According to Internet Live Stats, Google processes 3.5 billion search queries in a single day on average. That’s over 40,000 search queries per second! Just think about how often someone pulls out their phone to search something by text or voice command. When you do, it’s pretty easy to understand why Google’s search rankings are important. That said, there is also an incredibly large number of results that Google has to sift through and offer up to its users. This brings us to the question…

“How can I improve my wedding venue Google ranking?”  

There’s plenty of “how-to” information on the web but I took the time to research and put all this information to the test. Below, I list the top 5 things to focus on if you want to quickly move to the top of the list in Google’s search results. 

1. Links

One of the most important ways to increase your ranking on Google is by creating links that lead into and out of your website. You are trying to create as many natural paths to and from your website as possible. Two of the most important things to keep in mind while link building are the trustworthiness of the domain and the popularity of the web page that you are linking. This means real, authentic websites and quality information. Make sure you don’t overload your website with unnecessary links that make your copy hard to read!

These are the top 3 types of links that will increase your ranking in Google Search results:

Inbound Links

Links from other popular websites that lead to your website will drastically improve your ranking on Google. This is why it is important to have valuable content on your website. Google does not want to count “user-generated” links, or links you created yourself, so you need to find ways of having your website or venue featured on other blogs and websites. To do this make sure you really focus on making your website attractive and full of informative and shareable content!

External Links

External links within your website are also very important for SEO and landing in the top Google Search results. There are 3 things to keep in mind when choosing which external links to include:

• Validity of the linked domain
• Popularity of the linked page
• Relevancy of the content between your page and the linked page

When you’re writing your content, find ways to add in anchor text throughout your copy that adds value in some way. For example, if you are featured on a wedding blog, link the blog in your article with relevant anchor text within your content.

Internal Links

Internal Links are important because they build the architecture or structure of your website. It’s important to do this in an organized and navigable way for several reasons:

• Easier navigation means users will spend more time on your website
• An informational hierarchy is easier for crawlers to follow
• Spread ranking power appropriately across your website pages

The optimal internal page link structure should resemble a pyramid and can be done so with sub menus if you have a lot of pages. This structure ideally has a clear link path from your home page to each page that exists. This is a great way to ensure you are creating the easiest way for both users and Google to flow naturally through your website.

Neil Patel did a study on what types of links are best for Google Search rankings. Take a look at the data if you’re interested in a deep dive on the topic!

2. Keywords

The “key” to keywords is to do your research before writing the bulk of your content. Keywords will be strategically placed throughout your web pages and copy so it’s very important to pick some heavily used terms that you think your ideal clients are searching for most. 

In a society where information is a click away on our phones it is very common for people to google in question form or even with the voice search feature. Think about how your ideal client will search in Google and how you can match those keywords.

It is important to develop an understanding of your clients intentions when they google search for a venue so you end up in their top results. There are 4 main search intentions below. Think about what types of keywords you can use when writing your content that relate to these types of searches. 

Navigational: when trying to find a particular site

When a viewer googles your venue name

Informational: when searching for the answer to a question

“Where can I get married in the Mountains?”

Investigational: pre-purchase searches

“Wedding venues in the Rockies”

Transactional: when searchers actually want to buy

“Book a colorado wedding venue”

Now that you’ve been brainstorming, I recommend starting a list that you can add to as you think of more keywords. The key words on this list are known as your seed keywords. Next, you should check the ranking of these keywords with your site. You can simply do this in a Google search but there are also many online tools to help with checking keywords. Ahrefs has several free SEO tools including their Keyword Rank Checker.

You should also create longer keywords known as medium and long tail keywords. These tend to be much more specific and are very important and most web traffic comes from longer keywords. A great method for picking top long tail keywords is by typing some of your short keywords into the Google search box and seeing what queries auto generate after. These are top search long tail keywords!

Ultimately, you should pick a primary medium or long tail keyword for each web page. You can have 3 to 5 supporting keywords but try to focus on using one primarily throughout each page.

Keywords:

• Short: 1-2 words, high search volume
• Medium: 2-3 words, medium search volume
• Longtail: 4+ words, low search volume
• *Most web traffic comes from long tail keywords

Where to use keywords:

• Page Titles 
• Meta Descriptions
• Subheadings
• Within the first couple sentences and a couple times throughout content
• Images
• Links, URLs and social media updates

Want to do more keyword research? Check out this list of tools that help you optimize your keyword usage.

3. Quality Content

Longform content

If you want to put your website into Google’s top SERPS one of the best ways is by writing quality and helpful longform content. This is your opportunity to offer up all the pertinent information that investigational and transactional searchers are seeking like pricing, availability and contact information. However, it is just as important to give your potential clients a way to find out more about the experience you offer. Think of the best ways to portray what clients want to know and write it out in detail. Blogs are one of the most effective ways to incorporate longform content into your website.

Keep these 4 mini-tips in mind while you are writing your longform content:

• Keywords should be used throughout your content but too often and it can be considered keyword stuffing.
• Any current data or analytics you have on your current web traffic and clients should not be ignored. Don’t overlook the obvious when deciding what to write about!
• Know your target audience or ideal clients and keep them in mind while writing your longform content.
• Consider what types of content and keywords your competitors are using so you can also be competitive.

Other types of content

The main goal with adding more types of content is to Increase a visitor’s time spent on your site. This is another great way to increase your website’s popularity which in turn puts you higher up in Google search results. Here are some other great ways to add more interesting, useful and relevant content to your website. 

• Image galleries
• Video
• Assets (templates, checklists, calculators etc)

4. Meta Descriptions and Headlines

Meta Descriptions

A meta description is the paragraph of text that shows up under the blue clickable link of a Google search result. It pretty much goes without saying… they’re important! Luckily, they’re not too difficult to write. Follow the tips below and you will be writing attractive meta descriptions that will benefit your Google SERPS.

• Write a unique meta description for each page of your website
• Start with a type of call to action like “learn more”, “find out”, or “continue”
• Place keywords close to beginning
• Try to summarize the page content accurately
• Avoid generic descriptions
• Create something that attracts your ideal client
• Match search intent
• Keep it between 155-160 characters

Headlines

The headline, heading or “H1 tag” might be one of the most important pieces of content on your page. It needs to do more than just tell a website visitor what your content is about. A headline needs to also attract Google searchers and make them curious enough to click on your link. Here are a couple main points to keep in mind when writing a page headline.

• There can only be one H1 for each web page. You can learn more about other types of heading tags here.
• Keep your headline around 30-60 characters so it is not cut off in Google results pages
• Use your most researched keywords!
• Be direct and honest; don’t mislead your readers with clickbait. Your headline should match your content.
• Use numbers in your headline. Numbers offer a tangible and measurable amount of benefit they will receive by clicking on your headline. Fun fact, the brain is often subconsciously attracted to odd numbers so use them to your advantage!
  • An example of a way to use numbers would be:

“7 Reasons to Book [venue name] Now!”

• Use emotional language when writing headlines. Your goal is to make your potential website visitor feel something that urges them to click on your link. Our example of “7 Reasons to Book [venue name] Now!” would likely invoke a sense of trust, urgency and excitement. You can also aim to invoke a feeling of happiness with words like “bright” and “amazing”. Think about what types of emotions you want your ideal clients to feel when they visit your website and make a list. Then associate words with the feelings and emotions on those lists to come up with unique and attention grabbing verbage for your headings.

5. User Experience (UX) and Mobile

User Experience

User eXperience, or UX, describes itself pretty well with its own name. UX is all about how a user experiences something. This can be literally anything, a physical product, a venue, a mobile app or in our scenario a website. When thinking about your website users experience you should ask yourself a couple questions: 

1. How does the user feel when they interact with the website? Does your site portray a feeling of happiness and love like that of your venue? 

2. How effortlessly can they find the information they are seeking? Think about what we said about internal links. Is the site easy to use and navigate? 

A couple other things to keep in mind while focusing on UX are:

Site speed

One of the most annoying things when googling is clicking on an attractive link and then landing on a loading screen. This is a quick deterrent for viewers and Google top rankings alike.

Aesthetics 

How your website looks and feels is, again, one of the most important parts of increasing traffic on your pages. It is important to think about more than colors and font styles. Website designers are trained in structuring content and placing things like buttons and links in the exact right places. If you’re struggling with pairing aesthetics and functionality, that’s where Studio53 comes in to help.

User Signals

Google takes into account how long viewers spend on your page and how often they return. If a lot of people click on your site and quickly return to Google, they aren’t easily finding what they want or your site is not attractive or professional enough. This will deter Google from showing your website in the top results. However, even if users don’t spend a lot of consecutive time on your site, continuous views will show Google that viewers like your site because they return to it.

Google Analytics

One of the most valuable tools Google offers for website managers and owners is Google Analytics. If you’re serious about understanding how users are interacting with your website on Google this is where you will need to spend some time. Google Analytics will give you access to more of Google’s unique insights and machine learning capabilities where you can check the performance of your content, products and more.

Mobile

It’s kind of mind boggling how many people are using Google and search engines on their phones in this digital age. That number will only be increasing as we continue on in this tech-driven world. For that reason it is extremely important to make sure your website adapts to smaller screen sizes and is easily navigable when in this portrait orientation.

What makes a site mobile friendly?

Your website should not be a replicated second site that is adjusted for mobile. It should be the same website that automatically adjusts and optimizes to different screen sizes like tablets and phones. You can consider your site mobile friendly if it:

• Helps viewers find information quickly and without frustration.
• Loads correctly on a mobile device like a smartphone or tablet.
• Loads incredibly fast – people expect information faster when they are mobile.
• Presents content in a readable fashion, without having to pinch and zoom.
• Offers enough room to navigate by touch screen.
• Provides clear crawlability for Google’s search engine bots.

Mobile Friendly Test

Google offers a great testing tool that is able to quickly analyze websites and how mobile-friendly they are for viewers. Check out the tool here and test your website.

BONUS TIP: Getting started for beginners

Wow, you’ve made it this far and your head isn’t spinning?! If so, kudos! You may be interested in learning more about Google SEO before you reach out to us. One of Google’s top beginner tools is their Getting Started for Beginners SEO guide. This will definitely help you understand Google’s result pages on a deeper level. 

If you’d rather leave it to the professionals, we’re ready to help! Reach out to us with your questions below!