SEO basics for a small business website: where to start

Start with your Google Business Profile

When someone searches “dentist near me” or “hotel in Krabi”, Google shows a map with businesses before it shows websites. That listing comes from your Google Business Profile. It is free.

• Claim the profile and complete the verification Google asks for.
• Fill in everything: name, address, phone, opening hours, category, website.
• Add real photos of the place, the team and the products.
• Write the name, address and phone exactly the same way everywhere: website, Facebook, listings.
• Reply to reviews, the good ones and the bad ones.

For many small businesses, this profile brings more calls than the website itself. Do it first.

Give every page a clear title

The page title is the blue line people click in the search results. It is also one of the strongest signals Google reads. A good title says what you offer and where: “Italian restaurant in Chiang Mai | Your name”. A title that only says “Home” says nothing.

Each page needs its own title and its own short description. Keep the title short enough to fit on one line in the results. Put the important words first.

Use the words your customers use

People do not search for “hospitality solutions”. They search for “guesthouse with pool Koh Lanta” or “how much to repaint a condo”. Write those words on your pages, in normal sentences.

• Give each main service its own page or its own section.
• Answer the questions you hear every day: price, opening hours, location, parking, delivery.
• If you serve Thai customers and visitors, write real pages in each language. Tourists search in English, and local customers search in Thai.
• Write for people. Repeating a keyword twenty times does not help.

Make it fast on a phone

Many of your visitors arrive on a phone, often with an average connection. A slow page loses them before they read a word, and Google takes speed into account.

• Compress the photos. One heavy image can slow the whole page.
• Avoid automatic sliders, video backgrounds and pop-ups.
• Check that buttons and phone numbers are easy to tap.
• Test your page with Google's free PageSpeed Insights tool.

Help local search

Google needs to understand where you are. Write your address as text on the site, not only inside an image. Add a map. Mention the area, the street and the places nearby that people know.

Links from other local sites help too: a partner, a supplier, a local association, a directory for your trade. A few real links are worth more than many bought ones.

Check the technical basics

• The site uses https, with the small padlock in the browser.
• It has a sitemap, which is a list of its pages for search engines.
• It is registered in Google Search Console, which is free and shows the searches that bring people to you.
• Each page exists at one address only, without copies.

What to expect, honestly

SEO is slow. A new site usually needs weeks or months before Google shows it for useful searches, and the result depends on your competitors as much as on you. Be careful with anyone who sells a guaranteed first position. Google decides the order, and it does not sell places in the normal results.

What you can control is the work: a complete profile, clear titles, useful pages, a fast site. Look at Search Console once a month and keep improving the pages that people already find.

If you post a website project on Vemly, say in your project that you want these basics done. Each developer tells you in their offer what they will do. No developer can promise a position on Google, and nobody honestly can.