Imagine a new business owner.  Let’s call him Steve.  Steve has been working as a house painter for many years. He is among the best around.  His work is admired and he is the consummate professional.  He worked for many years for somebody else.  He finally decides to venture out on his own.

Steve has no experience as business owner. He is a master at his craft and has learned a lot about pleasing customer from his experience working at a painting company.   Steve will likely do what most people in his shoes do.  He will register a business name, put up his shingle, buy a yellow page ad, get his first work from his circle of friends, family and other contacts…and then hope word of mouth will do the rest.

Here’s the problem. Hope is not a plan.

But all of Steve’s competition is doing exactly what he is doing. That’s just how it’s done.

But what if that wasn’t how Steve’s business did it?

What if SEO was used to the company’s advantage?

What if Steve decided to shake it up?  What if he decided to get a website?  What if he used that website to let people know all about him and his company. What if he showcased his work and his expertise?  What if he had great content that let people know he was a top notch painter.

Let’s go a step further. What if Steve decided to commit to a strategy to create a website that would show up in search engines for keywords relevant to his industry, his specializations, his offerings and his service area?

Meanwhile, other painting companies are using the old cross your fingers approach.

SEO would turn out to be a big advantage for this startup.

Instead of hoping the yellow pages worked and maybe, if he got lucky, he would show up in a Google or Yahoo local directory,  Steve would be deciding where he wanted to be found and doing something about it.  When people typed in a search for his services he would have strong web pages ranked. He would have pages that out shine his competition and make him look much more polished and reputable.

SEO would give his company more exposure to potential customer and most likely increase leads.

If you are a small business owner you owe it to yourself to think about how you can use the internet and SEO to help your business.  The sad truth is that many startups just don’t give it the attention it deserves.

However, you could be the one who does and reaps the rewards for it.