by Amanda Williamson
If you are a client looking for a counsellor you may have picked up my card, or found my site via Counselling Directory or perhaps the BACP Find a Therapist website. There's also a good chance you found me on page 1 of Google.
There are many, many counsellors working in Exeter and competition is very stiff so I am very fortunate to be consistently on page 1 of the Google search engine. Many businesses pay lots of money to experts to get their website on page 1 to generate more traffic to their sites. I have never spent a single penny on search engine optimisation* (SEO - the term for making a website as search-engine friendly as possible). So how did I get to page 1?
The reason why Google likes my page is because of the content. Google has become more sophisticated in recent years and tends to prefer sites that delivers relevant content that people not only click on, but actually spend time reading before then clicking through to different pages within that site.
Back in 2011 when I made the decision to work privately I invested zero money and a lot of time into building my own site as a total novice. This site is actually an adapted blogsite via Google's Blogger platform. I invested time into writing articles and delivering content that would interest potential clients and others interested in counselling topics.
My hard work has paid off and not only do I have ranking that I am very happy with, but thanks to the volume of information available potential clients can get a very good sense of who I am, rather than experiencing a somewhat homogenised, generic site as is often seen. I believe that this information empowers potential clients to decide whether they think we will work well together or not.
It isn't without risk, no doubt some may be put off by certain aspects of what I put out there, but again, this allows those clients who are to find another practitioner who will feel more right for them.
A selection of my articles can be found here.
* I have taken advantage of Google Adwords free credit offers from time to time :-)
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