SEO basics for small businesses

Start with the questions customers ask before they buy: what you offer, where you work, what it costs and how to contact you. A useful service page answers those questions directly. Search optimisation helps people discover it.

Check that the site can be found

Verify your site in Google Search Console. Inspect the important URLs, check indexing reports and submit a sitemap. Confirm that the live site is not accidentally blocked by robots.txt or marked noindex.

Keep links to important pages in the navigation and relevant content. If you change an address, redirect it to a suitable replacement. Our redesign guide covers that planning.

Give each page a clear purpose

A page about website maintenance should explain the work, responsibilities and next step. It should not repeat the homepage with a different keyword in the heading.

Use a descriptive title and a short, accurate summary. Search-result snippets can be shortened or rewritten, so treat character counts as editing guides rather than strict Google limits. Use headings to organise the page and helpful links to connect related topics.

Describe informative images with appropriate alt text. Decorative images should have an empty alt attribute rather than a list of keywords.

Make the page usable

Read it on a phone. Check that the same important content is available, the text is legible and contact controls work. Review loading speed and responsiveness, and serve the site over HTTPS.

Good technical scores do not guarantee rankings. Useful content, relevance and the wider search context also matter. Google’s starter guide is a useful reference when evaluating SEO advice.

For a local business

Make the service area and contact details easy to find. If eligible, maintain a Google Business Profile with accurate hours and categories. Ask customers for honest reviews without incentives or pressure. See our Tirana local-search guide for the details.

Review results over time

Use Search Console to see which queries lead to impressions and clicks. Check whether those visitors become relevant enquiries. Allow time for changes to be processed, and avoid treating a daily ranking change as a verdict on the whole site.

Update information when it changes and publish new content when you have something useful to explain. You do not need a fixed word count or a weekly article to make a service page worthwhile.