What is SEO and how does it work?

If you’ve stumbled upon this, you’ve probably searched for SEO and are wondering what it is – and there’s a plethora of information to delve into on the subject. It’s not an exaggeration to say that the use of search engines is a significant part of our everyday lives. According to a report from Swedes & the Internet, 75% of Sweden’s population searches every day, indicating the potential of visibility on search engines, whether through paid ads or organic search results (SEO) – which is precisely what this blog post is about.

Our aim is to explain here, in a simple and concise manner, what SEO stands for, what indexing really means, and why it’s important to work with SEO. Our goal is for you to understand the basics and the significance of optimizing for Google.

So, what does SEO mean?
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, which means optimizing your website in various ways so that a search engine deems it relevant and places it as high as possible in search results.

Which search engine are we talking about? Google, of course because in europe around 95% of all searches are done on Google.

How does Google know about your website?

Think of Google like a big map of the internet, and your website is like a hidden treasure. But for people to find your treasure, they need a guide, and that’s where Google’s spider comes into play. This spider is like a special explorer Google sends out to roam the internet. It goes from one webpage to another, taking notes on what it finds and deciding if it’s worth showing to people who are searching.

When the spider finds your website, it looks at everything – the words, the pictures, how fast it loads – and decides how valuable it is. If your website has lots of helpful information that matches what people are searching for, the spider gives it a high rating.

But the spider is quite picky! It looks at lots of things, like the names of pictures, if the pictures match the words, if the words are easy to read, and many more technical things. All this helps Google decide where your website should appear when someone searches for something.

Why is this important?

Imagine you have a shop, but it’s hidden away in a maze. If people can’t find your shop, they won’t come in and buy anything. It’s the same with your website – if it doesn’t show up on the first page of Google search results, hardly anyone will see it. And most people only click on the websites they see first.

That’s why people work on something called SEO (Search Engine Optimization). It’s like putting signs on the roads leading to your shop. There are different ways to do it:

• Making sure your website has good stuff people want to see (On-page).
• Getting other websites to talk about yours, like telling your friends about your shop (Off-page).
• Doing some technical stuff to make sure Google’s spider can understand your website better (Technical).

If you work on all these things, your website has a better chance of showing up higher on Google’s map. And that means more people will find your treasure! And when people find your website through Google, they’re more likely to trust it and use it. So, it’s like free advertising that really works!

Remember, it’s Google who decides in the end; working on SEO is about making the content on your website as relevant as possible and having the technical aspects in place to create the conditions for ranking well.

So, what’s the first step to get started with SEO work?

As mentioned, there are many different ways to increase visibility and rank higher in search results. But the first thing you need to consider is whether this is something you can work on yourselves or if you need to seek expert help. If you don’t feel like you can handle it yourselves, our advice is to find a partner who can help optimise your website. Otherwise you can always contact us at Rexett.