The Right SE Marketer WILL Boost Sales
If you’ve seen a modicum and encouraging amount of commercial site success, you might consider hiring an SEO or SEM professional to take your site to the next level. (You can finally quit your day job!!)
But here’s the thing. Your Aunt Tilly could call herself an SEM or SEO professional. There are no credentials, no certifications or letters after the name, i.e., Dr. Jon Smith, PhD in SEM. So how do you know which of the thousands of SEO/SEM gurus is for real? Here are six things to look for.
1. On first contact, does the expert take the time to bring up your site on his or her screen and discuss it, maybe even providing a few free tips and suggestions? S/he should. As you describe your site and its perceived limitations, you want a potential expert to “be on the same page” as you are.
Conversely, if the “so-called” expert starts to bombard you with insider jargon “Well, Bob, I’ve developed interesting analytics that show your hit ratio increases when we spice up your meta data and add an opt-in.” Huh?
2. Find an SEM who walks the walk but doesn’t necessarily talk the talk.
Forget the jargon. Who cares? The fact is, experts in any field use jargon as a code language to exclude outsiders and SEM pros love to toss around terms like “keyword stuffing,” and content architecture.
Speak English! Search engine marketing is an on-going process but it’s, by no means, a difficult subject to master. It ain’t brain surgery. So, if your prospective SEM starts throwing insider gibberish in your direction, ask to have the information put in terms you can understand, whether you’re a first time e-vendor or own a hundred sites.
It’s like doctors. They tell you stuff only they understand. But, if you pin them down and ask for an explanation you understand (even if you have to resort to Crayola crayons), you finally understand options and consequences. Same with an SEO. You want to make the decisions.
That means you have to understand proposals, marketing campaigns and other SEM deliverables in terms that allow you to (1) turn the information into action and (2) contest the information if you think the SEM has missed a key demographic or some other oversight.
Otherwise, it’s all just a pile of numbers.
3. Can the SEM guru provide references you will contact?
A reference based on experience is the best reference you can get so, is there an SEM client willing to discuss the services provided by your prospect?
Now, don’t be surprised if the answer is ‘no.’ There’s a unspoken (okay spoken, here) understanding that client information is privileged and must be protected. However, many site owners give their SEMs permission to send visitors to the site to use as an example of the pro’s proficiency, Which gets us to:
4. Does the SEM provide reference sites?
This shouldn’t be a problem for any web pro with any kind of track record. Ask the SEO to provide sites that s/he has worked on. Then, go Alexa on each site’s assets.
Alexa.com delivers stats and graphs to show how the performance of a site has improved or deteriorated over time. Look for an increase in site traffic and lots of links. (See Connectivity in the post below). Look for improvements in page views and, by all means, employ Alexa’s Time Machine, a feature that enables you to see the evolution of the site and, especially how the site looked before and after the re-do by the SEM.
If you don’t see significant increases in the SEM’s reference sites, you are talking to the wrong SEM! Take your time, here. You’re about to sign a big check (SEM pros are pricey because of their highly-specialized knowledge) and you want to see quantifiable results that occur after the SEO/SEM optimizes the site.
5. Please don’t try this at home.
If your sites are performing well, you might think you can take yourself to the next level without the expense of a web marketing pro. Not recommended in the bang/buck equation.
You might pay $200 for a once-over lightly site review, or $20K on a tear-down and website rebuild, and still actually lose ground. Fewer site visitors, lower Alexa ranking, lower links popularity and so on. It happens thousands of times a day. The gnomes who inhabit Castle Google tweak the search algo and all of a sudden, a site that was on page one of Google’s SERPs has slipped to page 106.
So, if this is your money-maker, don’t shake it. Hire an SEM with a track record and see what s/he can do to boost your bottom line.
6. If you don’t like the results, jettison the web guru.
Do NOT sign a contract with an SEO/SEM agency. You don’t have to in the competitive consultation market, so go with a company that let’s you pay as you go or pay for play. You want results and you’re willing to pay for them. No positive results. “You are so outta here.”
It’s reasonable to ask a prospective guru to develop a plan for site growth. It doesn’t have to be long, but it must be informative, and once again, written in terms that make the gibberish understandable to you – the guy or gal with the checkbook. Hey, that makes you the boss even if you don’ t know an HTML title tag from a dog tag!
It isn’t recommended that you make major changes to your site – including migrating to another web host – without expert opinion and technical know-how behind you. Major changes can produce voodoo numbers in your site’s performance.
Evolution in site design makes it easier for search engines and clients, visitors or other site stakeholders, to access content and, in the case of customers or clients, place an order.
That’s why you built the site. You run the show. But let a good SEM help you grow to real profitability. If you find a professional who isn’t blowing smoke and provides a few dozen sites you can check out, you’ll see improvement in rankings and, more importantly, in site traffic.
Conversely, if you hire the first snake oil salesperson you come across in a webmaster chat room, you may be out a few grand as you watch site performance deteriorate right before your eyes.
Spend time finding the right fit and pay for quality consultation and services rendered. Consider it an investment. Just make sure you’re investing in a blue chip SEM not a penny stock loser.
