There are many different factors that determine a business’ success. The length of your sales cycles, your overhead expenses from employees and the costs of goods and services to stay open, among a slew of other things, directly impact how well your business does. This lends to business owners being much more frugal with the business’ money because, in today’s economy, every penny counts.
So why would a business owner want to hire an SEO company? Can an SEO company help your small business? The simple answer is yes. Let’s take a look at a few of the ways they can help a small business not only appear on Google’s search results, but turn that search traffic into sales.
Google is always changing
SEO companies exist because search engines exist. What Google decides to do next is how we stay in business. It’s our job to figure out why certain pages rank better than others on Google, to give you a competitive advantage against your competitors. It may just be dumb luck that your main competitor out ranks you on Google. SEO companies need to keep up on all of Google’s changes like the most recent Hummingbird update so that they know exactly what the next step is in your marketing plan.
It’s not just about ranking number one
Ranking number one is important, no doubt. In fact, 56% of all click traffic goes to the number one spot on Google. What this means is that more than half of the people that type in a search phrase will automatically go to the first result. It’s pretty important to be number one. However, it’s not just about being at the top of the search engines. You can be number one and still have no one visit your site. SEO is about getting you visible on Google, but also, making people want to click on your search result. Then, once you’ve got them to your site, it’s the job of the SEO company to get them to buy something. What good is a number-one ranking if it isn’t going to make you some money?
SEO is difficult work
When people get involved with SEO, they’re immediate reaction is, “so, I can just stuff my page with a bunch of keywords, and I’m good. Right?” WRONG! There’s one really easy way to think about the kind of work that goes into SEO. If it’s easy, don’t do it. SEO, especially now after the Penguin, Panda and Hummingbird updates, is not easy. You can’t just build a bunch of links at a page and do no on-page optimization. You can’t just put your keywords in your page and think that you can ignore links and social sharing. It’s all a big recipe for success, if you take the time to do it right. A lot of business owners jump into SEO thinking they’re ready for the time and effort required to make it work, and they’re immediately stunned by the amount of work it actually takes. That’s why SEO companies exist. There’s a reason that we don’t install roofs or manage people’s money. Each of those industries require training and knowledge that only an expert would have.
The best advice that we can give to anyone considering hiring and SEO company is to ask a lot of questions about what you’re actually getting. Don’t just jump in and sign the first contract laid in front of you. Know what you’re getting yourself into because SEO is a pretty scary landscape with all of the “professionals” out there that don’t actually keep up on what’s really going on with search engines.
Need more information? Let’s grab a cup of coffee and talk about your concerns. Give us a call at (970) 674-0079. The coffee’s on us!