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You open your internet browser and enter: SEO into the search box. In a nano-second you are provided with thousands of results for SEO. SEO tools, SEO books, SEO software programs, SEO consulting firms, and so on. Your head begins spinning with so many choices before you to make. Especially considering that the success of your business is largely dependant upon your choosing the correct SEO procedures for your website.

At first glance SEO and all of its strategies might seem to be nothing more than just common sense, and how hard could that be, but in actuality, many of the strategies involved in search engine optimization can be difficult to implement. It is for this reason that you might need help with the SEO of your website.

Choosing to work SEO on your own or with someone who isn’t an expert in that field could mean that your website may be overlooked by the search engines, leading to lackluster amounts of traffic. It is easy for those who are inexperienced with search engine optimization to make a mistake that costs their website the high ranking it needs to generate traffic crucial to high sales, or worse, get their website expelled from search engines.

Someone with comprehensive knowledge about how search engines work and what exactly a website needs to meet the requirements for listing and positioning among the search engines can ensure your website is meeting those requirements. These experts also know what to do to beef up a website with straight-forward SEO, for websites that would otherwise fall short of the requirements of the search engines.

Search Engine Optimization experts have their ears tuned into the industry pipeline and are among the first to become aware of search engine rule changes, and how those changes could affect the optimization of your web pages. They are usually among the first to hear about the success of new SEO techniques and to learn how these can best benefit you.

The knowledge you can glean from these experts can save you countless hours of searching for the answers you need about search engine optimization and from wasted dollars on materials that are not necessary.

Investing in SEO programs and software can be costly, especially if you are not sure of what you need and don’t need. SEO experts know the best SEO programs that are available on the market today and that means avoiding spending money on programs you don’t need or that simply don’t work.

An SEO expert has the knowledge and expertise to evaluate your website’s content and design, spotting areas that need sprucing up and areas that need additions in order to raise the probability of being picked up by search engines.

Most webmasters are busy enough with making sure the warehouse is properly stocked with product and fulfilling orders, without the added burden of finding the time to properly monitor all of the things that are involved in the SEO of a website. The last thing you want as a webmaster is to get buried under the avalanche of reports that are produced from using various SEO strategies so that you’re unable to use that information to improve sales.

Having someone help keep you on track by organizing, and monitoring the results reported, pays a big dividend in the headaches and missed opportunities to increase sales and profit that won’t happen because you have competent help on your side.

The question you should be asking yourself at this moment isn’t why you might need SEO help, but when are you going to get the SEO help you and your business deserve? You can find reputable SEO consultants and firms to help you with optimizing your website online. Ask them to give you a complete proposal of how they can help you with the SEO of your website. Make sure they can show you success stories from other clients and go with the ones who have had the best results with search engine optimization.

SEO experts are your #1 resource for information about the newest SEO strategies, services, and software programs coming in to use in the marketing industry, so why not take advantage of that valuable tool for the profitability of your website. The promoting of your business through a website is one of the most time and money consuming activities of a successful business. SEO is critical to getting the most out of your financial and time investments.

Why not let an SEO expert worry about the details of just how to attract the most traffic to your website. Leaving you to concentrate on the very important detail of connecting with your online customers for their increased loyalty to you and your company, and increased buying of what it is you are selling.

Many online businesses always find it a good decision to hire the services of a SEO expert. If you look through the Internet and lookup search engine optimization, you will definitely come up with tons of pages that try to explain how it can be done. In fact, it seems a very easy thing to understand and learn about. In fact, it may give you the impression that SEO is all about using your common sense to improve your web site’s visibility.

Well, the thing is, SEO is not something that you can jump right into and expect to learn in one sitting. The strategies involved in search engine optimization are just too complicated and very demanding to implement. As you first read about SEO today, you might find it easy for now but at some point, you will find yourself digging deeper and deeper into a world that you do not know. If you have time to learn about technicalities, programming and the intricacies of search engines, feel free to become a SEO expert yourself. However, given the complexities, many webmasters and businesses find it smarter and cost effective to hire a SEO expert to improve their site traffic. All of them never looked back.

Your website deserves only the best. It deserves to be noticed by people, especially the ones who will likely be interested in the products and services you provide. For this reason, you should entrust your search engine optimization needs to no less than a SEO expert. A SEO expert is equipped with all the knowledge, resources and tools to help your website fare highly in search engines. Here are some of the advantages of hiring a SEO expert:

1. A SEO expert will help you avoid the consequences suffered by most companies which have done SEO on their own. These include penalization due to improper SEO implementation, or ineffective SEO leading your site to fall right into oblivion.

2. There are just too many different SEO techniques. What will be good for one company might not be good for yours. There are many different factors to consider when choosing from various tactics, and a SEO expert will know just what you need.

3. A SEO expert will know the different rules and guidelines imposed by search engines. They know the right approaches to legally get you into the first page of search results on your keywords. A SEO expert will have a lot of experience and knows the proven implementation strategies best for your business.

4. A SEO expert will know how to tweak around their approaches depending on various variables and closely monitor whether traffic improves with a specific set of SEO configuration.

5. SEO experts are the first to find out about new and recent developments on search engine guidelines and will have inside information on the workings of the SEO industry. This way, they will know just what to do to keep you at the top of the rankings and maintain that.

6. Your SEO expert will help you choose the most economical yet most effective SEO tools and services. You can do away with those which are not effective and focus your efforts on the tools that bring about positive results.

7. A SEO expert will offer the services of evaluating and assessing both the design and the content of your site. Your SEO expert will also scan your site regularly for areas which are inadequate and provide you suggestions to improve your search rankings.

8. A SEO guru will expertly look for multiple level approaches to get you the desired targeted traffic that your site needs. Factors such as site design, keyword density, Meta tags, page size and even the amount of space on your pages will be considered thoroughly.

9. Being a business owner (and webmaster in some cases) is a very demanding job. Hiring a SEO expert will save you a lot of pain and headache in managing your business.

With the SEO expertise to support you, you can save lots of time and earn you the chance of personally managing the most important aspect of your business. Your SEO expert will make sure that your business gets known in the online world, while you improve the business aspect to provide the best service to your customers. All these will translate to increased business efficiency and more importantly, to profits.

It is important that you choose your SEO company very well before hiring one. This will save you from losing some of your precious time and money. If you choose the wrong one and get poor service, imagine how potentially wasteful it would have to be to do everything all over again.

Everyday, there are thousands of online entrepreneurs who spend thousands just to get a few minutes of time offered by an SEO company or an SEO coach. They wonder why their SEO attempts don’t seem to work despite all the cash they spend. On the other hand, there are also those who enjoy SEO success and are happy with the services of the SEO company they hired. Well, the point is, you will need some guidance from an SEO company if you want to make a real headway on the web.

When you hire an SEO company to help you increase traffic into your site, you should have a realistic mindset and remember that success can only be achieved with time and with constant hard work. You must avoid those which tell you otherwise at all times, or you are bound to make a mistake. Here are some questions to help you through the decision making process. These are realistic, real-world questions that will help you screen an SEO company thoroughly. Remember that you need to recognize a true expert from a thief and decide accordingly.

Questions to help you recognize whether the SEO company can do the job for you

Will you be implementing the SEO project or do I need to do the dirty work myself?

This is a question best asked upfront. There is of course no right and wrong answer to these questions. This question can only help you weed out those who are not inline with your goals and with your expectations. You need to know whether your SEO company will actually make the project happen as you want them to or if you should expect to do the work yourself. The SEO company usually will ask you to pay additional for implementation of the project before they devote time and effort into your site.

What services do you pride yourself for?

If you are really lucky, you will find an SEO company which is good at one or even two aspects of online marketing. Asking an SEO company this question will caught them in an off guard position and will help you gauge their honesty. Watch out for companies which claim that they are good at each and every aspect of online marketing.

What do you like doing online?

The last thing you would need is a starving SEO consultant who does not enjoy working on SEO but only need to do so for the money. They will take your project and suddenly realize how much they hate what they do and your project suddenly takes forever to complete, if it does. Remember that SEO is a time-consuming process that needs dedication and effort. The mere process of writing content pages will take some time and good skills. You need to make sure that your SEO company can offer you these during the implementation process.

Questions you need to ask yourself

Do the SEO company and me think alike?

You will be better off not hiring an SEO company which have a different set of business philosophies than you do. If you want to be interactively involved in the planning of your SEO project, you need to choose an SEO company that will appreciate the fact that you are sticking around and doing the work with them. On the other hand, do not hire one that will write a copy for you and you end up editing most of the words. What you want is an SEO that will work with you and you will like working with.

Will I enjoy working with this SEO company long term?

What you want is a pleasing business relationship with the SEO company that you choose. You would want fun-loving, energetic and happy people who are inspiring to work with. Try to check whether you like the mood of all the members of the SEO firm. Better yet, ask your consultant what he likes doing on his free time. This may be a strange question to ask but you will know a grump based on what he does on his free time.

Thinking about hiring an SEO?

As more and more small businesses look for opportunities to grow, the term SEO (Search Engine Optimization) always seems to come up. Someone has a story about some business who made millions off tweaking a meta tag, and people get very excited. But before you go running out and hiring someone, there are a few things you need to know.

Don’t fall for the get rich quick story.

For one thing, let me be the first to tell you that a lot of stories about SEO are either exaggerated, or simply untrue. Yes, you can make a lot of money from SEO, there is no doubt about that. But in talks with people at parties, or other social gatherings I hear more and more “SEO stories” that sell a too good to be true situation and you should be aware of it. If they are unaware of my SEO background, they even tell me this stuff. They talk about some kid who tweaked a few tags and made millions of dollars off his blog, or a company who boosted their profits 300% in a month from a little SEO. I’m not sure where these stories originate, but you must keep in mind that SEO is new, but the same old rules apply. There is no get rich quick method, and you won’t get something for nothing. SEO will certainly be a positive addition to your business, but it requires hard work and sacrifice just like anything else. Which brings me to my next point.

Manage your own expectations

SEO is good, it’s obviously what I base my SEO website on. It’s what I do for a living, and I don’t want to try and downplay it’s importance. However, it is by no means a silver bullet that will make any business successful. It’s not the “secret trick” to make you rich. It’s something you do to grow your business and it works, but don’t expect millions to pour in every night.

SEO takes time

SEO is a long, continuous process that requires work and maintenance. Gone are the days where you could hire someone to tweak some code, and sit back to collect the riches. It takes a long time to get going, and requires maintenance. It could be months, or longer before you see any improvement in traffic and sales. Many times I’ve seen people talk in forums about hiring an SEO, seeing no immediate results and feeling “ripped off”. While it’s certainly true in some cases, in other cases the person or company actually did positive things for your site, and it took a while to kick in. It can take days, months or even years for the effects to be seen, so be patient. Content has to be spidered, links have to be built and indexed, and the major search engines do this at their own pace. While there are anomalies here and there, for the most part top rankings come with time.

There may not be a crowd of people waiting to find you.

This has been the hardest point for me to sell to a customer, and something I’ve personally been involved in before. Let’s say your business sells webkinz. If I work hard, and get you ranked up high, you’ll get thousands of new customers a day, because webkinz are hot. There are 7 million people a day searching for webkinz of some type. This is a hot term, and will get a lot of traffic (and will also have a lot of competition). But what if your business sells heating elements for clothes dryers? If I manage to get you a top spot, should you expect 7 million people a day? Of course not, in fact around 1,900 people a day search for this, and at best you can expect 10-20% of those people if you have a number one spot for it. Then, you have to convert those 190-300 visitors into sales. It may not yield the results you were expecting. That’s why you need to analyze your business, and your market. Are a lot of people searching for your product?

SEO is not always the answer.

I may get rotten tomatoes thrown at me, but there are times where you shouldn’t hire an SEO. If you are a small business that runs on a shoestring, and you have a small market, and an extremely limited niche market, it may not make sense to pay thousands for some top SEO company to get you a ranking. You may be better off grabbing a copy of SEO for dummies (which is actually a decent book for beginners) and seeing what you can learn on your own. Another option is, finding an SEO that’s “creative” enough to find other search terms and streams for your business. The final word on this is, don’t expect too much but make the best of what you can get. I have worked with several companies who were fully aware that only 300 people a day were searching for their product, but wanted to dominate the listings anyway for branding purposes. As a business owner this is your choice to make.

Ask up front

If you’re hiring an SEO, ask up front what they are planning to do, and what it’s going to cost. Make them go into detail. If they are concerned with trade secrets you may have to sign a non-disclosure agreement. But ask them specifically “what are you going to be doing to get these ranks”. And do a little research. If they say they are going to buy 1000 links from various sites, look up some things on google, or SEO forums to see what ramifications this method has. Ask the SEO for this information, and if they aren’t totally up front and honest with you, don’t hire them. I tell my customers exactly what I’m going to do, and why I do it, if they are concerned. Transparency is key, if they are trying to hide it from you it might be something sinister. Note: Don’t ever let a company tell you they can guarantee rankings. Nobody but Google can guarantee you a spot. Keep that in mind when talking to your sales person.

Ask about their rankings.

Ask them what rankings their company has. Check on them, and see how well they do for SEO. Because after all, what kind of SEO company wouldn’t employ their own tactics for themselves? Presently my website sits at the number one spot for “Portland SEO” on the big three, and has for quite a while. But am I the busiest SEO in Portland, Oregon? Not by a long shot. There are companies who are doing 10 times the amount of business I am, and they are nowhere to be found in the search engines. They employ traveling salesmen and cold calling to sell their product to hundreds of customers. Think about that for a second. If they are so great at SEO, how come they aren’t able to squash the rankings of a “little guy” like me? Why do they spend so much money on print ads and telemarketing? I’ll leave that up to you to decide. Would you hire a painting business who had a building that looks like it was painted by a group of preschoolers? If the answer is no, then don’t hire an SEO person or company who isn’t able to get their own site in the rankings (without paying for google ads).

Understand the Process

I can definitely sympathize with the business owner who doesn’t have time to learn SEO. You’re a business owner, a lawyer, insurance agent or painter. You’re not a marketer or computer programmer, and that’s why you hire an SEO. If you had the time, you’d do it yourself but that would take away from your own role. I have heard this from customers before, and I understand completely. However, knowledge is power. The more you understand what’s going on, the more you can control and contribute to your own site’s success. Browse through some SEO forums or websites in your spare time, or pick up a book on it. You can still hire an SEO but at least you’ll have a better understanding of what they’re doing, and maybe even be able to pitch in some valuable ideas. Who knows your own business better than you?

Be prepared to contribute

In a perfect world, you would be able to hire and SEO, throw them a small amount of pay and sit back and watch the numbers go up. But it’s not that easy. Be prepared to contribute and help out. Make sure your SEO knows everything you know about your customers, your business, and your market. The standard marketing rules apply here. Know your product, why it’s great and how it helps people. Know what makes you stand out from the competion, and know who you’re selling to. Then turn that information into power for the person doing SEO for you. Bounce ideas off them, answer their questions and help them out. You’ll get a lot more bang for your buck.

Treat SEO like any other service based investment.

To conclude, treat this like any other business investment. Take care to make sure that you are being treated well, and getting the most for your money. Get as much information as you can, and use common sense rules when searching for an SEO. If you can do this, and you get the right company or person you will go far and grow your business. Good luck to you all.

Search Engine Optimisation or (SEO) refers to the process of improving the results of a given web site / page in the Natural (Organic or Algorithmic) search results, using both onsite and offsite elements. SEO is by nature rather an instinctive art that lends itself to being undertaken by an individual rather than individuals in a larger company. This article covers the main benefits of hiring a Freelance SEO Consultant and also touches upon other points that you may wish to consider during the selection process.

But First a Warning (or Why SEO Comes First)

It is simply incorrect to assume that SEO is something that can happen after a site has been designed; SEO (if done well) should be considered during and after the design process as the SEO process will often dictate the navigation and structure and certainly the content of your site.

Another Warning (or Beware of Dishonest or Black Hat SEO)

Search engines attempt to provide relevant results to their users in order to encourage the user to come back again and re-use the service. An SEO will optimise on page and off page elements to place the pages of the sites that they work for high up in the search results. Most SEO’s employ techniques that conform to the guidelines laid down by the search engines (this is sometimes called White Hat SEO); others attempt to trick the search engines with Black Hat SEO techniques. Unsurprisingly the search engines object to being tricked and black hat techniques can result in your site being banned.

Other so called SEO’s simply attempt to dishonestly trick their clients into spending money on services that are essentially unhelpful or useless.

You can normally spot a dishonest or Black Hat SEO when they:

Guarantee a #1 ranking, other than by employing Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising Claim that submitting to search engines still matter Claim to have a “special relationship” with Google, Yahoo or MSN Focus on Search Engines that no one uses any more Focus on keyword phrases that no one searches for, or those which you should achieve listings for anyway (like your company name) Refuse to let you know what they are doing, or how there efforts should help you Suggest SEO techniques such as doorway pages, domains with deceptive redirects, free-for-all links, link popularity schemes, or mass submitting your site Offer to sell you ownership of certain keywords

My No1 rule, is if it sounds too good to be true then it probably is, but now, back to the reasons why you should hire a Freelance SEO over an SEO Company:

A Freelance SEO Consultant costs less than a SEO Company

There are a number of reasons why its more cost effective to hire a Freelance SEO rather than a larger company, these include:

A Freelance SEO has low overheads compared to a traditional SEO company. A large SEO company is less able to scale down services to cope with smaller projects, where as a Freelance SEO needs smaller projects to survive. A large SEO company is likely to charge a standard monthly fee, a Freelance SEO can offer a bespoke service defined by the needs of the client.
The other reasons to hire a Freelance SEO Consultant

Aside from the financial considerations there are a number of other reasons to hire a Freelance SEO over a SEO Agency:

A Freelance SEO has to be good to survive and must achieve results to retain your business. A Freelance SEO is more likely to; care about your project, treat you with respect, return your calls and deliver the work on time. A Freelance SEO is not a small cog in a large wheel, they are less likely to be confined by outdated company guidelines, or made board by being handed the umpteenth link building project this week. A Freelance SEO is more likely to strive to leave a good impression, after all its their reputation that’s in the balance.

Justin March offers this set of instructions as ‘Guidance Only’. Therefore, Justin cannot be held responsible for any work carried out by YOU and/or ANY third party using the instructions.