As I’m getting quite a lot of SEO questions – I’m creating this post as the place to ask any SEO questions you have.
To ask a question- just do it in the form of a reply. Don’t worry about sounding silly, it doesn’t matter how basic or advanced the question is – ask away & I’ll let you know my thoughts.
Start asking 
Hi Brian
Answer here :
www.searchengine-promotion.co.uk/blog/do-all-websites-struggle-for-traffic-initially-seo-questions-answers
Thanks
Hi
I’ve seen that you say paid backlinks are not a good idea, and I’ve read that on other places too – but then I’ve seen other people saying that it’s a good idea to buy links on Yahoo directory? I’m confused?
Thanx
Debz
Hi
Do all websites struggle for traffic initially?
I have a website, it’s not doing so great for search engine traffic right now – is that normal for a new website?
Thanks
Brian
Hi
How much should it cost me to hire an SEO company? I’ve had some hugely different quotes from the SEO people I’ve contacted – I’d ask you as you seem to know your stuff, but I’m in Aus. It’s tricky to know who to put faith in with different people quoting such different prices. I don’t get it why prices are different SEO is not just SEO?? Shouldn’t there just be one price no matter who does it?
Thankyou
Hello
Do we still need to submit to google?
I mean my site is already on google but I have seen that there are submission services which auto submit a number of times per month or something & that this is how to get higher on the search engines by submitting often?
Hi Ben,
Over the past couple of years many web design companies & other marketing companies have got into SEO because there is such a market for it – this doesn’t always mean that they’re SEO specialists however. Having enough knowledge to sound knowledgeable to someone who’s not technical, really isn’t difficult – and doesn’t always mean that they actually have the skills & experience required to offer a great SEO service. This is not to say however, that firms operating in other area’s such as PPC & web design, cannot also offer effective SEO services.
No not everyone who does SEO also does PPC or vice versa. Personally I have some experience of PPC, and I probably have more than enough experience in it to offer PPC management services, but I choose to stick to SEO as its really what I’m good at & what I enjoy.
Being a web designer means that you will have some knowledge of how SEO works, but again it doesn’t automatically make someone an SEO specialist. There are web designers who’re also very good at SEO – there are also web designers & web design firms who solely see SEO as extra revenue, and take it on without really having the necessary skills & experience.
Hope this helps.
Thanks
Hi Jimmy
See my SEO costs post which goes into more detail about how SEO pricing works & what SEO consultants charge.
Basically what I say in this post is that what SEO consultants or companies charge, does not determine the cost of SEO.
What determines the cost of SEO or any online or offline marketing method, is the return – and that depends on how effective the SEO services are, not just how much they cost.
If you invest a hundred quid on SEO & it brings you a return of diddly squatt, then SEO has cost you a hundred quid, and has been a waste of your marketing budget. If you invest five grand on SEO, and you get a return of twenty grand, then it’s been a good investment & you’ve had a good return.
Real, effective SEO services are an investment – not a cost. SEO that costs, i.e. that doesn’t bring a return greater than the SEO cost, is inneffective SEO. (Of course, your website needs to be able to convert, so if the SEO is effective in terms of traffic but then the site isn’t converting that traffic, then you’ll need to work on increasing yout conversion rates – I discuss that on the post also.
So – seeing SEO as a product, and shopping for that product based on price – is not the right way to do it. Keep in mind that it is a service based on man (or woman) hours, and that the actual cost depends on the effectiveness of the SEO service & therefore the return, in terms of targeted search engine traffic.
Everyone works slightly differently, and there are huge variations in what SEO consultants & companies charge per hour. Usually if you work with an SEO company or agency, you’ll enter into a monthly contract from the beginning, agreeing on a set monthly cost.
With me however, I start off by quoting for one off work first, including keyword research & competitor analysis, strategy planning, and consultancy work to ensure the website will convert well, (if your site doesn’t convert, investing in SEO or any form of website marketing is a waste of money) and I’ll then do the onpage work, which again is a one off block of work initially.
Once this work is done, I can re-asses search engine rankings, and make a well informed estimate of how much offpage work (backlinking) is required – if any – to achieve your goals. It’s offpage work that brings with it a monthly cost, as it has to be done over a period of time, you can’t do offpage work in a one off block of work as you can with onpage work.
If your search terms are competitive, then you are likely to need monthly offpage work – however if you’re focusing on non-competitive terms, then you may not require any monthly offpage SEO at all, the initial work may be all you need to acheive first page Google ranking.
If you do require offpage work, then I suggest how much I believe should be done each month, and what this will cost you – however I do not require contracts, you can stop at any time.
I hope this helps.
Thanks
Hi Debz
Thanks for the question. Good one. You’re right I have made that a bit confusing.
I’ve written a more in depth answer for you here – hopefully this explains it a bit better : Paid backlinks are not a good idea?
Thanks
I was just searching for info on SEO & I found your site. My question is – my web design company have said they can also do SEO, which I find strange as they never mentioned it before & it said nothing on their web site about it – but am I better asking my web designers to do my SEO or should I just tell them that I want to work with a specialist Instead? Also – I’ve been talking to a PPC firm, they also didn’t say that they did SEO – but when I mentioned it they’re now telling me they’re also SEO people. Does everyone in all area’s of web marketing get involved in the others? I mean, because someone is a PPC person, does that automatically make them an SEO expert too, and are web designers also usually good at SEO?
TY in advance…
Do you know of a company called Infoserve – or has anyone reading this tried them? I’m not sure if this is a Scam, and if I have been “had!”
They phoned me a while ago and sold me a SEO report that they told me would increase search engine traffic to my website, I had my web designer implement it – and since then the site has dropped right down Google?
I don’t understand it – the report was NOT cheap either, and it appears it has cost my business quite a bit of money rather than making us money – and because I don’t really understand it, when I phone them they just baffle me with tech speak and I can’r answer.
Thanks
Jane
Hi Jane,
Actually that’s quite strange, I’d not come accross Infoserve until yesterday – when a new client mentioned they had previously purchased an SEO report from them.
It’s very difficult for me to comment on what is or what isn’t a scam, this company are selling a product – and they are delivering a product, so to say it’s a scam would be incorrect. If they’re doing a bad job then it would be more appropriate to say they’re not delivering a good service, rather than to say it’s a scam.
It’s something about the internet I think which makes this term so popular. If you go for a meal and you weren’t impressed, you wouldn’t be telling people it was a scam
, you’d be telling people it was a terrible meal.
The other thing to point out is that you might go to a restaurant & not be impressed – and then someone else coud go the next weekend & be mega impressed, it could be that the chef was having a bad night – too busy & he couldn’t cope, or the chef isn’t great at cooking what you ordered – or a number of things.
The same can be true of marketing services, you may not be happy with any particular business & the truth may be that you caught them at a very busy time & they were rushing, or the people working on your account were having a bad day, or they’re just not as good as they advertise they are full stop. I’m not talking about this particular company by the way, I’m talking about any company.
SEO is half art & half science, it’s not always perfect – if you’re not happy & you feel that the work done wasn’t right – then contact the company, speak to someone senior & explain this, I’m sure they’ll look into it – nobody really likes to have unhappy clients.
One thing I would say however is that paying a company to produce an SEO report which a web designer or yourself, are then to physically implement, isn’t really practical – unless of course they are doing ALL of the work & then simply producing a document which tells you what to do. In my experience where these reports fall down is that they are open to too much interpretation, it’s not a case of “do this” it’s a case of “do something like this” which can lead to trouble, especially when it concerns body content.
For instance, if a report says “try to get your main keyword into the page” as an SEO consultant I know how to go about doing this, and how not to go about doing it – but as someone who’s not experienced who is purely reading a report, they’re likely to take it more literally, and often this can turn into keyword stuffing mania – and a big SLAP from Google.
Take myself & cars – I have no idea. If I purchased a manual which told me how to replace the engine, and it said “put the engine in” I would probably open the passenger door & put it on the seat (if it were a light engine of course or if I suddenly developed super human stregnth!). And I’m not really joking either
. A few years ago when someone told me that when you’re jacking up a car to change the wheel, you should try to move the wheel with your hand to make sure it’s cleared the floor – they didn’t tell me however that it’s not a good idea to allow your fingers to actually go under the wheel…. at that point the jack broke (no kidding) and a huge Volvo estate landed on my fingers! (luckily there was some air left in the tyre so I still have my fingers, but it still hurt like hell, and my fingers didn’t look too happy for a while!!)
I’m just telling you this to illustrate how we all have area’s in which we’re clever, and experienced – and area’s in which we feel completely clueless – like me with cars, or DIY – so unless you or the person putting the SEO report into practise fully understands SEO, then it will be tricky, and if this is the case then you probably wouldn’t need to pay someone to produce the report anyway.
If it was however an exact concise step by step report which told you exactly what to do in every single area, for the keyword research, page titles, meta descriptions, header tags, alt image tags, the content itself, internal & external links & anchor text & so on – then that might work, but from what I’ve heard these reports aren’t usually this concise – and the ones I’ve seen have been all about onpage, and have been missing any talk of offpage, linkbait & so on.
Anyway – you’ve already paid this company for a report, so if you’re not happy I would advise that you go back to them & tell them, at least give them a chance to look into it & explain themselves – you never know you may find that they’re shocked to find that you weren’t given as good a service as they usually give.
I hope this helps
Thanks Jane
Kev