Who needs an SEO campaign?

An email from a reader asks: “How do we know if we need the services of a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) firm?” In addition to what I mentioned in my previous column, an SEO campaign is not for everyone. It is only a part of the whole marketing and promotions arsenal. To many a company, an SEO maybe their best weapon in the competition. Others find their strength in conventional campaigns while some may employ both. In other words, there are many ways to cut a carrot to pieces and one can be very efficient using only a knife than an electronic slicer or one may use them altogether to do the job.

And as I have said, before considering any SEO project, it is best to assess your strength at the outset and reinforce such strength to sustain it. Bear in mind that an SEO campaign is NOT at all inexpensive contrary to popular notion. It is a painstaking task where patience as a virtue is most needful.

So to get back to the earlier question, who really needs the services of SEO professionals? To answer the question is to describe those who do not need it. Aside those who do not own a website, a company does not need an SEO campaign if its main or natural market is not in the internet or happens to rarely use the internet to look around and buy. You don’t need the services of an SEO expert if you have established your brand equity. For example, if you’re as popular as McDonalds or Jollibee, customers do not always look around to search for hamburgers at search engines. The edge of having the brand equity is the “natural” position in search engines. Such companies enjoy the push being done by their customers that is why they are always on top during searches. Such position is usually difficult to overcome but there are ways to break it or at least find some wormholes to compete in other areas where the giants are at their weakest. But it would take a lot of skills to do it right. Your SEO professional should know where to find them.

Further, you do not need the services of an SEO if your products or services are extremely unique by themselves or when you cater only to very niche markets. Say if you’re selling a painting exclusively for one artist or offering a dish for the appreciation of Boholanos then an internet presence would be enough. But if you want to compete head to head with those who sell paintings or offer your dish against other local or international cuisines then that’s another story. Hence, an SEO campaign only happens when you become interested in a market that has the potentials of becoming your customers too.

But if we are to examine closely what goes in an SEO competition, it is all about dominance in keyword searches – that is, when your customers search for products using search engines and they happen to find your competitors on the first page of Google, Bing or Yahoo!, chances are they are into the SEO race. In an SEO, the battle is not how good your products are, it is how easy your customers can find you.

Can a company embark on an SEO campaign without the help of experts? OF COURSE! And the advantage of doing it in-house is significant savings. If you’re serious to getting started, I suggest you look it up in Google’s website and download their Webmaster’s Guide. Everything you need to know the basics of an SEO campaign can be read in that material.

But what are SEO firms are for if one can just do it in-house? SEO companies have the time to undertake and focus on such projects. While the principles or standards are pretty consistent in SEO, the technologies, developments and strategies that are employed are rapidly evolving. If a company is willing to pursue on its own an SEO mission it must also be willing to spend time to research and test these technologies and developments.

What if you screw up your website? We have gone through that stage in the past. Worse, after having been listed from 62nd page to sixth page in Google, our site was nowhere to be found a week later. A month’s worth of effort suddenly burst into bubble for entering a wrong code. A search ranking campaign always runs the risk of losing valuable time and effort if poorly implemented.

Finally, if you think you need an SEO it’s best to assess the level of skill your in-house team can do and the time needed to do routine checks and updates. An SEO mission is a tedious process and requires monitoring on a regular basis. Aside monitoring, an SEO campaigner must have that “killer instinct” to know what contents are to be added and where to promote the site in the right neighborhoods.

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