Search Engine Optimization For Cannabis Websites
SEO for cannabis businesses can be the smartest strategy to generate consistent website traffic and location visitors. The phone book is extinct. In person networking events are hit or miss depending on so many factors… not including Covid-19 shutdowns. How does a cannabis business marketing themselves when they may or may not be able to promote in person?
Organic Traffic is the key. Search engines like Bing, Yahoo, Edge, Google are to go to sources for most people with access to a WiFi connection. People use search engines to find the information that they are looking for all throughout the day. Whether it is for directions, purchasing a new item, researching some information on a topic or finding the best dispensary in the area, search engine use has become a part of every day life.
Is SEO worth the investment?
Search engine optimization can be worth the investment, but there are quite a few factors to consider. Cannabis SEO for ecom only businesses is HIGHLY competitive and will often cost at least $5000 a month to start. Brand new businesses that are just getting started online can have a hard time ranking for buyer terms if there is already a high influx of other sellers online. We can honestly say that if you want to sell cbd oil online, it will probably be a waste of money if you do not have a local storefront location. We already work with a couple CBD companies and budget just for links can run close to $10,000 a month.
If you run a cannabis service business, dispensary or you offer legal or accounting support to cannabiz, a properly optimized SEO campaign can create a consistent flow of calls, visitors and customers to your business. We know what a cannabiz client is worth, and showing up on page 1 for a buyer intent search term is SO worth the investment to rank. While the search volume may not be anywhere near ecommerce searches, generating free qualified leads from your website and maps listings can bump up your revenue every month.
Can you scale up or slow down the results?
SEO for cannabis businesses can generate consistent traffic and lead generation. Once the calls and visitors start rolling in, you can always choose to scale up or scale down the traffic. Since opening, we have actually helped 3 clients sell their business/ leads to other companies. As the market gains more competition, it’s always better to have too many calls than not enough. Therefore we do not recommend scaling down. There are ways to pass along the clients or customers you don’t want to work with to other businesses in the industry. There is plenty of opportunity for everyone to be profitable and we always prefer to build relationships with our “competitors.”
How does SEO for cannabis businesses work?
There are 2 main factors to consider when it comes to a properly optimized cannabis campaign. On page SEO is making sure that your site is properly optimized for rank results, speed, UX and conversions. On page content does play a major factor in how and what your site ranks for. We have seen (and fixed) dozens of sites that looked great but were never properly optimized by the web designer. Most web designers…. design websites and are not trained in how to properly optimize a site for rank results.
Off page SEO is all the work done off the website to help build your websites authority. This can include backlinking, sharing campaigns, social signals, guest posts, niche edits, IFTTT campaigns, citation updates and much more. Off page SEO can take some time before the “link juice” kicks in, but a consistent link building campaign is crucial to rank and maintain rank.
Is #SEODEAD ?
Every year the #SEOISDEAD meme starts to float around, but somehow Search Engines still generate more traffic than any other platform consistently. Usually the hashtag is used sarcastically by SEO professionals to show their results and shut down haters. When it’s not being used sarcastically, it’s often someone promoting their paid ads or social media marketing course.
As long as people use search engines to find what they are looking for, SEO will never die.