Businesses have been urged to increase the amount of informational content on their websites to achieve higher search engine rankings by one industry expert.

Suzy Sandberg, president of search engine marketing company PM Digital, told Internet Retailer that informational websites will always outrank retailers.

However, she notes that firms selling products online can improve their search engine optimisation (SEO) by including informational content that would fulfil the same needs for consumers as sites such as Wikipedia.

Research by NPD shows that 81 per cent of internet users go through search engines to find the information they need.

Some 45 per cent of searching is done using multiple keywords, which when included on websites can help improve SEO.

Further figures from Forrester Research also indicate that 81 per cent of new websites discovered by users are found through search engines.

What sort of informational content should retailers use to improve SEO?

Business Feet deliver targeted results through search engine optimisation