How should we know which seo company to hire?
Introduction
Let’s be fair, there are so many SEO agencies out there, so you absolutely have a huge selection of businesses that you can choose from. From your freelancers, right through agencies employing over 300 staff, there are a huge number of businesses scattered all across the United Kingdom.
Yet, it’s rather like looking at a menu full of delicious food, that is you only need one meal, but what one should you select?
Well, we thought we would write a rather handy guide to help you think about some of the things that you need to consider when picking an seo agency
Now what it all boils down to, is quality, don’t therefore jump into a deal that seems too good to be true, because often it’s just that, it’s too good to be true.
When the price is too low you have to contemplate this, how much work are you actually going to get out of any agency for a very low monthly fee?
Let’s say the actual staff member working at the company gets paid let’s say minimum of £17 an hour, then you have to think of the profit the marketing agency is going to make from that employees work.
So in reality what are you really can get for say £200 per month? In reality probably very little work from the marketing company.
You might only have say seven hours spent on your account over the month, which will most likely be absolutely a drop in the ocean to what a lot of companies need in terms of seo work to push the needle in the direction of winning.
So that leads us on nicely to our first point
If it sounds too good to be true it probably is
You’ve probably heard the saying, “you get what you pay for”, while this is sometimes true when you picking an seo company, yet point granted there are some freelancers which work for a very low-cost and might do brilliant work.
Yet when you think of an agency and the office costs, the staff costs the business rates, and everything else that goes with running an office, the heating, lighting, insurances you name it, and also all those costly seo tools, what you got to think of is this, what can you really expect for a low fee?
And in reality, is the agency just going to waste your time?
In that the not really going to deliver the results that you want, and to be fair, should you even expect them to it produce brilliant seo results if they are getting paid, well practically anything?
So that’s the first point over done and dusted, you do get what you pay for when it comes to hiring an seo agency.
However, with that said, paying through the nose doesn’t make it a good deal neither
Point taken, we have just said you get what you pay for, but we also have to balance that argument and say this, paying a small fortune for seo (search engine optimisation) doesn’t mean your always going to get a brilliant deal neither.
It’s not like buying a car, where if you pay more, on a brand-new car, well you often get more for your money.
This principle cant be extended when describing marketing agencies,because there are agencies which set up, which look absolutely brilliant, they are set up in the most desirable business locations, fancy offices, they may have a large amount of staff, but then bang, overnight the disappear and the set up under a new name somewhere else.
So don’t think that paying a fortune for seo will get you everything you want, because sometimes it simply doesn’t.
Its not about how much your paying, it’s the quality of the work that matters.
You need an agency you can work with
Now you might be scratching your head thinking, well this blog post is just stating the absolute obvious, of course we need an agency we can work with.
Yet let us elaborate a bit on what we mean by this, what we mean is did you should actively enjoy working with the agency.
The reason why this is important is because seo is very different from other services that your business may require.
So for example if you need an electrician to turn up and do something for your business, well it doesn’t really matter if they have a bad attitude, as they fix the lighting in a short amount of time and then you might not ever need them again.
But if you gets appointed a project manager for your seo, and you don’t like their attitude and their managing your seo on an ongoing basis, then things can become an uphill struggle.
The reason is you need to find somebody you enjoy working with, that you know you can pick the phone and talk to them and voice any concerns or simply just see how things are going, and that you enjoy working with them.
The reason why this is so important is because organic seo, it never really comes to a stop, of course it does stop when you stop paying, what we mean is when you do stop paying then your business can start to go back down the serps again, so often businesses invest for years.
For example, is not uncommon for businesses to invest every single month for say 10 years. The reason for that is that businesses are constantly competing with other businesses in order to get your business up the ranks on Google.
The soon as your agency takes their fourth of the accelerator, then you can start drop back down Google’s serps, and sometimes fast if your business is in a highly competitive business sector.
So the point we are trying to make is this, you need an seo agency that you really enjoy working with, better still when they get along well with them, you might even want a pint after work and discuss your seo, so the marketing agency should be your friends, and help your business, and then you can have a good working relationship that may last many years, helping your business, and the agencies.
Understands the latest methods
With seo, things are constantly evolving, changing and therefore marketing strategies need to adapt to reflect this.
You will always have those seo agencies which think that they can cut corners and that they see a loophole that they can use their advantage, from our experience however, successful marketing strategies come down to hard work and using the latest seo methods.
And this does involve a lot of reading, so you do need an agency which understands the latest seo methods and keeps their skills up-to-date.
Because if the marketing agency gets a little bit rusty in regards to their seo knowledge, then its easy for other agencies which have their finger a bit more on the pulse to quickly overtake your company.
You really do need an agency that understands what is called the latest “white hat” methods, and you might not think the seo changes all that often but it does.
Small incremental changes are made to Google’s algorithm, so if you don’t keep up on top of these changes then your seo agency may well become a dinosaur within the seo industry, and won’t be long before they become extinct.
So, what you really need to do is to make sure that you have an agency which understands the latest seo methods.
Now probably the best way of gathering if your seo agency has its finger on the pulse is not a quiz the staff members, with whether they know something or not, such as saying “tell me all about Google’s penguin update” because this might be seen as testing, testing of their patience .
Instead, what you might want to do is to ask for clients that are currently working for, and then see where they are ranking on Google.
Are they doing well? Are they ranking on page 1 of Google?
Or are they are languishing on page 10 of , Google which is not a good sign that they using the best seo methods.
Why not ask the agency if you can contact their clients directly, or at least one of them have a quick chat on the phone?
You will then begin to decipher whether they have a good working relationship with that client or not and if they have managed to improve the seo for that business.
And at the end of the day the proof is in the pudding
You can stare into fancy graphs for was long as you want, you can purchase the most expensive seo tools on the market, and you can sit down and drink as much coffee as you want with your seo agency, at the end of the day the proof is in the pudding.
What we mean by the proof is in the pudding is, are your sales improving?
If things are getting better and obviously the seo agency might be playing their part in that success.
If you’re getting more sales then this is great, then you simply need to weigh up is it translating into a good investment or not.
Because the truth is you can stare into graphs and look at facts and figures until you’re blue in the face, but sometimes it comes down to one thing and as turnover.
If your sales are improving online, then your seo agency might be doing their job.
