You want to hire an SEO expert. This article covers everything you need to know.
What Is SEO?
Search Engine Optimization involves preparing a website from overall structures to page design to content creation, to ensure the pages can be indexed by search engines like Google and for the pages to rank in Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs).
Why do you need SEO services?
Some business owners have the wrong impressions about SEO. They want to hire an SEO expert for the wrong reason.
The good reasons you need SEO services:
- So that your website will appear when people type some words into say Google.
- Make your website usable for people. Imagine if someone can’t use your website because it hangs or loads forever.
- To create content that attracts your ideal buyers.
- To create evergreen content that gets traffic for a long time.
- Make your website execute specific marketing strategies like creating dynamic pages or AB testing.
- To build trust and reputation.
- To increase the number of returning visitors.
- To ensure your website is accessible to all devices, either mobile, PC, or tablet.
The wrong reasons to hire an SEO expert
- Unrealistic expectations, like getting 1 million visitors in two weeks.
- To outrank your competitors (this is not good or bad. I recommend user retention rather than outranking each other in search. If your competitor is bigger and has been in business for a long time, they probably can outrank you with minimal effort. Instead, be the better alternative; in the long run, users, Google, and Keyword differences can put you in a better position and SERPs of many queries.)
- To create the kind of content others are creating. Your strategy should be about creating better, different, or content with certain angles. If your competitors are creating ‘how to make money online.’ YOUR angle should be ‘becoming an internet entrepreneur for teenagers.’ It looks similar, but yours is more specific and can even cover what the competitors are doing.
Without SEO, it’s like trying to get your books into a bookstore, but you don’t know what the shop owners want. Search engines care about what they show to people, and you need to meet those requirements, or else they won’t put your website on the list.
Bad SEO is like a bookstore rejecting your books or putting them in a warehouse without displaying them on the shelf.
The responsibility of an SEO specialist is to ensure your pages meet the requirements to rank and convert visitors to buyers.
Why Hire an SEO Expert:
These are some of the things an expert can do:
- Creating a long-term marketing strategy to attract an audience years after you have stopped investing significantly in SEO. If your SEO strategy is on point, you can slash your investments by 70% and still get sales, conversions, and subscribers.
- Ensuring your website pages are indexed. Like the bookstore example earlier, indexing is another way of saying the bookstore has agreed to show your books on their shelves.
- Site Audit. Reviewing the status of your site and content. Looking for ways or things that need to improve.
- Technical SEO. Checking if your website is easy to use for mobile phones and PCs. Check for any issues or if there will be an issue when your page appears on the user’s devices. Implementing the necessary changes.
- Competitor analysis. Know what your competitors are doing right or wrong.
- Content strategy development
- Keyword research.
- Content outline/creation
- On-page SEO practices (keyword usage, headings, formatting, image optimization, etc.)
- Link building, both internal linking and backlinks
- SEO reporting
Depending on your brand and goals, there are more things an SEO expert can do for you. The above list is the major areas they will start with. You can always create or adjust the job description based on your goals. Then, find an expert who can help you achieve them.
Everything You Need To Know Before Hiring An SEO Expert
These are the things you need to know before you pay for professional SEO services.
It Takes Time To See Results.
I have no idea what you have heard or how dire your business needs sales, but if you need sales in a matter of four weeks or two months, SEO is not the best option for you. For most businesses with the right professional, it takes six months of actively working to get good results.
Search Engine Optimization Is Quite Expensive In Relation To Time
If you compare it to other strategies like ads and the time you start seeing results, SEO is more expensive. With ads, you can start seeing results in a few days, depending on your target. The only way you’ll get results in a few days with SEO is by investing in it before. That means your website has certain authority, and some keywords already exist on your website.
The Most Important Part of SEO is the content.
If you hire the best SEO professional, you should hire or create the best content too. This is a marketing strategy, and what will determine if people will come back or buy your product is what they see. A good website is like a bookstore that is easy to locate in town. No one will come back if the inside is empty, the books have the middle pages missing, or the books are badly written. Great content is the best and most important part of the puzzle.
Your Ranking Positions Are Not Permanent
Sometimes, your page will rank at the top, and other times, it will drop. This doesn’t mean your content is bad. There could be a hundred reasons for that. Search engine updates their algorithm periodically, and update often affects how pages rank.
You can learn SEO in six months or less.
No, you won’t become a professional in that period. But you will understand the fundamentals, which is enough to get you started with your career. And no, you won’t get the same results as someone who has been doing the same job for years.
Most people make the mistake of starting with SEO without a real tutor. This is possible. However, you need a person or place you can go to when you’re confused.
Hiring an SEO expert will save you time and trial and error.
It took some of us years to figure certain things out. Some things come naturally now that I have practiced them so many times and seen results in real time. Even if I am writing an essay, it will be easy to rank it because my explicit mind already understands what I need to do. You can save time by working with the right person.
The more you invest, the better the results provided you hire the right people.
A professional SEO specialist will ensure your website pages can rank. A copywriter will ensure your pages convert visitors to buyers. You need to invest in other things like backlinks. Company A hires one SEO expert and one writer. Company B hires 4 specialists and 20 copywriters to create content. While Company A creates one post per day, Company B creates 10 posts per day. Both of them are doing things as professionally as possible. You can guess which company will get better results at the end of the year.
There are two sides to SEO: Black hats and White Hats Techniques.
White hats focus on following the rules that keep your website safe from being penalized by search engines. Black Hats strategies use a couple of techniques that can make your website rank faster or better. But if you make mistakes or get caught by search engines for manipulating the algorithm, your website can lose all its traffic.
Things You Should Be Clear About Before You Hire An SEO Expert
- Your business goals. What do you want to achieve, and what period do you want this to happen? A great goal is specific, measurable, achievable, relevant to your business, and time-bound.
- The scope of the job. If you need a content strategy, it’s different from requesting a site audit. Be clear about what you want. If you’re unsure, ask questions, and the professional will guide you.
- Industries. A professional with experience in your audience has the intrinsic skills to know what works and what doesn’t.
- Your budget. Once you describe your goal, follow it with your budget.
Where To Find SEO Specialists
- Because we are talking about search engine optimization, you should start by searching the internet for terms like ‘hire an SEO expert in Nigeria’ or ‘Search Engine Optimization expert in New York.’ If their page ranks, then they are doing things right.
- Recommendations. Ask other business owners in your niche or other industries for recommendations.
- Check job boards like Indeed, Upwork, and LinkedIn. You can check my profile on Upwork if you want to work with me.
How To Hire SEO Expert: Things To Note During Interview
- They don’t know how to explain their services or deliverables.
- They only use Black hat techniques. They tell you to buy links, buy followers, or spam your website through emails.
- They have no past clients or websites to show they can rank a website.
- Their services are extremely cheap. The only exception here is they live in another country where the cost of living is extremely low. Please ask for references or portfolios to be sure they can do the job.
- They promise you will see results in weeks. The only way they can achieve this is if they work at Google.
- Ask them to explain terms like indexing, crawling, core web vitals, breadcrumbs, and topic clusters. You should familiarize yourself with some of these terms before you decide to hire an SEO expert. You can start with my post on Keyword Research.
- Ask them to describe their process to you. Then watch out for the best SEO practices as they speak.
How Much Does It Cost to Hire An SEO Expert
It’s hard to put a range to the cost of hiring an SEO expert. What you will pay depends on a few factors, such as:
- Your business goals
- Your website status (technical SEO, content, and mobile-friendliness.)
- How hard it is to achieve your goals based on initial site audit
- The professional you hire
If you’re praying per hour, the cost ranges between $15 to $40 per hour. Some professionals charge as high as $200 per hour.
I charge $15 – $27 per hour, depending on the job
And if you need to hire someone right now, you can reach me using the social media buttons at the bottom of this page (check the sidebar if you’re reading on a desktop for LinkedIn, Twitter, and Upwork icons,) the contact form above, or Hadehwrites @, gmail.com.