From time to time I’ve visited Searchles and bookmarked articles from SEO Chat. They have several groups devoted to search engines and SEO, so when we publish an article I think they’ll find of particular interest, I bookmark it there. Sometimes another member of their community has even visited SEO Chat and independently bookmarked an article for which I didn’t post the link to Searchles. Other social bookmarking communities you should consider include del.icio.us, BlinkList, StumbleUpon, and Furl; there are many more. Be very wary of any company that offers you guarantees, especially guarantees that state they’ll get you into the top ten results or your money back, or a certain percentage of the keywords you choose will end up number one or two in Google. Find out what a firm’s code of ethics or standards are. Also find out what type of contract you’ll need to get started. If a company doesn’t offer a contract, then you need to get one of your own. It seems these days that contracts lately are only as good as the company behind them, but it does help to have a plan of action on paper to which you can legally hold the company. Make sure it covers any extra fees, what happens if you’re not satisfied with the work, what your responsibilities are as a client, and so on. There are a few SEO agreement templates on the Internet. In this case, it helps to remember that sometimes simplest is best. When considering user navigation, visitors benefit greatly from a visible, text-based site map. Ideally, they should be able to get to it from anywhere on your site in just one click. SEO Firms: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly - The SEO Firm or Individual Consultant? There are advantages and disadvantages between choosing a large firm or a small company or individual SEO consultant. There may be different priorities you have regarding your website, such as customer service, longevity of the company, experience, full range of services, price, and even ultimate results. Here I’ll outline some of the pros and cons of both, and depending upon your priorities, it may help you decide which type of service to choose. Keep in mind that these are generalities that I put together based upon the collective experience of clients, webmasters, and other SEOs. They certainly don’t take into account every type of SEO firm out there, and sometimes you get very lucky and find one that doesn’t fit the mold at all while still meeting every one of your needs. Tracking what your visitors do after they arrive at your site can give you valuable information about whether your site design really works as intended. You may think your site navigation is "intuitive," but the paths your visitors take once they're on your site may prove otherwise. While you should never "force" your visitors to follow one particular path, web sites should be designed with some idea of the way visitors will navigate through the web site. If your visitors are veering from the paths you've planned, you need to figure out why. There might be a few advantages to considering a large firm rather than going with a smaller company. For example, they will probably have a well-rounded group of people with different areas of expertise. Search engine optimization is not just about marketing, but it is also about search engine friendly design, page structure, coding and programming. If you go with a larger firm, the better your chances are of finding people who can help you in any area of SEO, no matter what your specific issues may be. They will employ not only marketers and optimization consultants, but programmers and website designers for consultation. In general, you should be tracking visitor statistics on a regular basis. Measure visitor sign-ups and conversions - not just once, but regularly, so you can see how your site performs over time. You can use this information to improve your site; for example, you can make changes to the content on your landing pages and track how that affects the length of visits and how many of your visitors convert. You might get lucky with a small SEO firm that is well rounded in this area, but it’s difficult to find an individual consultant that will have the technical experience you might need. In my case, not only do I have the marketing experience and education, but I do have a solid coding background, even though I am not a programmer; and many times I will have to get a programmer to help with the really hard stuff. But if you find an SEO consultant you like, it would be extremely helpful to you to find one with website design experience, at least. Many times, however, the SEO consultant may contract outside services for your programming needs, and that will be fine for you. All you need to do is ask them, and if you’re okay with your SEO contracting another service, then make sure you mention it. Tuning Up Your Web Site - Tracking Traffic The number of search engine referrals you get is only one aspect of the traffic that you need to be tracking. Which sites and search engines provide you with the most traffic? Knowledge is power, and you can use this information to increase your traffic further. For example, if you're getting a lot of visitors from certain blogs or social sites, maybe it's time to browse those sites and see why. Larger SEO firms tend to have set packages for SEO, and while usually reasonable in price, any customization of your SEO project may cost you much more than you intended. This is because custom work veers from what the SEO does day in and day out, and takes more of the SEOs' time. Smaller SEO firms, in general, have better customization options overall, since they tend to look at a client as an individual, not just an account. And while we're on the topic of being seen, how does your web site do among those who physically can't see it? The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) offers standards, guidelines, and support for those who wish to make their web sites accessible to blind and visually-impaired visitors. Don't immediately assume that blind people won't be interested in what you have to offer; they have many of the same interests as sighted people, and most have sighted friends for whom they purchase gifts. Don’t be put off, however, by companies that prefer to handle contacts via email or trouble tickets. This is a good practice for even a smaller firm, because it creates a written record of activity, and not just verbal communication. Let the company know exactly how you prefer your communication, and if phone consultations are extra, just keep in mind that it is far more time-consuming to maintain a telephone relationship with your consultant than it is for email. This is true of just about any company. Even companies like eBay don’t offer anything but online support or email. This will obviously be more of a concern with a larger firm than a small company or individual SEO. You should know which search terms are most popular with your target audience today, and optimize your site accordingly. Make sure you use and integrate these terms into the most logical places: page titles, meta tags, and visible page text. You may say you did this once already, but if you look at the site with fresh eyes, you may find that you can now do a better job than you did a few months ago. Another disadvantage of a larger SEO firm will be their company expenses, which may ultimately affect your price. It costs a company more to maintain a large batch of employees, equipment, and of course the building costs will be higher. We refer to this in business as "overhead." If a large SEO firm has a lower price, then this could mean they have to take on far more accounts than they should probably handle. This could adversely affect your customer service. We’ll look at price differences a little later in the article. Getting indexed is only part of the battle though. You want to make sure you're indexed for the right keywords. You probably did your keyword research when you first designed your site. The popularity of terms used to describe a thing can change, though. Your target market may have used one word to search for something six months ago, but is now using a different word more frequently. Quick: is "notebook" or "laptop" more popular? That's just one example. Google Trends can help you compare which terms are more popular in what parts of the world, even over time. Here you'd find out that "laptop" is the more popular term in general -- but "notebook" is much more popular in certain parts of the world, such as Italy. Many large SEO firms will have multiple contacts for your account, depending upon the type of question or need you have. So if you have a marketing or SERPs question, then you may get one person, but if you have a question regarding your site structure, you’ll get another person. If you have copywriting issues, you may even get a completely different individual entirely. Sometimes it's just too hard for an SEO consultant with too many accounts to keep track of your needs, in which case your account may end up with several consultants, which makes it more frustrating for you. If you want to make sure you're getting indexed in the search engines, it helps to create and submit an XML site map to Google Sitemaps. You can also submit a site map to Yahoo Site Explorer. But your best bet is to check out Sitemaps.org for more information about a protocol that is being adopted by all three major search engines (and possibly more).
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