Small businesses everywhere are beginning to understand the need for an Internet marketing and SEO plan. In today's day and age, many businesses are already on top of the SEO game and rankings. In order for small businesses to compete they need to make a plan and put it in motion, immediately. However, with all the misinformation available on the Web today, if you are an SEO-newbie, you may not know where to begin or what to believe. Here are some basic tips and tricks of the trade to help get your company on the search engine map.

• Understand that SEO is not a one-time thing. SEO and Internet marketing is a process that takes a lot of time. Understand first and foremost that an in order to see results from an SEO campaign, you must first make the commitment to stick with it. Also understand that top rankings to do not happen overnight and if you have a new site, the process may take even longer than you expected. However, all of your waiting and hard work will pay off in the long run.

• If you're hiring an SEO firm, make sure to ask a lot of questions so you understand the process. Even if you hired someone else to do it for you, try to learn as much as you can about the process so you can do what you can to enhance what they're doing and kick your marketing campaign into overdrive. When working with an Internet marketer, it's a team effort, so make sure you're open to be a team player, otherwise you may find yourself disappointed.

• Make sure your Web site design is SEO-friendly. If your site's design doesn't cater to the search engines right off the bat, you're going to run into some problems. Work with your SEO firm and design team to make sure search engines can properly crawl the pages of your site. Also make sure your site is great and user-friendly. If you're going to do all of this work to get people to your site, it better be good, otherwise people will just leave and never come back and all of your hard work will be for nothing.

• Track your Web analytics. Make sure you set SEO goals for your team and have Web analytics in place so you can analyze what you're doing right and what areas need to be improved upon.

• Include a site map. Remember that search engine's cannot index pages that can't be found to crawl. If you have a site map, the search engine spiders will be able to understand how many pages your site has and crawl each and every one.

• Use keywords everywhere. Conduct keyword research then make sure to use keywords for everything you do. In the URLs, file names, Web copy, headlines, photos, videos, social media and more. However, it's important to understand the difference between using keywords and spamming. Don't overload your Web copy with keywords, keep it at one keyword per paragraph. Otherwise your site will look like spam and could be put on the Google blacklist.

• Use META tags. META tags are found on the back end of the Web site that only the search engines see. Make sure your META title is 70 characters or less, and your META description is 200 characters or less. Also include META keywords and a ROBOTS tag to tell the search engine spiders how often to come back and crawl your site. Use different META tags for each page of your site.

• Create great content to impress your visitors (and the search engines). The content on your Website is extremely important. You wouldn't want your visitors reading your site and finding it boring or hard to understand, getting discouraged and leaving the page. Make sure your content is informational, persuasive and above all, written for your target audience. Good content also makes search engines happy and your site will be rewarded with higher rankings.

• Start link building. Submit your site to quality link directories. Start a blog, get on social media networks and link from them. Seek links from trusted sites in your area, find quality, relevant Websites and ask for a link exchange. Write articles and press releases and submit them to directories.

• Participate in social media marketing. Getting on social media networks allows you to connect with your customers on a more casual level. This will make them feel more comfortable with your business, which will inspire brand loyalty. It also gives you a platform to make company announcements as well as promote sales, specials and give away coupons.

Following these tips and tricks will help get your Website to the top of the search engine rankings, boost your sales and leave your competition in the dust. So what are you waiting for? Get started on your Internet marketing campaign.