Choosing a search engine optimization (SEO) company can be a daunting prospect. There are literally thousands of SEO companies online, all promising that they can get your company more exposure, more hits, and more sales. Telling the good ones and the bad ones apart can be tricky indeed. However, there are some key questions you can ask which should help you narrow the field down a bit.
What Testimonials Can Your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Company Provide?
The proof, as they say, is in the pudding. While there are plenty of really great guys in the business looking for that first big score, you need to base your decision on proven results. If you're dealing with a serious SEO firm, they should be able to produce some testimonials and example cases from past clients who have benefited from their efforts.
What Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Techniques Does Your Company Use?
This is the big one. There are a lot of different SEO techniques that can be employed. Some are good, some are bad. Here are a few key points to look for:
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Keyword selection. Your SEO firm should be able to name several different resources for determining the best keywords for your site, from popular choices to obscure ones. Keywords are the foundation of good SEO, and they must be able to utilize them well.
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Changes to your webpage. A good SEO company should be focused on improving both the content of your site, and making changes to its underlying structure, like its metatags.
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A focus on content. SEO is about search engine bots, but your site is still being written for human beings. They need to be focused on making sure actual people will enjoy your site and want to see more.
There are bad techniques too. If a SEO company mentions any of these, be wary or, better yet, be somewhere else:
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Keyword stuffing. Google actually penalizes you if you use keywords too often. Further, this produces bad content that people don't want to read.
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Invisible text. Some companies do this to try to increase the keyword frequency but, again, this will just get you penalized by Google.
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Link farming. Plenty of disreputable websites do nothing but post links to sites that pay them. Google knows about these and disregards them.
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Overemphasis on Pay-Per-Click. PPC strategies, in moderation, can help your SEO. However, over-reliance on them quickly becomes both costly and counterproductive.
What Proof of Your Effectiveness Will Your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Company Provide?
One of the greatest things about Internet marketing is that it's no longer a guessing game, like old school marketing is. A good SEO firm should be able to track your site visitors from search engine to shopping cart, and show you detailed breakdowns of your site hits, bounces, time spent on each page, lead conversions, increases in visits, and more.
This information, besides showing you that your money is being well-spent, is also crucial in fine-tuning your site for effective SEO. Knowing how customers are using your site tells you how to make it more usable, and how to better funnel them into paths towards the checkout page. No good SEO firm ignores analytics.
In closing, however, there is one question that you should not ask, no matter how tempting it seems: “Can you guarantee me a #1 ranking?” Search engine optimization (SEO) is still an art and not a science. No one can guarantee specific search results. What they can guarantee, however, is increased hits, leads, and sales. If they can't deliver that, you should find another SEO firm that can.
Come to DeepSky Marketing's Internet Marketing Seminar and see how to do a professional keyword strategy in a live demo. If you can't make the seminar on April 14, 2012 simply call DeepSky Marketing for help with the marketing of your business.
