SEO - A Portuguese and European Perspective
SEO is a big deal, worldwide, as businesses realize that consumers no longer have access to products only through their phisical stores. Someone in China can order a product from the US and get it in a few days, if he or she is willing to pay for the extra speed.
This is a radical shift and those who don’t see it, will pay the price. The online world is becoming more and more competitive and you won’t get new costumers using old tactics anymore.
Sure, in the US this is clear cut. You need a site, a well designed, accessible site, with fresh content and preferebly with a blog inside to create buzz and interest in your products, you need online marketing campaigns and a creative approach to sell.
Europe, on the other hand, has always been a more conservative market. At least the old europe. We are slowly realizing the online potencial for growth and the erasing of borders that comes with universal access to the Internet. Someone in Portugal can sell directly to a client in Bruxels, Amsterdam, Cape City our Korea. It’s really amazing.
In Portugal Internet access is much better than, say, 10 years ago. But only the younger generation accepts it without question. Baby boomers are reluctant. And Baby boomers run big companies. Usually they still invest a lot of money on traditional marketing and see the online world as something small and not really that important.
The thing is. Costumers don’t see it that way. More and more people here are researching produts online, even if they end up buying them in a store. Those people are valuable clients.
Today there is only one SEO company in Portugal: www.searchmarketing.pt. Other companies have online marketing services, but are usually web design firms as well, so they are not as focused.
Recentely a directory here began a seo contest. It’s called “esquillo seocontest”. You can find out more about our perspective on SEO here: esquillo seocontest. It’s the first portuguese seo contest and we hope it enlightens more people to the reality of SEO. Sites must be visible online, and people searching for products are extremelly valuable costumers for businesses.