How to Run SEO in Singapore?

7min.

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How to Run SEO in Singapore?
15 January 2023
Asia, especially the Far East, is the market full of perspectives for many investors and business angels. A lot of local businessmen made the most of dynamic growth at the end of the XX century and gained a solid position in the industry. Some knowledge of SEO process in Singapore will be precious to stand out of the competition and other offers.

7min.

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”Asian Tigers” are countries full of contrast. There are a lot of various development models leading to one goal: economic growth and living standards’ improvement. The modern technology sector and advanced electronic solutions are growing rapidly in the biggest cities. However, if we only go a bit further out of the urban area, there is a chance we’ll encounter a few smaller towns where life goes on slowly and peacefully, but even there you can spot some solutions created for life improvement. Singapore is a bit different in this matter: this city-state has an impressive population density and a very high level of service advancement helping those who live in overcrowded districts. Singapore stands out when it comes to the cleanliness of public facilities and high penalties for its obeying. The economy of developed Far East countries is a mix of free-market rules, known from the West, and author approach, where authorities interfered in various processes, encouraging to invest but on the other hand protecting from global companies’ domination. Effect? Countries such as Korea or Taiwan are well-known all over the world due to their modern electronics or cars. Need SEO in Singapore? Contact delante If we take a close look at tools in our house or office, there’s a great chance that one will find the words “Made in Taiwan”, “Made in Korea, or “Made in Malaysia”. The Far East market is a subject for deep reflection, but let’s focus on SEO in Singapore.

Singapore- internet user portrait

The history of Singapore is strongly connected with Great Britain and partly with Malaysia. Why are we mentioning this? It’s mainly about the languages- a small city-state is a cultural mosaic in this respect, but the most popular, next to Chinese, is English. Virtually all websites- government, with service offers, or e-commerce, are prepared mainly in English. This makes it significantly easier for investors who, when opting for SEO in Singapore, can prepare content in universal English. It’s also worth focusing on the fact that many foreigners work in this country. According to the official data of the Department of Statistics (singstat.gov.sg), they represent over ⅓ of all employees. What they have in common is that they are fluent in English.   Let’s not forget that the current cultural mix present in this country has developed a number of local phrases in the form of simplifications that can help with the presence on the market.

A resident of Singapore- an active user who has a large choice

The small size of the country translates into limited resources. A rational approach was to focus on the development of financial and trade services and education. As for the industry, processing dominates with the typical Asian domination of electronics. This translates into the level of technological advancement and knowledge of residents that can be described as conscious and active internet users. According to the information on sbr.com.sg from January 2018, 4,83 residents of Singapore use the internet. This number makes up about 84% of the whole population of the country. This is one of the highest in Asia. Over 90% of them use the internet every day. A very important conclusion from the posted data is the fact that the most popular tool for browsing the internet in Singapore is a smartphone. A website adapted to mobile devices is an absolute must-have. The answer is Google search engine priorities - a functional version for smartphones is a big plus in the assessment of robots.

SEO in Singapore- popular search engines

[caption id="attachment_9180" align="aligncenter" width="750"]Search engines in Singapore The most popular search engines in Singapore (source: gs.statcounter.com)[/caption] When it comes to traffic generated by search engines, the obvious leader in Singapore is Google with over 95% of market shares. Despite a large number of people using the Chinese language, products such as Baidu are of marginal importance. In the context of SEO in Singapore it’s a very important tip. Preparing a website according to the recommendations of this well-known tool can help improve search engine rankings.

E-commerce in Singapore

Due to attractive conditions for investors, Singapore has become the headquarters of many companies or their large, regional branches. This translates into the structure of e-commerce in this country. It is dominated by large online stores whose main offices are located in Singapore and their activities include neighbouring countries such as Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Hong Kong or even China. When opting for e-commerce on the Singapore market, you should prepare yourself for competition in the form of websites:
  • qoo10.sg- a wide assortment- home, clothing, electronics, cosmetics, entertainment
  • lazada.sg- similar to the ones above
  • zalora.sg- clothing of local and premium brands
  • sg.carousell.com
You can’t forget about the local version of Ebay.com Therefore, the local .sg. domain and the professional location of the online store (code en_SG) addressed only to the customer from Singapore can bring effects in the form of improving the position of the brand.

What do Singaporeans look for?

Taking the incomes of individual segments of e-commerce into account, according to data from statista.com, the most popular types of purchases of Singapore people were from:
  • the electronic and media industry- an income of over one billion US dollars
  • the fashion industry
  • the furniture industry
The next positions were toys, food and personal hygiene. The largest increases are predicted for the last group mentioned. It’s hard to say if these parts of the market have room for new members- this is a topic for analysts. In SEO it’s important to remember that the key words connected to the brands mentioned above can be very competitive in search engines. Finding your niche can be the recipe for success. [caption id="attachment_9181" align="aligncenter" width="750"]e-commerce Singapore E-commerce market development predictions in Singapore (source: statista.com)[/caption]

International SEO in Singapore- how to start

The first thought that comes to mind when it comes to SEO in a specific country can be searching for local SEO agents. In Singapore’s case, the issue is more advanced. Because of the specificity of their small market, local SEO agencies that we can find on the first pages of search results show their world optimization as the main element of their offer. It’s also a standard to individually price projects based on information from clients. If we become interested in available prices of packages of SEO services in Singapore, they are very different, depending on the involvement of specialists in the process, as well as the number of analysed and monitored keywords. A basic SEO package costs around $300-$500 monthly. It should be remembered that a dozen (or even 20, 30) keywords for a bigger store can be too little. Bigger packages cost $600-$800 a month. The prices of advanced, extensive linking and site optimization, based on an unlimited number of keywords, will definitely exceed a monthly cost of $1,000. To effectively position your website on any market, you don’t have to use the services of local agencies. Many companies offer local and international SEO services that can be narrowed e.g. to the market described in this article.

SEO in Singapore- where is it worth being seen?

The professional process of SEO is divided into two main activity groups- onsite and offsite. The second one mentioned are activities outside of the site that are used to acquire valuable links. A few years ago it could have been treated superficially according to the rule, the more the better. Currently (luckily for the users) quality is the most important due to the continuous development of Google algorithms.

Social Media in Singapore- create your own community!

[caption id="attachment_9187" align="aligncenter" width="750"]Social Media in Singapore The shares of specific social media services in traffic generated on the internet- Singapore, February 2019 (source: gs.statcounter.com)[/caption] When it comes to social media, Facebook is the leader which shares are going down. The rising curve is primarily on Pinterest and Twitter. About 5% of the shares also belong to Instagram. If your business has the possibility to promote through interesting product pictures (e.g. the fashion industry) it’s worth creating content on Pinterest. According to statistics, it’s more popular than Instagram and also allows you to add a directing link to your post.

Are you active locally? Show it!

If an integral part of your business is an active office or another service point in Singapore it’s worth using services that make it easier to find this place in crowded streets of the “Lion City”. The first right idea is Google Business Profile. You should also take a look at the equivalent created by the giants biggest competition- Apple Maps. In Singapore’s case, local services also have certain value- brand catalogues. It’s worth paying attention to their offers. Using moderated services that aren’t filled with spam can help raise the credibility of the site in search engines. Directing links from these domains usually have the “nofollow” attribute, however, for reasons of marketing presence in such a service, acquiring them can give a positive effect. When building a base of external links avoid creating only links with the “dofollow” attribute. Here are five interesting examples of local brand catalogues:
  • sgpbusiness.com
  • insing.com
  • yelu.sg
  • yellowpages.com.sg
  • thegreenbook.com
[caption id="attachment_9188" align="aligncenter" width="750"]Yelu brand catalogue in SEO Singapore yelu.sg - one of Singapore’s brand catalogues[/caption]

Bet on collaboration, show up on forums

The catalogues mentioned above won’t be a good idea for companies that don’t have their own point in Singapore. They aren’t a rich source of good quality external links. It’s worth considering a collaboration with local media, influencers and other services that publicise sponsored content. In addition to creating an image of an expert in their field, we also obtain valuable links that will help raise the parameters of the domain’s authority. Another possibility is being active on popular industry forums. You should definitely avoid spamming, valuable statements will support users while also naturally allowing them to create a link to the desired website.

Website optimisation - Quality first!

A huge amount of money spent on improving the website’s visibility in search engines won’t work if it lacks valuable content. Search engine algorithms are able to evaluate if there is an informative and meaningful description with highlighted keywords that users search. Preparing relevant and, what is crucial, unique product descriptions, writing a professional blog full of valuable content and developing a user-friendly website will definitely help to increase the number of visitors. On the other hand, using content copied from other websites, serious shortcomings in categories’ descriptions and meta tags, can jeopardize climbing to the top of search results. There are many tools that can help to find relevant keywords, including Google Search Console and SEMrush. Some tools are specifically helpful in finding long tail keywords, and answerthepublic.com is one of them. Because English is commonly spoken in Singapore, such analysis (if conducted by an expert) can have a very high value.

Wrapping up

SEO in Singapore is not an easy task because of the special nature of this market and strong competition. The key to success is proper content preparation and analyzing keywords and user behaviour. Quality link building is not less important, both in terms of content and domain authority. A successful SEO in a given country doesn’t require being physically present there, nor working with local companies. All that counts to get satisfactory results is knowledge about the market and the industry coupled with the skills of an SEO specialist.
Author
Author
Bartek

Author
Author
Bartek

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Awards

Award - Deloitte 2021 Award - European eCommerce Awards 2022 Award - European Search Awards 2022 Award - Global Agency Awards 2022 Award - IPMA Award - US Search Awards 2021

SEO SEM Agency based in Europe