• Well, you don’t necessarily need a professional to manage your website SEO. • Hiring a pro, however, makes your SEO effort more effective and faster as we all know that SEO is a time-taking process. Hence, it may take several months to years to rank websites in the search engines if handled by a nonSEO. • For anyone who is ready to invest in their businesses’ SEO efforts, it’s time to go beyond the DIY SEO trial and onboard an SEO expert/firm to get the job done right. • Now, the challenge is to find and hire a trusted SEO provider that can drive profit-driven results and clients to your business. How to do that? How to determine which SEO service provider is reliable enough and can serve your expectations?
Well, here are the top 8 tips to help you find and hire an SEO provider successfully:
• • • • • • • •
Consult To Get Recommendations From Your Network Request An Honest Quote Know Well About The Company Offerings Inquire The Efficacy Of Their SEO Strategy Schedule An Appointment Research The Company Thoroughly Let The SEO Provider Know About Your Business’ Goals Do Comparative Analysis And Pick The Best SEO Service
We will check those in detail below. But, before that, let’s vet out why you should hire an SEO firm and what mistakes you should avoid in the process.
Why To Hire An SEO Provider? • Though there are numerous free tools and resources to help you successfully implement your SEO strategy on your own, outsourcing SEO services from a reputed/relied SEO firm adds more perks to your SEO efforts. • As mentioned earlier, SEO is a time-taking process, it is not always the easiest part to figure out. So, availing of professional assistance helps a lot in fast finding of effective solutions rather than wasting time and money than what’s required.
If you are still not convinced that it is worthwhile hiring an SEO provider, check out the following benefits that it guarantees: An SEO company: • Prevents the need for guesswork from your SEO effort, thereby helping you to start with an effective SEO implementation strategy, right from the beginning • Saves money by pursuing highly targeted, data-driven campaigns that could reduce your overall marketing budget to a significant amount • Expands your business’ online visibility by taking it forward to multiple online channels • Prevents risks of serious SEO errors and, most likely, the Google penalties • Gives vivid details of your website analytics, what those data imply, and how they matter for your business These are the most proven ones from the long list of numerous other benefits of hiring an SEO provider.
What Mistakes To Avoid While Hiring An SEO Firm? • These are some of the mistakes often made while hiring an SEO company: • Thinking that a company ranking at the top in Google searches is the best existing company ever: This type of assumption is a common mistake that most entrepreneurs commit. The maximum they do is search on Google for the best SEO services provider in their particular [geographical region] to hire their assistance, just because that service provider ranks on Google as a top SEO firm in that selected location. • Most business owners have preconceived thinking that the company might know SEO well and so, it outranks in SERPs. But, that’s not always true. • The Google ranking of any company depends on a number of factors, including spamming, data/products/services relevancy to user search, SEO optimization, etc.
The fun fact is: to get a good Google rank, many SEO providers use black-hat spamming techniques to improve their presence in Google searches. • Agreeing with a fixed estimate: SEO needs a customized approach to fit any website’s business goals. While some businesses might require minor help in SEO, others may need a complete suite of SEO services. In both the cases, the requirements are different and so, the project quote should also be different. • That is the reason why you should not go for an SEO company that demands a pre-fixed package for their SEO assistance; regardless of the project type or its requirement.
• Hiring such a company could be a financial loss to your business as they might quote an unworthy budget. • So, make sure that whichever company you hire gives first preference towards understanding your business requirements and issues, and then they accordingly create their SEO strategy to give you a feasible quote. • Trusting fake ‘credentials’: Step back if an SEO provider claims that it partners with Google SEO services, or has Google “connections”. But, the truth is that there is no such Google SEO partner, specifically, albeit there are several Google Ads partners. • Avoid falling into the trap. • Getting into long-term agreements: If an SEO agency offers you a service contract of 1 year or more, step back and search for another company that offers short term contracts to meet the deadline.
• Locking yourself up in a long-term agreement with a company (whose services are returning nothing fruitful to your business) will make you pay them as per the contract. • Also, you won’t be able to seek help from a better SEO provider until your current contract period ends, as that would be a double load on your SEO budget. • Note: If an agency is genuine and true to its service offerings, then you will see that effect on your business’ improvement. Then you will automatically keep returning to them, seeking their assistance for a longer-term. Then why will they need to lock you with a long-term agreement?
Tips To Consider For Smart SEO Hiring • It takes careful observation and consideration of certain points while looking to hire an SEO agency that could meet your business goals. • That is why, we have compiled below a list of considerable SEO tips to help you settle for the right SEO provider for your job:
1. Consult To Get Recommendations From Your Network
• Asking for SEO agency recommendations from your existing network of business professionals who belong to the same industry as yours is a good source of information. • These are the people who previously took assistance from any trusted SEO firm, and can give you honest reviews and vouch for their provider’s services, directing you to the right path.
2. Request An Honest Quote
• Once you get the right SEO consultant for your business website, request an honest SEO audit for their SEO services and assistance on your site. Also, confirm the timeline their services would take to make effect into your business. • Step back from a service provider that’s cryptic about their service offerings and charges. • A decent SEO company knows what should be the cost for what type of website optimization and how long it will take to accomplish the proposed business goal. The company may also provide additional add-ons. But, that’s a latter topic; their upfront estimate will only include the basic charge that you can expect from them to work on your project.
3. Know Well About The Company Offerings
• Many SEO consultancies claim to provide an “all-in-one” SEO package to their clients. But, every business needs a different SEO approach to work out accordingly. So, you need to be wary of anyone promoting such a pitch. • A genuine one-stop SEO service provider will first view and understand your project requirements thoroughly. Then it will accordingly tailoring a strategy that fits your target audience and goals. • Make sure to confirm what services your chosen SEO agency offers so that you are rest assured of what you can expect from them for your project. Also, you will be super clear about what you would pay them for. Some of the primary SEO services include on-page and off-page SEO, technical optimization, inbound link building, local SEO, content development, etc.
4. Inquire The Efficacy Of Their SEO Strategy • It is the sheer dream of every new and old business entrepreneur to be at the top in SERPs (search engine result pages). But, SEO is not only about outranking in search engines. A reputed SEO agency knows and understands the efficacy of an SEO strategy if done right. It could help businesses grow and make big money, so they also consider performance indicators (KPIs) and not just the ranking. • Rate of lead conversion, traffic generation, revenue generated, are some of these KPIs instances. These metrics play a major role in determining the true worth of an SEO strategy and measuring the workability of your SEO efforts.
5. Schedule An Appointment
• Before signing a contract, a phonic or face-to-face conversation is a must to stay transparent from both the ends (client and service provider). • Scheduling an appointment with your potential SEO service provider helps you discuss your needs in detail, inquire what they offer and how they can help you. All these give you a better idea of whether this provider is the best fit for your job.
6. Research The Company Thoroughly • Before signing an agreement with an SRO agency, it is always better to do a little homework on researching their service offerings, SEO approach, and the results they generated for their customers. • The research involves checking out the website reviews/testimonials, searching on social media platforms, and checking out the company’s website portfolio and case studies.
Check out the testimonials/reviews • Whether you are recommended by anyone in your business network or you stumbled across an SEO agency, you should check out their testimonials to sense the company’s working strategy and how much its services are liked by its previous clients. • Additionally, look for the successful results that they generated for their clients in terms of high traffic generation, frequent lead conversations, increased sales, and more.
Check out their socials media channels • Nowadays almost every SEO firm has its presence across the social media platforms. So, checking out their service contents on their social media pages is a good idea to sense their SEO approach and how they communicate to help the clients. • Apart from reading their reviews, also read blog posts and other content shared on their social media channels to determine if it is the brand you can work with.
Check out the company portfolio and its case studies • While checking the social media pages of your chosen SEO company for reviews, don’t miss out its website’s portfolio and case studies of their past works. • Though testimonials give you enough good reasons to hire a particular company, case studies are a stronger proof of how successfully their services worked for their previous clients. • See if your search for a good SEO company fulfills the following: • Does the company communicate a deep understanding of analytics and how to elucidate them? • How does the agency determine and measure its client’s success? • Does it only focus on improving your search engine ranking, or it also considers the other discernible metrics? • These questions are clearly imperative to ask yourself while checking their website content and case studies. These responses can either make or break your confidence in that company’s services, thereby revealing if it is a right company for your business.
7. Let The SEO Provider Know About Your Business’ Goals • Ranking #1 is the noble goal of any new or old business. But, you may also have some specific purposes and goals to meet which may differ from other businesses. • So, be sure to share all your necessary credentials and plans with your chosen service provider so that they know what you are looking for. Also, ensure if both of you are thinking alike in that regard. • The right company will be able to articulate your SEO objectives by crafting a new SEO strategy accordingly. They will know what can practically work out for your business and be able to fulfill your demands right from the start.
8. Do Comparative Analysis And Pick The Best SEO Service • Before settling for a service provider, compare all your chosen SEO agencies thoroughly concerning all the abovediscussed aspects and see which company fulfills most of the criteria. • Shop around, check out any number of service providers, view their insights well, testimonials, etc. and then decide which fits the best for your business. Ultimately, it will roll down to who understands and knows what it would take to realize your business objectives through your SEO campaigns. • Hire The Best SEO Agency For Your Business • It requires thorough research, asking the right questions, vetting out necessary reviews or testimonials, and proofs to determine the reliability of an SEO company. • Any worthy agency will take time to decipher your business goals and requirements to develop a custom SEO strategy that could fit well your SEO needs.
• Sun Media Marketing is a leading digital marketing services company in India that has earned a reputation for its reliable, time-bound, and custom SEO solutions and others. • Contact us to know more, or to request a free SEO audit: • Give a call: +1 (917) 267-8626 •
+91 -9898-630-296
• Drop an email: info@sunmediamarketing.com
249, 2nd Floor, Maruti Plaza, Nr. Vijay Park BRTS, Naroda, Ahmedabad – 382350, Gujarat, India.
info@sunmediamarketing.com
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