With the average small business spending around $75,000 a year on digital marketing, it’s hard for startups to compete. Without Google search secrets to take advantage of SEO algorithms, you could be going into the red just to get attention to your site. Search engines are valuable tools but if you don’t know how to take advantage of their inner workings, you could lose out to your competition.

Here are four ways to stay ahead of Google’s search algorithm.

1. Unique Content

If Google wants one thing from you and your site it’s for you to have lots of unique content. Because Google’s web crawler is seeking to index every single page of the internet, they’ll know if you’re reusing or rehashing content. You can’t cheat the algorithm that’s seeking out new and unique content relevant to your audience.

Instead of trying to reinvent the wheel, become a resource about your industry. Start a blog that’s chockful of information about what people ask you the most about your business.

Instead of leaving a boring and underwhelming FAQ page kicking around your site, create a blog where each one question has an answer in the form of a post. This way you can keep your URL constantly refreshed with exciting content for your clients while feeding the SEO beast.

Unique content will help you to set your brand apart from other brands in your industry. When you answer the most pertinent concerns that people have about products and services in your industry, you provide value. When the answer to those problems leads back to your own products and services, you can sell services in a sincere way.

2. Prioritize Linking

One of the things that Google wants to know about your URL and your pages is that they have some relationship to the rest of the internet.

The internet was started with just a small network of computers that were hardwired to one another. The originating code and ethic of the internet were to ensure that everyone was always contributing to a community. The internet isn’t a one-sided conversation like television or radio.

Take your time to populate any posts that you write with links that can help to support the information that you’re sharing. The more reputable your sources are, the higher you’ll rank. When you connect your information to highly reputable news and information sites, you’ll show that you know what you’re talking about.

Avoid connecting to sites that are purely commercial or e-commerce pages. This will lower the ranking of your pages.

When you’re sharing information, stick to the facts. Pepper the most important keywords in your texts and include information about where you’re located. This will help you get the edge when to comes to searches originating from your area.

3. Get Some Guest Posters

Having a few well-known bloggers to guest post on your site will give your page some extra clout. When you connect with a writer or blogger who is well known and has their own following, you can cross-pollinate. You can double each other’s following when you write a guest post for them and they write one for you.

Guest posters help you in search results by showing off your products and services on well-established sites. These are difficult to acquire compared to paid links and ads, so by trading guest posts with writers, you give each other a bump.

Contact other writers in your niche and see if they’ll trade articles with you. Build relationships over time so that you can continue to stay connected as you each grow your base.

Some sites need writers and will be happy to add you as a guest blogger. Your presence will help them to add content to their sites and you’ll be able to get your name out there.

This kind of network can only yield positive results as more people see your name and find links to your products and services. When you mention products and services, be sure to keep your use of keywords and links organic. Selling too hard will make you look too desperate and will lead users to pass right by.

4. Seek Reviews and Testimonials

Reviews and testimonials are vital to the survival of any brand in the contemporary internet environment. When you search for products and services on Google, you’ll often get links that lead you directly to certain brands and companies near you. Along with the names and addresses of these companies, you get reviews.

If this happens and you don’t have good reviews under your belt, you could be losing the attention of hard-won customers. Getting customers to find you is difficult and resource heavy. If you lose them before you get the chance to make your pitch, you’re tossing marketing efforts down the drain.

Reach out to your most loyal customers and ask directly for them to write testimonials or reviews. Some brands will even run in-store promotions for when you like or review them on social media. Whatever works for you, make the effort to collect more reviews.

While you can’t exactly hack the algorithm on search engines with this method, you can ensure that you get a lot more hits by showing off reviews. Without enough good reviews to buffer against a bad review, one wrong move could do serious damage to your SEO ranking. Collect positive reviews to combat this potential.

Google Search Secrets Will Save Money

A few Google search secrets will help you get ahead and stay ahead of your competitors. When you provide the kind of content that Google knows their users want to see, you’ll be able to claw your way to the top of the rankings,

If you’re struggling to get the attention you deserve on search engines, check out our guide to outsourcing SEO efforts.