Sometimes a search engine optimization company will miss that glaring question
posed by potential clients and assume the benefits of search engine optimization
are obvious to everyone. While shelling out a couple thousand on an SEO campaign
is common sense to some, others may find it hard to part with the cash unless they
know it is an investment in their business that is sure to bring a good return.
Search engines account for a huge portion of traffic to web sites. Data varies
depending on what sources you read, but the bottom line is that search engines are
used millions of times each day by consumers searching for goods and services.
And having your business displayed at the top of search results is essential if you
want to do any business from the major search engines. Nine in every ten users will
find what they’re looking for in the top 10 results and won’t go to page 2.
It’s obvious that people can make a lot of money from online sales, but how you
advertise your products has a large bearing on what kind of profit you make. If you
buy advertising space on Google AdWords or other services that charge per click,
you may only shell out 10 cents for every visitor to your site – But what if it takes
100 clicks to make one sale? If your products only sell for $10 a piece, then there is
no profit being made. Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns will also never stop costing
you money. Search Engine Optimization, on the other hand, can be very affordable
over months and years.
Many SEO and Internet Marketing companies will say that ongoing maintenance is
needed to reach and keep top search engine rankings. While this is true, be careful
how the company says they do it. There is an affordable way and then there’s a way
to pad the pockets of the “experts.” For more on this issue, read my other article
entitled “What Constitutes a Complete and Effective SEO Campaign?” In short, the
affordable way will involve an intense content optimization followed by work to raise
link popularity. This link popularity development should be the bulk of any ongoing
maintenance. A couple times a year keyword research should be done again and the
content should be looked at. Search trends can sometimes fluctuate so you want to
make sure your content is still aimed at the right audience.
What is affordable and what isn’t varies greatly from company to company, industry
to industry. In the bed and breakfast industry, $30 per month may be enough to
keep a top 5 ranking on Google if the market is not very competitive. A web site
competing for a top spot in a database administration field may be looking at
several hundred a week if not more. The bottom line is, if you pick the right Search
Engine Optimization company, your return on investment from an SEO campaign
can be over 1000%.
While there are other ways to advertise a web site (No, search engine optimization is
not the be-all and end-all of online advertising) very few can match the wide
targeted audience and affordability that search engines provide.