I hear a lot of talk amongst business owners about DIY-ing various elements of their marketing, including social media, website management, and SEO. As with all things, this DIY-ing can be possible, but there are a few elements to consider which may tell you that you need to hire a pro. These are SBN Marketing’s tips on deciding when to hire an SEO pro, but they could technically be applied to any marketing outlet.
- If you don’t understand the basics, please hire a pro. To test this, you can try reading a couple of articles about SEO or talking to a friend/colleague who knows SEO to get see how much you understand without having to ask questions. Do the terms on-page and off-page click with you? Do you know where and how to do proper keyword research and how to choose terms to optimize around, or do you think you know how folks search about your industry/services? What about keyword stuffing? What elements are the bare minimum that need to be optimized? What’s considered black hat?
- The caveat to #1 is that you don’t understand the basics but you’re willing to learn and have the time to dedicate to it. If you do not have the desire or time to learn the basics, do not try to DIY your SEO.
- If you know the basics or are willing to learn them, you should still consider hiring a pro if you’re not dedicated to keeping up with algorithm updates. Google runs major updates usually once or twice a year, with minor updates coming much, much more frequently. And Google’s algorithm is different from Bing’s…and DuckDuckGo’s…and Yandex’s…and every other search engine’s. While it’s fine to focus on Google because of their vast majority of the search market share, you shouldn’t discount the others. So trying to work with the best practices of Google + the other search engine(s) that attract your target market is key. If you can’t dedicate the time to keeping up with the knowledge AND keeping your site updated appropriately, you need a pro.
If you’re ready to take your SEO out of DIY status, give us a shout! We’d love to see if we’re the right fit for your company and its SEO needs!
Image by Darwin Laganzon from Pixabay