In the course of my professional career, I’ve seen almost all types of clients imaginable. You have the decades-old businesses looking to tap into the digital market; the startups and bootstrapped purely remote-based service providers; the local home services such as plumbers, roofers, etc.; your statewide legal firms; and other startup digital marketing agencies.
While many of them are already SEO-savvy, quite a few of them are still wondering, “Are SEO services worth it?”. I’ve handled a couple of projects in the past wherein the business is literally just testing out if SEO would work for them or not. And unfortunately, the most common misconception these businesses have is that SEO works like MAGIC.
How?
- They think once you start optimising (and sometimes, they think you can do it in 3 days or a week), you rank instantly within the top 10.
- And once you get them to rank, sales will skyrocket like crazy.
- SEO only needs a one-time-big-time effort. So no need to prolong your service miss.
I’m sorry to say, but none of these is true.
SEO is a long-term marketing strategy that requires continuous effort and maintenance. It’s not a one-time deal where you work on it for a couple of weeks and then leave it be. You need to continuously monitor your progress, adjust your tactics, and work on it consistently to see results.
And even when you do see results, it would take a few months (at least 3-6 months) before you can experience an ROI. So if you’re looking for immediate results, SEO is not the marketing strategy for you.
With that being said, SEO is still one of the most effective marketing strategies out there. If you’re in it for the long run, then yes, SEO services are definitely worth your investment.
In this guide, I will give you a breakdown of what SEO entails and how you can see results from your investment. I’ll also show you some case studies and businesses that prove that yes, indeed, SEO services are worth every penny.
In this Guide:
- Can you find your website?
- How expensive is SEO and does it generate sales?
- When will we see SEO results?
- SEO, Content Creation, Web Design: How can I manage it all?
Can You Find Your Website?
The first thing you need to do is find your website. Try Googling your business name or some of the keywords you want to rank for and see where you show up. If you’re not on the first page (preferably in the top 3), then you have some work to do.
A lot of businesses make the mistake of thinking that their website is ranking because they can find it when they type in their business name. But that’s not how people find businesses online. They use keywords that are relevant to what they’re looking for.
For example, if you’re a plumber, people might search for “plumbing services near me”, “emergency plumbing”, “leaking taps”, etc. If you don’t show up for any of these keywords, then you’re not going to get any organic traffic from search engines.
This is where SEO experts do their thing. SEO techniques can help you rank for the keywords that people are actually searching for. And as a result, you get more website visitors organically (i.e. without having to pay for ads).
There are a number of factors that affect keyword ranking. But the most important ones are:
- Relevance: Is your website relevant to what people are searching for? If not, then you’re not going to rank no matter how good your SEO is.
- Keyword density: This is the number of times a keyword appears on your website. If you stuff your website with keywords, then you’re going to be penalised by Google. So make sure that your keyword density is just right.
- Meta tags: Meta tags are snippets of text that describe a page’s content. They help search engines understand what a page is about.
- Title tags: Title tags are the most important meta tag. They appear in the search engine results pages (SERPs) and tell searchers what your page is about.
- Alt-text: Alt text is the text that appears when an image can’t be displayed. It’s a good idea to add keywords to your alt text so that your images can be found in image searches.
- Sitemap: A sitemap is a file that lists all the pages on your website. It helps search engines index your website so that your pages can be found in searches.
- Robots.txt: Robots.txt is a file that tells search engine bots which pages on your website they can and can’t index.
These are just some of the most important on-page SEO factors. There are many other technical aspects of SEO that need to be taken care of. But if you don’t have the time or knowledge to do it yourself, then you can always hire an SEO agency to do it for you.
And then, there’s another aspect which is the off-page/link building optimisation, which means getting high-quality links from other websites. This is a very important ranking factor because it shows Google that your website is popular and relevant. So if you’re serious about ranking higher in search results, then you need to focus on link building as well.
How Expensive is SEO and Does it Generate Sales?
With SEO being a continuous effort, it’s important to consider the costs involved over time. SEO is not a one-time investment, but it can be considered an ongoing expense, similar to your electricity or internet bill.
The cost of SEO depends on a number of factors:
- The size of your website: The larger your website, the more pages you’ll need to optimise.
- The competitiveness of your industry: If you’re in a competitive industry, then it’s going to cost more to rank higher in search results.
- The location of your business: If you’re a local business, then you’ll need to focus on local SEO which is usually cheaper than global SEO.
- Your current SEO situation: If you’re starting from scratch, then it’s going to take more time and effort to reach the top of the SERPs. But if you already have a strong SEO foundation, then it’ll be easier to maintain your position.
The bottom line is that SEO is not free. But it is an investment that can generate a lot of sales and leads for your business. And if you’re serious about growing your business, then it’s worth the investment.
Now, the question is does it generate sales? OH ABSOLUTELY!
SEO can help you generate a lot of leads and sales for your business. But it’s not a quick or easy process. It takes time, effort, and money to rank higher in search results.
You see, SEO leans more on long term benefits, while paid marketing such as Google Ads is more effective in the short term. SEO, when done right, can keep you up in the search engine rankings for a long time. Whereas, with paid marketing, as soon as you stop paying for ads, your traffic will drop.
But why would you want to rank in search engines in the first place? Search engines are the starting point for 68% of online experiences. This means that if your website doesn’t show up in search results, then you’re missing out on a lot of potential traffic and sales.
Another study confirms that 70% of online marketers say that SEO is better than PPC for generating sales. Consumer behavior studies revealed that most internet users resort to Google when they are looking for services and products to purchase. This is the reason why SEO should be a fundamental part of your digital marketing strategy. It’s an investment that can generate a lot of sales and leads for your business in the long run.
In fact, in one of my clients, organic search has proven to be the primary source of their website conversions.
In the last 6 months, we can see an increase of 10% in leads generated in spite the decline in traffic. This means that while there is less traffic generated (which may have been caused by several algorithm updates rolled out throughout the months), the SEO efforts implemented have led quality visitors to the site who are actually interested in their service.
So if you’re looking for a quick and easy way to generate sales, then SEO is not for you. But if you’re willing to invest the time and effort, then SEO can be a very effective way to grow your business.
When will we see SEO results?
The answer to this question depends on a number of factors:
- The size of your website: The larger your website, the more pages you’ll need to optimise.
- The competitiveness of your industry: If you’re in a competitive industry, then it’s going to take longer to rank higher in search results.
- Your current SEO situation: If you’re starting from scratch, then it’s going to take longer to reach the top of the SERPs. But if you already have a strong SEO foundation, then it’ll be easier to maintain your position.
The bottom line is that SEO is not an overnight process. It takes time, effort, and patience to see results.
Related reading: SEO: How Long Does it Take to Start Working?
SEO, content creation, web design: how can I manage it all?
The answer is you don’t have to do it all yourself. You can outsource some or all of the work to a credible SEO services provider in the Philippines. This will save you time, money, and effort in the long run.
The Philippines is home to some of the world’s best SEO services providers. So if you’re serious about growing your business, then it’s worth considering outsourcing some or all of the work to a reputable agency in the Philippines.
