Not every business is ready to hire an SEO company. Here are 5 questions you should ask yourself if you’re thinking about hiring help.
Truth is, not every business is ready to hire an SEO agency or consultant. You have to lay down the foundation in your business before you can multiply your sales through SEO.
Before hiring us — or anyone else — to manage your organic traffic and growth, we recommend you ask yourself these questions.
In fact, we ask ourselves the same questions before we take on a new client. It’s important to us that we partner with companies we know we can really help.
1. Can I afford to make the investment?
A good SEO company isn’t cheap because they can double or triple your initial investment. However, it does take time to see the ROI.
For professional service firms, SEO projects range typically start at $10k and it can take about 3 to 12 months for you to make enough back to cover the fees.
It’s a long-term project that requires patience but the outcome can be fruitful.
The question is, can you make the long-term investment and still have enough funds to operate your day-to-day business?
Be skeptical of any SEO company that promises you immediate results for little. They could be using unethical SEO practices. Once you are caught and penalized by Google, it’s difficult and expensive to recover.
If you cannot make the investment to hire us or any other reputable SEO company, we recommend you hold off until you can.
2. Is my website ready to be promoted?
Before you invite people over to your place, you first want to make sure it’s clean. The same is true for your website.
Ask yourself if you are satisfied with your website design and user experience. Keep in mind that when you hire an SEO company, you are hiring them to promote your website. So make sure you have a website worth hyping up.
If your website has a slew of flaws, that will only be amplified with an increase of search engine traffic. Imagine receiving thousands of visits to your website but none of them convert because it isn’t mobile-friendly or it looks outdated and spammy.
Do you need a website makeover? Let us know and we’ll refer you to a website or UX designer that we trust.
3. Is my product or service free of defects?
At Findable Digital Marketing, we always prefer to take on clients that have been in business for at least a year or two. We want to support businesses that have a product or service that customers are already buying and enjoying.
It’s poor business to promote a broken product or service.
And it’s also a misuse of your time and marketing dollars.
Is your product on the market and free of defects? Are there any important bugs that you need to address? Do you have a team or systems in place to handle an increase in inquiries?
If not, your money is best spent on creating a product that your customers love instead of hiring an SEO company.
4. Do I know my customers inside and out?
The more you know your customers, the better you can serve them online and offline.
When hiring an SEO company, this may not be a must but it’s definitely a big nice-to-have.
Within the first few weeks of working with a new client, we schedule a strategy call. We’ll ask you a series of in-depth questions about your customers and industry. We want to know the language your customers are using and the answers they are searching for on Google. It’s an important piece of the keyword research process.
Before working with an SEO expert, we recommend you prepare data about your customers in advance. This could be a year of website analytics, surveys, and questionnaires or even a report of your social media analytics.
5. Do I have the time to commit to the process?
Although you’re hiring an SEO company to grow organic traffic on your behalf, you will need to be involved in the process. Especially in the beginning.
When you hire us, or any other SEO expert, we encourage you to consider us as your partners. The Findable Method is very collaborative. It’s how we make sure that we are aligned and communicating openly from day one.
Do you have time during the first month to participate in the strategy and planning process? Will you be available to answer emails, give feedback, and receive our monthly reports?
Should you hire SEO help?
It’s always a pity when we have to turn down small businesses and explain that we’re not the right SEO agency for them. But we’d rather be honest and only take on clients that are ready. It’s how we ensure that we can deliver excellent results.
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