If you have a business, you know how important new enquiries and leads are. And Google can be a vital source of these leads.

It's also a good chance that you've had someone promise they will get your website on the first page of Google. It's like the gold standard promise. But there is an argument for not being there – in fact that it may not serve your business all that well.

First - why would you want to?

85% of New Zealanders will research something online before they buy – and 97% will start their search with Google.

Click through statistics vary greatly and depend on a range of factors such as user intent and use of brand names, but a recent study published on the MOZ Blog show that 71% of searches result in a click on one of the results on page one. Second page results get only 4%.*

Ok, so we've established that if you are listed on the first page, you'll get more clicks through to your website than if you on the second page or subsequent pages1.

But wait, there's one important thing to consider first. You want to be on the front page for phrases that count.

Search phrase that are relevant

Many conversations about search ranking miss an important point, and almost all of those sales calls promising first page listings skip over the question (either that, or they are actually selling you adwords).

And that question is, what phrases do you need to rank for to get the best result?

If you sell socks, you don't want a first page listing for fridges? If you are a small local business based in Wellington, being on the first page in Dunedin won't do you a lot of good.

If you are selling classroom based training courses, do you want to rank for 'free' or 'online' training? Probably not.

So, you want phrases that people use when looking for what you have to offer.

Why else would you NOT want to be on the first page of Google?

Phrases that no-one uses

You don't want to be on the front page of Google for phrases that no one uses. This is a common slight of hand by dodgy SEO companies – first page listings for phrases that will give you no visitors to your site at all. Sometimes businesses insist on being on the first page for a phrase that they think their target market uses - but in fact they don't. So you need to do some research first – and the best way is to ask your customers, sales team or service reps.

You might HATE that people use the wrong term for what you do, but you have to go where the searchers are.

High Volume – wait, what?

Perhaps you are thinking you should be on the first page of Google for a search phrase that is relevant and has sufficient volume, right? And that would be correct. (link to keywords secret sauce), But lets look at an example, say 'Xero'

Lets say we use Google Adword's keyword planner and find our phrase (and variations of it) gets an average of 40,500 searches a month. (Let's assume this is correct – it won't be but for the purposes of illustration lets say it is **). If Moz's click through statistics are correct then if you rank number one, 12150 searchers would click on your link.

Website conversion rates can vary, but lets take a conservative 5%, and say that this is how many of those 12150 clicks would actually get in touch. That's 607 contacts in a month, or 30 every business day. If you are a small business could you handle 30 contacts every single day and do the work as well?

Ok, this is an extreme example and good luck competing against Xero for the number one spot, but it illustrates the point.

If you do want to aim for the top spot for a highly competitive term, then you'll need to invest in a good marketing strategy that includes online visibility, and you'll need to work hard – you won't get there by throwing a couple of dollars at it.

Generic phrases may be yesterday's game

The more generic the phrase you target, like 'xero', 'builder' 'accountant', 'tee-shirts' etc – the less likely they will be relevant to your business (unless you ARE Xero).

And searchers have found this out as well, so have started to use variations and qualifiers (like location). They are using what are called 'long tail' searches.

What this means is they enter phrases and questions rather than single words, because they know that will get to what they want faster.

This does present a challenge because it increases the potential list of search phrase you are targeting, and so some brute force SEO practices of old no longer work. But adding regular, quality content that targets a single phrase per page is an effective way.

A note about ranking for your business name

Unless your business name is the same as a dozen others, chances are you'll be there if people search for you by name - unless your domain bears no resemblance to your business name. The virtual wool is pulled over many a business eye by promising (for a small fee of course) a first page listing, when what they really mean is that you'll be there - for your business name. Ranking for a business name is almost criminally simple to do. And yet I have seen businesses who don't appear on the first page for their own business name, so it does happen (if this is you, you need help).

OK, so what should you want?

You should want to be on Google's first page of results for search phrases that are relevant to your business, that are used in volumes that you can handle, that result in profitable (so, no tyre-kickers) leads that convert well.

Even if you do your research, you may find that once you get some data about what phrases your audience are actually using (which you can get via Google's Webmaster Tools) you'll need to do a bit of re-think. 

In our experience it's a bit of a moving target as user behaviour and business priorities change, so you never stop looking at it.

*. In theory – These statistics are from the US and in practice they vary widely depending on your industry. But if you are beyond page 2 it's not likely you'll get much of a clickthroughrate
**. If we compare Google's keyword research tool to actual search impressions, we've found it to be out by as much as 300%