Unlike the movie, if you build it, they do not always come. The novelty of the web has worn off and the fact that your church has a website will not make you unique anymore. You need to be easily found; and with all of the church websites out there, high rankings in a search engine is your best bet. So how can you bubble to the top of search engine rankings? Last episode I talked about some proactive measures you can take to get yourself known, however there are plenty of strategic decisions and tactical actions you can take that will give your site the high-ranking it deserves.
Topics include:
- Register your site with search engines
- Generate and submit a sitemap
- Create a robots.txt file
- Decide on keywords you wish to rank for
- Internal and external link building
Action Item: First, get your technical team members creating accounts, generating sitemaps, and robot.txt files. In parallel, have website and church leadership consider their approach to SEO from a strategic perspective. Determine the keywords you wish to capture, and develop a site structure and content that you will need. Once you get your site up and running, start both internal and external link building campaigns. Check your search engine accounts and analytics to ensure you are capturing those keywords. Finally pray for guidance in moving forward with tweaks and revisions to your strategic approach and tactical solutions.
Referenced Links
- CWS Podcast – Ep. 28: Get Your Church Known
- SEO for Churches article
- GSiteCrawler: sitemap generator tool
