SEO is a tricky topic for financial advisors (and marketers in general) largely because there is a lot of misinformation. Ask 10 different SEO experts and you’ll get 10 different opinions on what works and what doesn’t.

One reason is that Google’s algorithm is constantly changing so what worked last year may not work anymore. Second, SEO is like a math equation; there are several different ways you can reach the same result.

While SEO best practices will continue to evolve and change, here’s what we know does work for financial advisors.

Backlinking

A recent study in Entrepreneur magazine found that backlinks are still the most important ranking signal used by Google. The key here is to have backlinks from different domains — not just your own site.

Success Tip: With each blog post or content page you create, add a link to one of your other blogs or website pages. This will help you build internal backlinks. The best way to build your external backlinks is by contributing content to other websites, such as guest blogging on another website and linking to your site on social media.

A Lower Bounce Rate

Your bounce rate refers to people who almost immediately click off your website after arriving. A high number of bounces tells Google that people don’t find your website useful or relevant. A low bounce rate means people are spending time on your website reading your content.

Success Tip: There are a few ways you can reduce your bounce rate:

  1. Make sure you feature content above the fold (or the top part of your website that people see without needing to scroll down).
  2. Don’t use clickbait in your email or social media campaigns. If your title or call to action doesn’t match the content you link to, your visitors will quickly leave your site.
  3. Break up your content into smaller sections. No one likes to read long paragraphs. As a rule of thumb, keep your paragraphs no longer than four or five sentences.
  4. Add visuals, such as photos and videos. These proven methods for keeping people on your website longer.

Long-Form Content

It shouldn’t come as any surprise that long-form content ranks better than short pieces of content. For one, it keeps people on your site longer (which helps you reduce your bounce rate). Secondly, more people are likely to link to it to share (improving your backlinks).

Success Tip: While you want to keep your web pages short and sweet, your blog is where you can let long-form content shine. Aim to write blog posts that are around 800 words or higher. To drive traffic to those posts, share snippets or quotes from the article on social media and via email.

While SEO will likely remain an ever-changing and complex marketing strategy, a few methods such as these three stand the test of time. Give some of them a try and compare your before and after results to capture your ROI. And remember, if you ever need help with content, our friendly copywriters can help!