How To Make Your Blog Appear In Google Search

What's the key to appearing at the top of Google Search? Why are some designers on the top of page one while others rank way down on the third page—or lower—where their businesses will likely never be seen? How can designers take charge of their online reputation and optimize their web traffic? AD PRO consulted with designers Kati Curtis and Summer Thornton, as well as the marketing firm The SEO Works to uncover everything designers need to know about SEO. Here's what these three experts shared.

Quality Control

First and foremost, it's critical to have robust, relevant, and interesting content that will resonate with your audience. Declan Reilly, head of SEO at The SEO Works, advises, "Provide the answers to your industry's pain points [or] unanswered questions, or create a piece that really informs or excites."

Reilly also suggests evaluating how your website is being viewed and used: "Think about what search queries your target audience might enter into a search engine. Would you choose to rank any of your pages highly for those search queries over what's out there currently? If not, you should consider creating a page that you think is better. Make sure to include those target search queries in a natural way, but in a way that helps search robots understand that the page is actually about that subject. Then get other strong and trusted websites to share and link to it—another major ranking factor."

Become an AD PRO Member

Buy now for unlimited access and all of the benefits that only members get to experience.

"The best way to have great SEO really comes from ensuring you have stunning content that other people want to share, pin, and link to. If you have great photography and design, people will share your work, and that will help your position," notes Joss Thornton, managing director at Summer Thornton Design, one of the first design firms to appear in a Google search for "Chicago interior designer."

"We've prioritized ensuring our website ranks well for the past five-plus years, but we aren't obsessive about it. However, we do employ strategies that we know will help our SEO and search position," he adds. "There are technical elements that are part of good SEO, such as keywords, backlinks, meta tags, alt image text, and a slew of other elements, but they're all worthless without quality content."

Keep It Fresh

One SEO strategy employed by Summer Thornton Design is to constantly refresh content. "We upload press articles, new projects, update employment opportunities, et cetera, to make sure our website is fresh for visitors," Thornton says. Kati Curtis, of her namesake firm, concurs, adding, "Update and change your site frequently. Google looks for fresh content!" Clearly, this tactic works for Curtis, who is the first designer to appear when googling "New York interior designer."

Reilly suggests, "After you appreciate how people are trying to find your website, you can tailor your pages to meet their needs, and, therefore, the needs of search engines like Google, which simply want to provide the best result possible. Be that result!"