For startups and small businesses, hiring the best SEO agency to invest in SEO seems to be a mere extra expense. Little do the owners know that SEO is one of the most cost-effective ways to grow their budding business. It’s fairly cheap but the techniques are powerful enough to create a high-quality network that can boost their profit.
If you think you are one of them, then it’s time to change your outlook and consider investing on SEO. The real question now is whether to DIY your SEO, hire a full-time SEO specialist, or avail the services of an SEO agency.
For so many reasons, going the third route could be the best option. Below, we will find out why.
Hiring SEO Agency for Growing Your Small Business
If you’re the owner of a small business or a start-up company, you would usually handle most of the tasks to save on having to hire additional staff. In your marketing, you’re probably doing all the lead generation as well as the sales generation. Then there are still other things to worry about like branding, social media marketing, and payroll. But the list just keeps on going on.
When it comes to marketing strategies, the load has been greatly lessened since the internet was made. Most businesses today already have their website, making business owners reach a wider network and boost their sales. But having a website go live isn’t enough. Like I mentioned in my blog about instant Google indexing and crawling, you need to tell the search engines that you exist in the internet realm so that it can add you to its list of websites competing for ranking.
Now, this process is a part of the SEO strategy. And not all business owners know about it or are experts in doing it. You can only enjoy the benefits of SEO when you do it right. Otherwise, you are just wasting your precious time trying.
SEO done right will get you high-quality traffic that can be translated to sales. First things first, though. For you to get the traffic I am talking about, you need to appear on the top ranks in search engine results pages. This way, people browsing the internet will know that you are there and that you have what these researchers are looking for.
The best part? SEO is free. It’s an organic traffic that you don’t need to pay for in every campaign you launch. SEO are strategies that give Google signals that you have relevant answers to user queries without paying for ads. But while the strategies are free, you might still need to invest on a few dollars to employ the best SEO agency or SEO strategist to carry on the task.
Remember, SEO expert wannabes may just hurt your SEO stint. You may just be wasting your time so be sure to find one with a credible reputation. But before I walk you through the qualifications of the right SEO expert and best SEO agency to hire, let’s first look into the benefits of investing on one.
Hiring a professional is always worth the investment. Not only do they ensure quick turnaround but they also make sure that the quality of work they render will result to your business’s profitability. Here are some more reasons why you should definitely invest in hiring an SEO agency:
1. Benefit from the Experience and Knowledge of an Expert
Only Google knows how exactly it is ranking contents. However, SEO experts work on thoroughly analyzing the trends so that they can at least have an idea of how they can come close to the standards set by Google.
It’s estimated that there are 200 factors used by Google to rank published websites and pages. Knowing what these factors are and how to rank according to these criteria require a lot of work. If you aren’t willing to go through this tedious phase, then hiring an SEO expert is the right route to take.
However, you need to make sure that you hire the best SEO agency. I’ve seen a lot of SEO wannabes who give substandard services or use what we call black hat techniques. If you don’t know yet, these are shady SEO practices that may work for a time but when Google finds it out, the punishment will hurt so much that your website might even suffer from being banned from search results altogether.
A good SEO agency and SEO professional will stay on top of the ever-changing algorithm and use only what Google approves of. They will evaluate your competitors and help you create and implement a strategy that will get results.
2. Improve Your Website’s Overall User Experience
When outsourcing your SEO, it’s important to look at it as a holistic process. Since you are paying at least a thousand bucks for an SEO package, your agency’s work should make a clear impact on your website ad not be limited to simply optimizing content.
- Target the right keywords.
- Learn the updated rules of search engines on ranking
- Work on loading your website faster.
- Make navigation on your website more user-friendly both on desktop and mobile.
- Win more traffic for your website.
- Help you rank on search engines.
- Help you turn your traffic into sales.
- Generate more leads.
- Make your phone rang.
- Plan and execute a clear strategy
By hiring a well-rounded and the best SEO agency, all these should be achieved easily and turn you into a more competitive business in the digital marketing. If they focus only on keywords for their strategy, then your SEO is technique and you are just wasting your money and time.
3. Analyze Your Data
Anything from your profitability to the effectiveness of your SEO stints are nothing when you don’t measure them. When you analyze your data, that’s when you will see which areas need improvement and how to make adjustments. Sure, there are tons of tools available online, but not knowing how to capitalize on them will make you lose on a lot when it comes to conversion.
- Number of visitors per day
- Keywords that users are using to find your site
- Keywords and other SEO elements used by your competitors
- Your website and landing page’s bounce rate
- Your content that’s earning engagement
- The traffic and engagement you get from social media.
- And the Next step…
So while it sounds easy to optimize a page or content, doing the strategies will let you see how difficult it really is to up your SEO. And when you do it on your own, without the right knowledge and experience, you will just end up wasting the opportunity for you to rank.
Now that you know how important it is to get a professional service rather than doing it on your own, the next thing to do is to know how to hire the right person:
1. Find Out Their Process
SEO specialists and agencies have their secret strategies too that they don’t reveal to help them stay on top of their competitors. But when you get bids or inquire for services, be sure to have them explain to you their process. You may not know exactly what they will discuss about but you can always do your homework and check on Google whether they are telling the right things or they are just tricking you with words just so they can win the project.
Research is the backbone to SEO so the agency you plan to hire should place a lot of emphasis on research. When interviewing a potential SEO agency, ask about their research process. Each SEO campaign is unique and should be driven around your company, its goals, and the type of market you are targeting. So the right SEO agency should be able to adjust and do their research well around whatever niche you are in.
2. Can They Give You results?
SEO is a long process and you won’t be able to see the results instantly. It’s not like you add a keyword and then your traffic automatically goes up. You should give it time until your efforts convert into profit. Ask for their previous projects and find out how they achieved good results. To know whether they can do the same for you, ask them to show you a case study.
3. Check Their Own Ranking and Traffic
An SEO agency who can’t even rank their own website might not be the right one to hire. The best proof that your SEO agency is good enough for your precious investment is their own stats. If the agency pursuing you doesn’t rank on the first page for any of the services they provide, that is one local SEO agency you should avoid (I have plenty to mention but they’re too obvious to can catch them).
4. Do they optimize for voice search?
I already discussed about how voice search is the next big thing in SEO this 2020. Google is making queries more natural because more people are now searching the internet hands-free. The techniques are now trickier since people have their own unique way on how they ask questions. If you are going to do it on your own, you might already spend a day trying to figure out this new technique and still haven’t come up with the right steps.
Voice search isn’t going to go away soon. It will just keep on improving as mobile devices also keep on becoming more modern. Hence, your SEO agency should know how to optimize your site for voice search so you can rank on search engines.
When you hire someone, they need to think beyond the right-now and focus on the future of your business. A short-sighted SEO strategy isn’t going to get you results in the long run, and voice search should absolutely be on your radar.
Final Words
These are some great ways to help you find a reputable SEO agency to handle your SEO needs. Their rates vary but for sure, your investment will be worth it. A trustworthy SEO firm will work with you to find the package and pricing that’s best for your business.
