Do UK Interior Designers Need SEO to Grow their Business?

First and foremost, what is SEO and do UK Interior Designers need to know about it to grow their business? To start with the first part of the question. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation. Any the wiser? Then let’s keep it simple. SEO determines how highly internet search engines rank your website. Put another way, does the internet return your website on the first results page when someone searches for ‘interior designer near me’?

As for the second part of the question. Do UK Interior Designers need SEO to grow their business? Unfortunately, the answer is, ‘maybe’.

Before we go much further, SEO isn’t only about Google. Bing, Yahoo, and so on are all internet search engines. And the same SEO principles apply. But 90% of us search the internet using Google. For this reason, ‘Google’ has become a synonym for ‘internet search engine’. In the same way that ‘Hoover’ is a byword for ‘vacuum cleaner’. And in this article, when I say, ‘Google‘, I mean internet search engines in general.

Should Interior Designers Care About Their Google Ranking?

Only if your interiors website is your digital shop front. Or at least one of them. What does that mean? Do your clients find you through Google, Insta, Facebook, or in other ways? Because each of these routes to your studio is a digital shop front.

Unfortunately, many UK interior design business owners don’t know how their clients find them in the first place. And it’s a problem they can easily solve. By asking your potential clients when they first get in touch. At some point in that opening chat, pose the question, ‘How did you hear about us?’

You have a few options, depending upon the answer. Namely:

• None or very little of your new business comes to you via the internet. And you’re already making the most of other digital marketing routes, such as Insta. Then SEO is a possibility for your studio. So, keep reading!
• Some of your clients come to you via Google. This suggests you already have a working SEO optimisation approach. But you want to increase the number of design projects your studio works on. Then improving your website’s SEO is something to consider. Again, keep reading!
• You want to use different marketing channels to attract different types of clients. For instance, Insta for single-room residential projects. And the world-wide web to attract hospitality clients. If so, you know what to do. Keep reading!

What is the Goal for SEO?

For UK interior designers who want to use SEO to grow their business, the goal is page 1 of Google. Nothing other than that first page will do. Why? Because 95% of people who search for something on Google only look at the web pages returned on page 1. Of course, that means 5% go to page 2 and beyond. But in these cases, it’s usually because the search has returned lots of remarkably similar e-commerce sites. Or the results are pages from a different country. Usually the USA. Put another way, people looking for interior design services aren’t likely to stray from the page 1 search results.

Other Ways of Getting on Page 1 of Google

Pay-per-click, also known as PPC and Google Ads, is worth a quick mention. PPC results are usually the first 3 or 4 websites shown at the top of the results. And can also be the bottom 1 or 2 on the first page. Google shows that a result is a PPC result by putting the word, ‘Ad’, in front of the web address. And it’s the word, ‘Ad’, that’s the key difference between PPC results and what’s called organic search results. The first is advertising, the second is marketing. And in this article, we’re talking about marketing.

But what’s the difference between marketing and advertising? Advertising is a subset of marketing, where you pay for the medium used to share your message. To use an example from outside of social media marketing. If you print out a flyer and put it through someone’s door, that’s marketing. If your local shop pins the same flyer to their noticeboard for £5 per week, it’s advertising.

To return to digital marketing. To rank somewhere in Google’s search results doesn’t cost you anything. Of course, you may have paid a web designer, developer and so on for your site. But your site shows up in the search results for no cost. However, with PPC, you pay Google every time someone clicks on your website link in the search results.

Do UK Interior Designers Need a Google Strategy to Grow?

Now we know what SEO is. That’s to say, the process by which our potential clients can find us on page 1 of Google. If we need SEO often depends on the success of other marketing strategies. But if you’ve maxed out those other strategies. Or if you believe the internet can give you even more clients. On the other hand, you want to expand into other interiors sectors. Then SEO is a worthwhile exercise.

And the next question is, ‘How?’. How do we make SEO work for us, so we can expand our UK interiors studio? We tackle that question in next month’s article. Get More UK Interior Design Clients Using Google. Follow the YourCoachApproach LinkedIn page / Sign up for the YourCoachApproach Business Success Blog so you don’t miss it.

Do You Want an Effective SEO Approach to Develop Your UK Interior Design Business?

Do you want to grow your UK interior design business? But you’re not sure if a SEO strategy is right for you? Let alone, how to go about putting one together. Then discover how  YourCoachApproach can help your design studio progress. Alternatively, book a FREE 30-Minute Chat. And let’s see what we can do together.