Nowadays, every online business, startup or established, will need to get their site optimised for search engines to have success in cyberspace. This is where search engine optimization (SEO) comes in. If a site is built with pleasing a search engine in mind, you will be rewarded with high rankings in search engines. And this is what you are really optimising for. Being placed high in search engines will definitely give a big boost to traffic and brand awareness.

However, SEO should only be done properly not aggressively. When you create a site that only search engines will understand, you stand the risk of losing your customers. People subscribe to products and brands that can please them the most.

When creating a site, it is important to consider that you are doing this not only for search engines but also your users. Written below are a couple of steps to achieve that goal.

1. Look From Your Customers’ Perspectives
   This is the most important tip. You should create a site with your customers in mind. Step into their shoes and look from their perspective. Do not do something just because it’s what you want. Chances are it’s not what your customers want.Why would your customer choose to buy from you? What makes you different from your competitors? What features would customers like most on your site? These are the questions you need to answer in creating your website. Because without a site with your customers in mind. Step into their shoes and look from their perspective. Do not do something just because it’s what you want. Chances are, it’s not what your customers want.

   Why would your customer choose to buy from you? What makes you different from your competitors? What features would customers like most on your site? These are the questions you need to answer in creating your website. Because it’s the customers that make a business keep on running.

2. Don’t Try to Turn Your Site Into Art
   Just because a design looks good or a feature is innovative, it is not justification on whether to apply it to your site. Some designs are not for everyone and most of the time simple but functional designs trump artistic ones.This is not to say that you site should be a crappy clump of functions. Not at all. Just that it’s also important to consider structure and functionality. Again, this returns you to the eyes of your customers. They visit your site to achieve a certain goal or aim. Not to ponder over a work of art. Prioritise your customers’ wishes. A good idea is to design your site’s aesthetics depending on your customer base’s tastes.
3. Create Purposeful, Well-written Content
   You should create content for your readers, not for search engines. Well-written and informative content will not only keep your readers/customers happy, you will also be on good terms with search engines.When you write, ask yourself what your readers will get out of it. The content in every page of your site should contain a purpose that will help, inform or please your customers. Writing techniques that take advantage of search engines robotic nature will only annoy your customers and you’ll even possibly be banned by search engines.
4. Simplify Your Site Structure
   Create a structure that will be easy for your users to understand. You might want in put navigation in both the header and footer so your users will be able to find their way on your site more easily. Users will definitely appreciate it when you create your site in a way that is easy for them to use. After all, most of the time, they visit your site with a particular goal in mind and making it easy for them to accomplish that goal will certainly please your customers.Furthermore, a site with good structure will also make it easier for search engine crawlers to do their work. Search engines love sites that have a simple page structure and rank them in search results accordingly.
5. Continuous Testing
   The previous steps are merely the foundations of creating a site with your goal of pleasing both users and search engines. SEO is not an exact science, well, hardly all marketing strategies are exact sciences. The circumstances vary for everyone and what works well for one might not for another.The trick is to continue observing your results and adjusting your settings to suit your observations. Observe your data on a platform like Google Analytics. Regularly monitor your Key Performance Indicators (KPI) – the goals that you want your users to accomplish on your site, e.g. completing a purchase by arriving on a “Thank you” page. Experiment and see how these affect your KPI.

   Don’t only consider page-ranking but also your KPI and other important data like traffic and conversions. Always look for ways on how you can improve your site.

If you simply follow these basic steps, you will surely be on your way to creating the site that will both please your users and search engines.