The UK headlines sure are a depressing read at the moment: inflation is soaring, and according to the BBC, we’re “heading into what’s expected to be the longest recession on record”.

With that in mind, thoughts undoubtedly turn to protecting your business. Now, SEO may not be the first focus area that springs to mind, but it’s actually an uber-effective and steady way to boost your organisation.  Below, we outline why.

Reasons to invest in SEO during a recession

During an economic downturn, businesses consider ways to tighten up expenditure while trying to stimulate traffic, enquiries and sales. Enter SEO, an efficient, affordable and ethical long-term approach.

Not only does it help you understand customers’ behaviour and needs, but it also shines a spotlight on how much they’re willing (and able) to spend, and where. These insights allow you to focus your efforts on the most relevant business areas.

Organic clicks don’t directly cost

SEO is the process of improving your rankings in unpaid – organic – search engine results. Tactics range from keyword research and link building to quality content creation.

When you implement an effective SEO strategy and put it at the heart of your business, you raise your digital brand’s visibility and ranking, making it easier for potential customers to find you.

Organic clicks don’t incur a direct cost, so if you have a strong SEO roadmap, you’re on track to maximising those all-important zero-cost clicks. However, it’s important to note that you do, of course, need to pay an agency or staff to implement SEO, so there is a cost there.

How much depends on your available budget, and as with many things in life, the more money you have to spend, the better the results may be. Remember though, that often a large SEO retainer is relatively small in comparison to other media budgets within an organisation.

By contrast, when you pay for ads, resulting website traffic usually comes at a direct per-click price. Paid media can be pivotal to businesses, especially in hard times, but in terms of longevity, it’s hard to beat the results of good SEO. Indeed, over a longer period of time, SEO usually generates a higher ROI compared to other marketing efforts.

To help ensure you beat your competition in terms of traffic, be sure to avoid common SEO pitfalls, from technical errors like duplicate product descriptions and high-level blunders like assuming fixes will stay live, to not conveying the importance of SEO to your entire organisation.

SEO and traffic

When hard times hit, consumers set stricter priorities; they’re reluctant to spend money, particularly on non-essential items. That will undoubtedly lead to a decrease in conversions, sales and profit.

To help ensure customer spending doesn’t drop critically low and encourage traffic and enquiries, it’s important to maintain good SEO performance, whether that’s improving and streamlining UX, speeding up page load times, publishing regular content, or optimising for mobile. By doing that, you put yourself in a strong position for when spending levels do pick up again. 

SEO: measurable and amendable

Another reason SEO is valuable during a downturn? You can easily track its performance and results. Metrics to focus on range from organic traffic numbers, keyword ranking and SERP visibility to click-through, bounce and conversion rates.

As a result, you understand your customers better, can show up in the right places, and deliver relevant content – helping build trust at a time people are feeling wary. Moreover, you can identify if you’re falling down somewhere, and tweak your SEO plan accordingly.

There are a handful of resources you can use to help: check out our Top SEO tools for eCommerce websites article for some expert advice.

The flexibility of SEO

SEO also allows you to focus on optimising core services that need to continue, despite a recession. These include logical mapping, relevant content, fast loading, and making sure your website appears in the searches of possible customers via keyword research, competitor analysis and trend spotting.

Alongside that, you can target potential customers locally or internationally – for instance, if you’re a small business, it’s all about long-tail keywords that appeal to consumers closest to you – location-specific SEO, helping you appear in ‘near me’ searches. Indeed, a regular local customer base may well become your lifeline.

Conversely, if you’re a big brand, hone in on keywords that will help you reach new markets that may not be feasible in more competitive boom periods. Meanwhile, if your business is global, concentrate on international SEO, so your site is optimised to appear in different countries.

SEO and recession: examples

Let’s say you’re a law firm, with clients who are struggling because of an economic downturn. They’re looking to renegotiate fees and reduce their billable hours. With that in mind, SEO is key to maintaining a good Google position and being seen as an authoritative company in the legal sector. 

If you’re a finance firm, it’s all about trust, especially during times of hardship. Here, SEO gives people confidence that you’re the experts who can guide them through challenging times. Moreover, some individuals will make the most of the dip and invest while the market is low, so you want to be their go-to option. There will also be clients who jump straight into investing when things improve – you want to be ready for them, too.

SEO and ethics

By optimising your website, multiple parties share the benefits: your business, your customers, and the search engines. Of course, an alternative strategy during a period of economic decline is to slash prices and offer bargain deals, but is that sustainable?

SEO creates a level playing field, whereby all companies can take part. Those with a strong SEO game reap the rewards, while those who don’t participate at all aren’t actively penalised.

Meanwhile, if an organisation is found to use SEO negatively – black hat practices – they may pay the price by being (temporarily) unindexed by Google – an unappealing proposition given the global behemoth dominates the search engine market.

Investing in SEO during a recession

Bolstering your SEO is a way to help safeguard your digital business during an economic slump. Why? When used effectively, it puts you in a strong position to maximise organic clicks and maintain (or increase) traffic and enquiries. But remember, SEO is essential to success regardless of whether the world is going through a recession or a boom.

Contact us today if you’d like to find out how Organic can help strengthen your SEO strategy – click the button below and let’s start a conversation. And if you’re keen to keep on top of the latest SEO news, follow us on Instagram.