Yep. I said it. I work in this space and I am here to tell you. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is waste of your time and you shouldn’t do it. Why? Well it’s too time consuming, can’t be done in a month, and it just won’t show the results you need fast enough.
This is you –
“Our business is down, lets test out some SEO next month and see if we can get results. Let’s evaluate in 30 days.”
This is also you –
“Our competitors are beating our ass on Google, we need to regain immediately. You need to fix this by next week.”
And maybe this –
“I get that SEO is important but we don’t have a budget for it so let’s just invest as little as possible to see if we can show some success, then we can talk about upping the budget.”
I can tell you right now if this is you that you are completely wasting your time on SEO. You think if you build a web site, they should come. You think your product is 100 times better than everyone else’s and just the fact that you are online is enough. Wrong. There are 15 other companies out there that can do it cheaper, faster, and are more aggressive than you. What are you going to do about it?
My feeling is you are used to the lazy way of doing business. Back before the internet, you didn’t have to compete. You had your price; people came in and paid it. Shopping around was difficult and people didn’t try very hard and accepted your price as the cost to acquire. Now everyone has a smart phone and they can tell you within 20 seconds if your item is less expensive somewhere else. You have to try harder. Too much work? That is exactly what your competitors are hoping you’d say.
If I decide to go into business and rent some space, pay the electric, furnish and stock my store but don’t bother getting a sign, a phone, or let anyone know I am here, I won’t succeed. SEO is about letting the world know you are there. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is about letting them know you are still there and are still the best place to buy. Think of building your web site as building your office building. The site, like the building, has a map to get around it and you can get to the various places of your business. SEO is like the electricity lighting your sign on the outside of the building. SEM is like the sign blinking when people go by so they will see it and the ads you put up pointing people to your store. You can’t just pay to get it lit and then stop; you have to keep investing in the electricity so people know you are there. Turn it off and you might as well be closed for business.
Until you understand that SEO is no different than a necessary utility of your business, you are wasting your time. Don’t believe me? Okay let’s look at it from Google’s perspective. You and everyone else wants to be ranked on page one of Google. How do they decide who deserves to be there? Who is the best? You? Your competitor? Prove it!
You decide to launch a site and don’t want to invest in SEO and just let it be. Your competitor launches, adds new content each month, does link exchanges online with relevant sites, gets people to review their products and give opinions, does press releases on their services, posts blog posts about their products, and has a Facebook page to interact with their fans. Who do you think Google will say deserves to rank higher? Your competitor clearly is trying harder than you and deserves to be ranked…and he will be.
Hmm, so maybe it’s not a waste of your time? (I thought you might say that.)
Next question on your mind – “Okay but how much do i have to spend on this?”
Answer – More than you want to or planned on spending.
But just like your electric bill, your payroll expenses, accepting credit cards, etc. etc., it’s the cost of doing business. You won’t like my answer but i would devote at least 40% of my marketing budget to SEO/SEM. why? Because if you do it right it will work and it’s the most measurable thing you will spend on in your marketing budget. This can obviously vary depending on what business you are in and how competitive it is but regardless of the site I would be spending 15-20 hours a month at a minimum on this. Too much? Your competitors are spending more. Don’t believe me? Go Google your top search terms and see who comes up and who is on the move.