By Dagmar Gatell (SEO Expert, Guest Blogger)

If you are a cat lover, you know what I am talking about. Your cat can be your biggest fan or your biggest enemy.

Because I am an SEO consultant and a cat lover, I find it amazing to see the correlations between my cats’ behavior and human behavior online. And how the second positively (or negatively) influences the SEO ranking for a website.

Like SEO, there are myths, and there are facts about cats.  What may be a fact to one person, may be a myth to someone else – especially when it comes to cats.

Over the last two years I rescued four of these little furry babies:

• SHEBA: A female Russian Blue, who sees everybody as her servants and shows it too!

• KIT: My Australian Tabby, who is a true Florida boy. He’s calm, relaxed, wants to be friends with everybody and enjoys to annoy his siblings.

• SNOW WHITE: The huntress in our cat family, a white Siamese. She’s sweet, loving, feisty, and my only cat that would survive without me feeding her. (You know what I mean.)

• LILIPUT: My little tripod, who is also a female Russian Blue. She’s a smaller size than my 15-pound Sheba and eager to explore her world by hopping and jumping – faster than any of the other four legged cats.

So, now that you know my cat family, you’re probably wondering what this has to do with SEO and your website’s ranking. I would, too.

Scroll down to read more about why knowing your cat helps your website rank better. Enjoy!

Insights of a Cat and SEO Lover

Fact #1: You don’t choose a cat. A cat chooses you.

My first cat, Sheba, was that one cat in the shelter that nobody wanted to adopt. She was overweight, not moving at all, and did not pay attention to anybody who tried to get her to come to the front of the cage to pet her.

So I just sat in front of the cage and started speaking with her. I could see her pointing her little ears and her eyes started to light up, looking in my direction. Then, she lifted her heavy body up and walked to the front of the cage, ready to be petted.

The same happens online. You don’t choose the visitors who come to your website. They choose you. To make it easier for them to pick you (like Sheba picked me) you want to “speak in their language”.

Understand their search intent and choose keywords that are answers to their questions. Do your keyword research to know what your visitors are really searching for. Don’t assume. Use the facts you can find, for example, in the free keyword research tool like Google Adwords Keyword Planner.

The easier you make it for online searchers to choose you, the more they will come to your site, stay longer, read your amazing content and go deeper into your site. All of this is seen by search engines and helps to improve your website’s SEO ranking, because the search engines assume these are signals of happiness and satisfaction with what you offer.

Fact #2: Cats need 6 weeks to feel safe and comfy in a new environment. And then, they trust you.

I didn’t know about this, but my friend Kim made me aware of it. And, looking back, it makes sense. For the first few weeks after I acquired each cat, they moved slowly and tentatively until we created trust.

They got used to my voice and how it changed, depending on what I said. They got used to my movements, or my fragrance. I could see when they stopped being nervous around me and trusted that they were in a safe and loving environment.

Now, let’s look at what’s going on your site. Searchers find your site in Google or Bing and click on your search snippet. They land on your site and subconsciously question if they can trust you or not.

Are you trustworthy enough to stay, or should they leave immediately? Did the page they landed on have the same “taste” and “smell” as what you promised in the search snippets on Google? If yes, they will stay. If not, they most likely will leave immediately.

Online visitors who leave immediately will negatively increase the bounce rate of your website. A bounce rate indicates the percentage of new visitors that find your site, but leave immediately.

A high bounce rate impacts your website’s SEO ranking negatively. The search engines assume you don’t do a good job taking care of your visitors or, in the worst case, misleading them. Always make sure you fulfill the promise you give in that initial search snippet on your landing page. It’s worth it!

Fact #3: Cats don’t want to be told to what to do. But they will follow you if they see a benefit in it.

I tried it. Really. I tried to tell my cats when they should come to me. especially when it’s night time and the sun sets.

Snow White, my little huntress, loves to be outside when it’s dark, but she just cannot do this. We have wildlife here in Florida – bobcats, panthers and alligators.

I try to tell her this and what happens to little cats when they don’t want to come inside. They get eaten. But normally, she does not believe me, and I have to trick her by shaking the treat box. That’s the only way she makes it back inside.

Try to tell your online visitors what to do by shouting at them or dictating their next actions on your website. They will leave.

But now, give them a “treat”, and they will stay and go deeper into your site – which is perfect because this increases your time on site and number of pages/visitors data.

How you can do this? Give them a treat in the form of an easy-to-digest, tasty internal link to another relevant blog post that will educate them, inspire them or help them to find the solution to another problem they have.

Fact #4: Cats want to be spoiled. It’s all about them, first and foremost.

My cats could live without me if there was another good person that would take care of them. I could not live without my cats. That’s the truth, and they know it.

Perhaps you’ve heard it before, but nobody cares about you unless you show that you care about them first. Our online visitors really don’t care about what we say, how much of an expert we are, how great or outstanding we are… if it doesn’t benefit them.

They don’t know us. But they know their problems and the challenges they face.

Keep this in mind when you fill out your metas, your title tag (SEO title), meta description and alternate image tags. Getting ranked on the first page of Google – when you fulfill all the SEO requirements – can be easy, but if nobody clicks on your search snippet, how good is it?

Google shows you in your Google Search Console how many times you were showcased for search queries it finds relevant, as well as the conversion rate for each search term.

The better your conversion rate, the more Google will think you’re doing a great job and, as a result, showcase you more. This helps your overall website’s ranking and gets the right targeted traffic to your site, too!

Fact #5: Cats are picky with food. They only eat what they want to and when they want it.

I am not in control – not in life, and not with my cats. When I was younger, I thought I was King. I thought I could control time, what I wanted to do and when I wanted to do it.

Then life happened. My German husband died, and I got it. We are not in control. My cats are a great reminder that life happens. We better get used to it and make the best of it.

On average, a website attracts 75% researchers, 10-15% shoppers or people who compare features and pricing, and 10-15% buyers. Depending on where they are in the buying cycle or their customer journey, they will be interested in one (or more) of the following:

1. They are just curious what you have to offer.
2. They are interested in what you have to offer.
3. They’re evaluating what you have to offer.
4. They are ready to make a decision about your product.
5. They already bought from you, and they are looking for more.

Make sure you fit your content to the target market you want to attract, whether it’s the topics you write about or the keywords you find in your research.

A researcher won’t buy your product, whereas a buyer probably isn’t interested in the latest industry news. By offering them the wrong “food” – topics or keywords – you could not only prevent a potential conversion, but also, you could send negative signals to search engines. They may “think” you don’t have what it takes to provide visitors what they’re looking for.

Fact #6: If cats love you, they love you forever.

It took a long time for me to stop hoping my cats would love me, but rather allow them to decide when, where and how they wanted to show their affection.

The same counts for the search engines. You cannot make them love you and see you as an authority. The computer programs (bots) that search engines send out to index your site will store it in their big archives, then tag and label them with keywords they find relevant.

They won’t love you if you write a blog post about a trip to Spain today, then another post about women’s rights tomorrow, and next week, you provide the step-by-step plan on how to cook the perfect pasta.

To rank a website well, it is a marathon, not a sprint. To be seen as a go-to expert in your industry – and also be recognized as an authority by search engines – create relevant blog posts on a consistent basis and make sure your website shows a clear focus on a specific topic/niche/industry.

Fact #7: Cats will tell you what they want. And you better listen.

I have two cats who are talkers. First, I didn’t understand their “language”. Now, I know exactly the meaning of each sound of their voices.

Snow White talks the most, especially when she brings her prey home or she wants something that Mama does not want to give her. Kit talks when he’s complaining about the girls – they don’t let him sniff their butts. He’s often looking for Snow White, and she hides, because he annoys her.

Understanding how to speak in the search engines’ “language” (metas) and using your online visitors’ voices does two things: It brings you higher, relevant ranking on the first page of Google and clicks to your website. Having one without the other doesn’t bring you the conversions you are going for.

So, start listening, and stop shouting about what you think they both want to hear.

I think by now you can see that I love my cats! All four have their own unique personalities and behaviors, but together, we have built a bond that is unstoppable.

And that’s exactly what I want for you, too. I want you to be recognized by search engines as the amazing expert or company you are, and I want you to attract the perfect client, ready to be convert – so you can help them to make an impact and change, for the better.

She is the founder of Global Empire SEO Consulting and the co-founder of Sozial Monster.

Dagmar helps entrepreneurs, small businesses, and subject matter experts to turn their expertise into a global business.

Read more about Dagmar at http://dagmargatell.com.

ALSO READ – DIGITAL MARKETING DONE RIGHT

The post 7 Facts About Cats That Will Help You Rock Your Website’s SEO Ranking appeared first on Wilde Agency.