When is the best time to do Search Engine Optimization on your website?

Using Search Engine Optimization is crucial for your website’s success. While SEO is a long-term strategy, performing certain measures (such as keyword optimization) is critical for your site to rank for the keywords your ideal audience is search for.

But when should optimization happen? Right away? Or after a site has been live for some time?

Here’s the best time to do Search Engine Optimization on your website.

1st choice: When you launch (or relaunch) your website

In a perfect world, you’ll want to optimize your website when you’re first launching (or relaunching) it. This is a perfect time to update your keywords, content, navigation, links, and so on.

One of the biggest reasons a site launch (or relaunch) is the best time to perform SEO is because keyword research will drive so many of the choices you make during your website build. Here are just a few examples:

• URL: While, more often than not, branding outweighs SEO for your URL, keyword research may factor in here.
• Website platform: The search engines like certain Content Management Systems better than others. If you’re developing a site with SEO in mind, the platform you choose to build your website on will be a big consideration.
• Navigation: the keywords you uncover during keyword research may cause you to choose certain terms over others. When you have to much so much emphasis in such a small space, it’s important that your users understand your meaning in the navigation structure.
• Calls-to-Action: Usability is very much an SEO issue, so SEO and competitive research could help drive design and recommendations for CTAs, too.

The launch/relaunch is also a great time for SEO because you can get everything done at one time. Since you’re often creating or rewriting content at this stage, it’s much more efficient to also perform SEO.

Last but not least, it’s effective. The longer your website is live and optimized, the more beneficial it will be for you.

2nd choice: Soon after you launch your website

If you can perform SEO research and strategy on a website soon after it’s launched, it’s not ideal, but it’s certainly better than the alternative.

Be sure to – if nothing else – make sure you have some sort of statistical tracking system (such as Google Analytics) installed so that you can be guided through some beneficial SEO change using the data to your advantage.

3rd choice: When your site has been live for some time

If you absolutely have to wait to perform SEO, it’s not the end of the world. There are many reasons for having to wait, such as budget, time, and so on.

However, strongly consider also doing a full site overhaul if you’re going to perform SEO on a website that’s been live for several years. The reality is: the design and platform may very well be out-of-date and need to be freshened up any way. (And like we said in the first choice, a relaunch is the perfect time for SEO!)

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Search Engine Optimization is going to benefit your website no matter when you do it. However, there are certainly better times than others. If possible, try to get SEO done right when your site is launching or about to be launched.