Online responses to COVID-19 for your business
Online responses to COVID-19 for your business
By Courtney Rambo, Intellitonic
Google is doing its best to combat misinformation during the international health crisis. Their organic search results are favoring authoritative public health entities including the World Health Organization (WHO), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as well as established news outlets. Additionally, Google Ads is prohibiting targeting (keywords and ad copy) capitalizing on the coronavirus. Note: Keyword research in Google Ads Keyword Planner does not have any search term data beyond “covid” – this is true for other keyword research tools as the majority of them rely on Google’s data.
Update Your Online Channels
If your business model is affected in any way (e.g. changes in service delivery, supply chain, ordering, etc.), consider the following actions:
- Email your constituency
- Update your website
- Add a banner to your website header indicating your status or special efforts
- Update your homepage hero with information
- Add a new page to your site fleshing out how you’re combating the crisis
- Update your FAQ page
- Update your contact page (and any location pages)
- Avoid creating a subdomain or separate website
- Update your social media channels
- Share any new pages or blog posts you create
- Update your Google My Business
- Again, share any new content
Any Covid-related updates made on your site should explicitly relate to your business. Now is not the time to try to rank for searches related to the situation e.g. coronavirus, corona symptoms, etc.; not only is Google not allowing it, it may negatively hurt your SEO in the future.
However, if your product or services are related ancillary to the situation, we suggest you look in your Google Analytics account for new content ideas:
- Login to your Google Analytics account
- Go to Behavior / Site Search
- Look at what people have been searching for on your site in the past 15-30 days
- Create a new page or blog post addressing the most common searches to ensure you’re giving people what they’re looking for
Courtney Rambo is the director of Bellingham-based digital marketing agency Intellitonic.
