How to Grow Your Audience with SEO

Have you ever wondered if you could use SEO to help grow your audience? There’s so much focus on social media and ads, but what about good ol’ SEO for audience growth? Oh, my friend, SEO should be your favorite marketing channel because it’s so powerful. You can grow your audience with SEO in a few simple steps. SEO can help you be found by your ideal customer, wherever they search. Whether someone is searching a traditional search engine like Google or an answer engine or AI search engine like ChatGPT or Claude, or even a podcast app, SEO can help them find you. When you optimize the content you create for your audience, you make it easier to find. 

How do you grow your audience with SEO?

First, you’ll want to keep your Ideal Customer in mind as you develop your content. What do they want to know? What do they need help with? Brainstorm content ideas for your Ideal Customer. Need help identifying your Ideal Customer? Check out this post.  We want to make sure we create content that our ideal customer is interested in, is searching for, and wants to read. When we create content that we know our audience is searching for and we optimize it for search, we make it easier for them to find and to get the help that they need or the answers to the questions that they have. You want to think about your ideal customer and the questions they have because you want to make sure you're creating the right content for them. You don't want to just create content on a whim because that often wastes time because we end up creating content no one is searching for and that won't grow your audience or your business. 

Second, research keywords that are tied to the content ideas you generated. What terms does your Ideal Customer use when they’re searching for something? Are there terms with more search demand than others? Are there terms you think you can rank for easier than others? Not sure what SEO keywords are? Check out this post.  You want to look for keywords that your website has a good chance of ranking for that your ideal customer uses when searching for information related to your topic. You also want to think about the questions they ask because you'll want to incorporate some of those in your copy for AI search. 

Third, create content for your ideal customer. Write your blog post, record your video or podcast episode, and make sure you answer the questions your potential customers ask. Need help speeding up the process? I have a blog post on how to batch content to save you time. It will help you be more consistent. Creating content on a regular basis is one of the best ways to expand your reach, grow your audience, and increase your visibility, if you're creating content people are searching for and you're optimizing that content for discovery. 

Fourth, optimize your content using the keywords you researched and ensure you follow the SEO best practices for your website (not sure what to do, get your copy of my free Beginner's Guide to SEO today.

You also want to optimize your copy for AI search or answer engine optimization. You want to make sure you're thinking about the questions someone would be asking an answer engine like ChatGPT, Claude, or Perplexity, and incorporating those into your copy as well. I have a Beginner's Guide to AI SEO you can request here. It walks you through what you need to do for AEO, GEO, and AI-based SEO. 

 Fifth, add an opt-in to the content pages that you’re creating so that you can begin to nurture that new lead and, in time, turn it into a customer. Not sure how to create a lead magnet? Get started here.  You want to make sure your opt-in or freebie directly helps your ideal customer and is the next step from initial content information to action. You want it to be a quick or easy win for them, something where they can feel like they're making progress within 10-15 minutes at the most. You don't want it to be a 30-page PDF; keep it short, simple, helpful, and actionable. You want them to not only request the guide, but also use it because when they find something from you that's helpful, they're more likely to want to work with you again in the future. 

How does this SEO strategy work?

As you create & optimize more content, you should start to rank for more keywords and be more visible on AI search. When you are more visible, you're more likely to be found by your ideal customer when they're searching for information related to your niche. Being visible wherever your ideal customer searches is the key to growing your business online. 

The higher you rank in Google’s search results, the more traffic you get. Generally, the websites in positions 1-3 get about 60% of all search traffic. As you move up on page 1, you will get more traffic because more people will see your search results. With AI-based search, we don't have to rank on page 1 of Google, which is very helpful, especially in instances where you are in a competitive niche and it's hard to find keywords that you can rank on page 1 for. You want to be visible on traditional search and AI search to be able to be found by your ideal customers. 

If your website offers value to them, they’ll likely stick around, sign up for your opt-in, or return the next time they have a question about something related to what you do. You also want to send them your nurturing content each week if you have an opt-in and have collected their email address. The content that you create and share with them each week needs to answer more questions, provide value, be helpful, be actionable, etc. You don't want to teach them everything in your free content, or they won't have a reason to buy from you or work with you, but you want to teach them enough that they find you helpful. It's a real balancing act, isn't it? Anyone who's been creating nurturing content for a while knows that it's a challenge to find the right amount. I've been sending my weekly nurturing emails since 2018, and it's definitely a balance to find the right mix of teaching, help, and still making sure that people have a reason to pay you so that you can stay in business. 

Taking the time to determine your SEO content strategy and choosing the right keywords and AI questions can help send more qualified traffic to your website every day. The more people Google and AI-based search engines send your way, the bigger your audience can grow. What's great about organic growth or SEO traffic is that it sends you people who are interested in what you offer and are actively looking for information, guidance, or help. You're not trying to catch their attention when they're doing something else, like we are with social media and paid ads. Now, that's not to say that paid ads or social media are bad for marketing. I believe that all marketing channels can work for a business; you just want to have a mix of channels that you use to grow your business. 

See how easy it is to grow your audience with SEO? If you're ready to do this for your business, I'd love to help you. I work with students in a group program or one-on-one. I'd love to help you with this too. Let's chat. 

If you're ready to do this for your business, join me in Simple SEO Content, and I'll walk you through how to do it step-by-step.