Online marketing is quickly becoming an essential component to the growth and overall existence of any business in today’s competitive market. More and more consumers are using the internet for a variety of reasons, including product search, business reviews, and contact information for specific business locations. It’s not enough to just have a website for your business these days, even if it is top of the line, high quality, or expensive. Sure, having a quality site that is user-friendly is a step in the right direction, but neglecting a strategy that helps your site’s visibility to online users could make all of your hard work go unnoticed. That’s what SEO (search engine optimization) strategy fixes.
Instead of hoping that one day your site will move up the ladder of search results on its own, SEO influences Google to rank your site at the top of the results so more potential customers see it and visit it. Some business owners may think they can learn enough about SEO overnight or hire a computer-savvy friend to start implementing a strategy right away, but the complexities surrounding sound knowledge of SEO should encourage the majority of entrepreneurs to consult professionals in this area of their business instead of risking making mistakes that ultimately cost their business rather than help. Here are four reasons why businesses should consider hiring an SEO professional to assist them with their online marketing strategy.
- Essential for online presence. John King from PlacementSEO says, “You wouldn’t just throw your business cards outside of your car window while driving down the highway and hope somebody stops to pick one up. The same applies to having a website with no SEO strategy.” Without optimizing your site in search results, Google and other search engines have no idea how to categorize your site or which searches it should even show up in, and therefore your site can get lost in the endless sea of online pages. If you ever want a chance at your website showing up on the first page of a search result, let alone the top three links, then SEO should become your number one friend. In today’s highly competitive online market, SEO is not just the bow on top or an “extra” that’s nice to throw in at the end of a marketing strategy. It should be integrated into every facet of your online presence to truly make an impact on your reach of potential customers. Without SEO, you may never gain the organic traffic you may be striving for.
- Time. SEO strategies include writing content that features keywords customers may be searching, optimizing your website for mobile use, and updating your site to meet the criteria needed to rank highly in searches based on Google algorithms. As you can imagine, any one of these processes requires a significant amount of time to finish correctly. Most companies are focused on other important aspects of business for making themselves successful competitors and don’t have time to research these steps properly. An SEO professional can jump right in to optimizing your site, already having a knowledge base of the complexities of SEO to form a successful strategy for your unique business site. They already know what works and what doesn’t, so you don’t have to waste your time experimenting. Save your precious minutes and hours by hiring someone whose job it is to spend time on your site and effectively optimizing it to its full potential.
- Investment. While there is a cost to hiring an SEO professional, the returns can be monumental if done well. That is why it is better to think of SEO as an investment rather than a cost to your business. If you don’t hire a professional and end up making punishable mistakes by trying to figure out SEO on your own, it could end up costing your business a lot more than what it costs to pay the professional. Like any investment, though, it is important to do your research and weed out the scammers or “professionals” who don’t personalize their strategy to your unique business needs. No other marketing strategy will give you a higher ROI than proper SEO. That being said, SEO is never a one-time action. In order to see continual volume on your site, SEO must be maintained with updated content regularly and your website will need to be updated to accommodate any changes Google makes to its criteria.
- Personal editor and online marketing manager. A good SEO company will investigate your website for errors, usability, and areas of improvement as part of their strategy to getting your website ranked higher in search results. They will make sure your website matches the criteria required by Google to be a top site, and they will keep an eye on any updates Google decides to make to its algorithms so you don’t have to add that to your already enormous list of things to do. An SEO professional will also know exactly how to “communicate” with Google to get your pages categorized in the right searches and ranked above your competitors. As far as online marketing goes, SEO professionals are invaluable tools waiting to be utilized.
SEO is one online marketing strategy that should never be ignored, and preferably done by an expert in the field. Professionals not only free up your valuable time to let you focus on other areas of business, but they also help your business grow, expand your reach, and stay updated on all criteria and algorithm changes. By not hiring a professional, you are risking mistakes that could damage your online existence and effectively excluding a large number of potential customers from ever organically finding your site in a search. If your business is lacking an online SEO strategy, or you need assistance in developing a more robust approach to your online presence, contact the experts at www.placementseo.com, who will work with you to create a personalized plan based on your business needs and goals.