You’ve spent years building your business, soliciting new clients and customers to get your foot in the door, and doing what you love daily: serving your locale’s pet parents. Kudos to you. We know it’s not easy breaking into any industry.
So, we can understand the devastation you may feel when you discover that focusing solely on SEO for your pet website is only half the battle. That’s right—there’s another thing called OSO, and if you’re not incorporating OSO best practices on your site, you may not be reaching your whole target audience.
No worries. Your friends at Barketing Solutions are here to break down SEO and OSO, what they are, and what might work best for your pet website. Check it out below!
What is SEO?
SEO, which stands for “search engine optimization,” is on the tip of every tech-savvy pet business owner’s tongue. It basically refers to how visible your website will be when a potential client or customer searches for pet supplies or services in their local area.
So, if you want to stand a chance at nabbing that crucial regular dog walking contract that’ll help keep revenue flowing, you need to rank high on the SERP, or “search engine results page,” as studies show most people won’t scroll past the first five listings.
What is OSO?
Okay, so if SEO refers to ranking on sites like Google, Bing, and Yahoo, then what the heck is this other crazy acronym and how can we use it to make sure we’re reaching our target market?
OSO stands for “optimization for social outlets” and involves social media. Sites like Instagram, Facebook, and more feature marketing are everywhere on the web these days, so you’ll want to prioritize OSO if you want potential clients to find you while scrolling through their feeds.
What makes OSO so important? Well, recent surveys found that virtually all consumers in the US and UK have at least one social media account and follow, on average, five businesses. So, if you want to develop a brand identity that keeps you fresh in your customer’s minds, you’ll want to build a site that follows OSO best practices.
How Do SEO and OSO Work?
Businesses that rank highly with SEO and OSO aren’t doing it by accident. An algorithm determines what will perform well and what will be pushed out of sight and out of mind.
For SEO, it’s all about on-page and off-page content, including variables such as keywords, meta tags, backlinks, site speed, and mobile-friendliness. On the other hand, OSO involves content relevance, social sharing, user engagement (likes, comments, shares), influencer partnerships, and trending hashtags.
Let’s break that down into layperson terms: SEO is about whether your content reflects quality and expertise, whereas OSO refers to popularity. If people like and share your posts, use your hashtags or tag your profile in them, and otherwise keep you front and center on their feeds, you’ll rank higher and become more visible.
Think of it like a digital word-of-mouth. The more people like what you’re doing and share it, the more others will find out about you.
How Can We Put OSO to Work for Our Pet Business?
Theory is great, but how does this all work in practice? What things can we do to maximize OSO and drive traffic to our site? Well, it’s all about content, content, content.
Do you have a super adorable picture of a pug fresh from his walk with your staff? Snap a pic, think up a funny caption, use a buzzworthy hashtag, and post it (with their parent’s permission, of course).
Have you got a short video clip of a Goldendoodle chasing its tail or a pack of huskies enjoying a frozen treat to cool down in the hot summer sun? Maybe a picture of a teacup chihuahua in, well, a teacup?
Give the pet parents what they want: pictures and videos of cute pet stuff, funny pet stuff, and stuff that you, as a pet lover, would like to see when you log on to your social. The more people you attract with your content, the more they’ll engage with your brand, find out more, and ultimately do business with you.
It doesn’t happen overnight, but by always keeping time and OSO in mind, you can use these principles to drive traffic and increase revenue.
Level Up Your SEO & OSO with Help from Barketing!
We get it. You’re already wearing many hats managing your business, so where are you supposed to find the time to incorporate OSO into your site and social media?
Good news: you don’t have to! Barketing Solutions is the industry leader in building SEO- and OSO-optimized sites that drive traffic and get results!
Contact us today and find out how we can take your pet biz website to new heights!
Erika Godwin is the President of Barketing Solutions and the Co-Founder and CMO of ProPet Software, an industry-leading kennel management software. Erika has over 8 years of experience with WordPress and graduated from Elmira College in 2009 with a BS, Business Administration- Marketing and Management. View Erika’s Full Bio.
