Finding, selecting, and hiring an SEO consultant–one with whom you can work long-term–is not always the easiest endeavor for a marketing executive or business owner. Unless you can get a few good referrals from your network, you’ll have to start your search fresh. Since I’ve been in the SEO field for over ten years, I thought I’d share some of my insights into the process that I’ve seen my clients and prospects go through, as well as some of my own advice.
What To Ask SEO Consultants
Whether you’re looking for an SEO consultant, our first piece of advice is to keep your search local. What do we mean when we say that hiring a local expert is a good idea? In our instance, we serve clients from all over the world. “What does an SEO specialist do?” is the first thing you should ask. It’s a red flag if the person can’t sum up what they do in one to three sentences. Although a digital marketing agency may claim that SEO is “included” in their services, this does not imply that they understand how to optimise websites for Google.
SEO Content Audit — In order to improve and refine the content that search engines have indexed, this type of audit can involve improvements, pruning, consolidation, and other recommendations for the content on your site. This type of audit should also include keyword research for some of your most relevant pages.
Technical SEO Audit — This Sort Of Audit May Include Suggestions for fixing crawl faults, optimizing your robots.txt file and XML sitemap, implementing redirects, fixing rendering issues, and other technical SEO best practices.
How To Select An SEO Consultant
Hiring an SEO consultant is a difficult task. During the proposal process, you must be involved, know what to look for, and ask the proper questions. The better informed you are, the more likely you are to select the best SEO expert for your business. Let’s look at a few key issues to think about.
What Makes A Good SEO Consultant
A top Seo consultant will immerse herself or himself as much as possible in your organization since only by doing so will she or he be able to uncover a wide range of opportunities for your firm to increase organic search traffic, leads, and/or sales. The traits listed below are characteristics of an excellent SEO consultant.
1. Know The Warning Signs
When it comes to choosing the proper service for your company, knowing the indicators of terrible SEO consultancy is crucial. Some services will employ deceptive tactics to try to persuade you that they know what they’re doing and are the most competent, but these can be hollow promises.
What we call black hat SEO tactics are a significant red flag. Buying links on other sites, keyword stuffing, and writing bad, irrelevant material all fall under the category of black hat SEO.
2. Get References From Your Peers
Checking evaluations from real people and your colleagues is one approach to avoid being drawn into a contract with a terrible SEO expert. It’s likely that searching for “Ideal Professional SEO Services” isn’t the best way to find the correct consultant for you. It does not, however, show whether they provide the same level of care and attention to their clients.
Speak with others who have used a consultant to help them enhance their inbound marketing strategies.
3. Have Specific Goals (And Kpis) In Mind
The metrics you’ll need to establish whether a consultant is genuinely helping you enhance your inbound marketing approach are known as PIs or key performance indicators. To verify that these KPIs are improving, you’ll need to check in with the consultant on a regular basis.
When picking between professional SEO services, look at the exact goals you want to attain. Consider which KPIs will be used to assess if these objectives are being accomplished. The number of organic sessions you have, search engine rankings for specific keywords, conversion rate, phone calls, and other KPIs are all crucial.
4. Ask For Samples
Asking tangible examples of an SEO consultant’s work is a wonderful approach to discover if they’re a suitable fit for you. Inquire about their experience in working for brands similar to yours, and if so, how successful they were. To be fussy now or never is really the only option.
is a decent indication of their capabilities. However, keep in mind that many consultants will be more focused on client sites than on their own, so don’t lose faith in them simply because a few things aren’t as you expected.
5. Look For Quality Communication
When it comes to finding the ideal SEO expert, good communication is crucial. A solid Seo might take months, if not years, to develop. When you sign a long-term contract, you need to know that you will be well communicated with.
6. Ask Questions
When choosing an SEO consulting agency, you can never ask too many questions. Make sure they can meet your needs and that you understand how they’ll do so before you hire them. Before hiring, you should ask the following questions:
- When will we be able to see the fruits of our labor?
- What might I expect in terms of costs?
- What happens if I wish to discontinue my subscription?
- If I break the contract, will I be able to keep the website?
