It is important to ensure professional search engine optimization (SEO) is conducted on a website’s content even in a difficult financial climate, it has been claimed.

Minneapolis-based SEO firm WordsmithBob explains that failing to do so is the most common cause for a website achieving poor results on search engines.

But businesses are told to engage the assistance of a professional content provider in light of the fact that there are two main stages to online profitability.

These comprise attracting traffic to a website more effectively than competitors and converting those visitors into sales.

"If your business website isn’t performing, it’s usually because it wasn’t properly search engine optimized or it wasn’t written by a professional website copywriter," WordsmithBob asserts.

"In that case, almost any improvement would increase sales – even in a recession."

The organisation adds that putting in place good quality content can turn a website into a "24-7 sales machine".

But attempting to do so without expert assistance can damage search engine rankings more than doing nothing at all, the firm concludes.

Katherine Griwert is Brafton's Marketing Director. She's practiced content marketing, SEO and social marketing for over five years, and her enthusiasm for new media has even deeper roots. Katherine holds a degree in American Studies from Boston College, and her writing is featured in a number of web publications.