size of the device from where they are being viewed, ie. desktop, mobile phone and tablet.

Soon, we will see the number of mobile visits surpass those of desktops’. We will also see more client families locate funeral homes solely via their mobile devices. If you haven’t done so yet, it’s about time to build a responsive website for your funeral home.

SEO-friendly URLs

URLs must be structured in such a way that they include the keyword you are optimizing for, but must be short to be share-friendly. If your funeral home’s brand already includes the name and location, Atlanta Funeral Home, for example, then it’s easy to structure them in a URL (www.AtlantaFuneralHome.com). But if not, you must create a page, an About Us, for example, so you can create a URL that should include these elements.

Harness the power of video

Video, especially those hosted on YouTube, which of course is owned by the search giant Google, does so much for a website’s SEO strategy. First, YouTube is the world’s second largest search engine, so there’s a great chance that your funeral marketing videos will be found by a lot of searchers if properly optimized. Second, Google is now including video results in their search results. And because videos are more engaging than regular text-based content, they tend to be shared more by people.

We can help you build a video marketing strategy for your funeral home. Ask us today.

Social SEO

Social media is now making a huge impact in how a website is ranked in search. That’s why you also need a good strategy for building a presence for your funeral home on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter. Constantly update your social pages with keyword-optimized posts for visibility. But strive to minimize the promotion of your own services. You should also share related content that offer value and relevance to your target audience.

Content

And then there’s content, which is still king, of course. Content is what helps your users stay engaged in your website. It’s also what helps search engine spiders properly identify your website, understand what it is about, and how it should be ranked. Also, Google favors websites that are frequently updated with fresh content. Strive to always update your website with useful, timely, and relevant content for client families. Also, keep in mind all the SEO best practices when creating content. Include keywords in the title and within the body. When linking to your other pages, try to use natural keywords or variations of the main keywords that your mainly optimizing for.

There you have it, the crucial elements of a successful SEO strategy for your funeral home’s website. If you need help, contact us today or call (800) 810-3595.