Last month, we published a blog post on important questions to ask before hiring an SEO company. The reality is many business owners are on the ropes about whether to outsource their SEO and digital marketing efforts or to do the work on their own. Large corporations can afford to hire an SEO specialist and have them work in house. Many small businesses and startups don’t have that luxury. There are many things to consider if you’re an entrepreneur in this position and the biggest factor to consider is time.
Here are some of the most important factors to consider if you’re undecided on outsourcing your brand’s SEO and digital marketing efforts.
SEO Is Always Changing and Evolving
The search engines are always changing their algorithms so what works for your SEO strategy today may not work next month. Believe it or not, there are a lot of people on the web that aren’t focused on delivering great content to readers and are just out to make a quick buck. Search engine algorithm changes must be done in order to stay one step ahead of those trying to game the system and cut corners. Are you prepared to go back to square one and learn the newest strategies following a major algorithm update like the Penguin update? Are you prepared to study up on the latest SEO changes and recommendations via popular SEO sources like Google’s Matt Cutts, Search Engine Land and Moz? Do you plan on attending annual SEO and digital marketing conferences like SMX and Pubcon to hone your SEO knowledge and stay up to date?
Search engine optimization is not a one-time task and requires a long-term strategy; especially for businesses in saturated and competitive markets.
Do You Know How & Where To Find Backlinks?
Building links to a website is much more sophisticated than just creating status updates on social media. There are plenty of domains on the web that you DO NOT want to have linking to your website. Nothing gets websites penalized quicker than spammy backlinks. For businesses that are hoping to rank well in the local search results, do you know how to find and build citation listings? Do you understand the importance of making sure all of your business information is the exact same on every citation listing?
Another popular link building strategy is to audit the backlinks your competitors have built to their website and then trying to build those same links to your website. Are you well-versed enough in SEO to complete this task? Do you know how to create content and build backlinks on blogging websites like Tumblr and Medium? Do you know how to reach out to key influencers in your niche and ask them to provide a link to your website?
Do You Know How To Build A Targeted Audience On Social Media?
Instagram and Youtube are really the only social media networks where a brand can attract a large audience by only publishing content. Truth be told, most businesses don’t produce enough beautiful imagery or informative videos to build a large audience on these networks. Although businesses should at least create an account for every social media channel available, Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter are effective social media channels where brands will need to put in work in order to build a targeted audience.
The audience you build will need to be an audience that is legitimately interested in the products and services your brand offers. A targeted audience is an engaged audience and will be looking forward to the content your business publishes in the future. Are you familiar with Facebook boosting and Facebook advertisements? Do you know how to connect with the right professionals on Linkedin? Do you know how to attract the right followers on Twitter with the use of hashtags and conversation?
Today, social media marketing is as interconnected with SEO as it's ever been. The search engines are now sophisticated enough to measure how well your content is received on social media. These measurements are also called "social signals".
Can You Make Sense Of The Data In Google Analytics & Google Search Console?
Google Analytics and Google Search Console are the two most important tools when it comes to measuring the effectiveness of your brand’s SEO strategy. Interpreting the data can be tricky but greater understanding will come with time. Google Analytics will provide data such as your website’s most popular pages, how many visitors are coming to your website, how they’re getting there and how they’re interacting with the website as a whole.
Google Search Console will provide you with information regarding server issues, crawl errors, broken or missing pages within the website and valuable information regarding sitemaps. It’s very important that business owners and their marketing staff know how to navigate these two platforms because it will tell the story about which marketing strategies are working and which aren’t. If you don’t have Google Analytics or Google Search Console integrated into your website, you will likely need to assistance of an SEO professional or a web designer to help.
Do You Consider Yourself A Skilled Writer?
Inbound marketing, also called content marketing, is slowly replacing outbound marketing. Rather than spending money to interrupt people’s attention and trying to get them to notice your business, businesses are creating content that answers questions, solves problems and engages readers. The content then provides an opportunity to pitch the products and services offered by the business. Business owners will slowly see an increase in revenue and conversions in return. The power behind inbound marketing lies within the effectiveness of the major search engines and their ability to provide answers to popular search queries.
ALL business websites should have a blog that gets regularly updated with original content. Otherwise, your website is limited to ranking only for it’s internal pages (“about us”, “our mission”, etc.). Are you skilled enough to write content that answers your customer’s questions? Do you know how to effectively promote that content on social media after publishing it to your blog? Do you know how to strategically decide what an article’s title should be? Do you know how to strategically incorporate important keywords into the content you’re publishing? These are all key components of inbound marketing.
Outsourcing your company’s marketing efforts or hiring a full-time SEO specialist is not cheap. And like anything else, you certainly get what you pay for. The average salary of an SEO specialist will range anywhere from $45K-$65K annually. SEO agencies are very flexible and will offer different pricing packages based on your brand’s needs.
Contact John Mann SEO Consulting
Are you small business or entrepreneur that’s ready to invest in the services of an SEO specialist? John Mann SEO Consulting is a reputable SEO company in Nashville, Tennessee that offers services such as search engine optimization, social media marketing, content marketing and email marketing consulting. To schedule your free consultation or to learn more about our services, please give us a call at 615-491-9819 or complete our inquiry contact form. We are passionate about helping business owners scale their business via a stronger digital presence.