Why we might not try to sell you SEO
March 27th, 2008 by johnI get two or three new business calls a week. It’s typically a business owner who needs to improve her web marketing, but has no idea what it will cost to get to the top of the search results. Or, it’s a sales guy in a company who is looking for a quick fix, to make his numbers for the quarter. Both get a quick, free assessment, and it usually doesn’t include my recommendation that they sign up for search engine optimization.
Having a small business myself, I know how much I needed sales in the early days, and how much I have had to learn about marketing to understand where sales come from. Have you ever noticed how few advertising agencies advertise? That should tell you something about marketing professional services.
When it comes to web marketing, the small local business owner is clueless about what tools are available. One of the most powerful is absolutely free: signing up for a business listing on Google Maps. Local results are often at the very top of the search engine results, right where you want to be found.
The other recommendation I make is to try pay per click advertising. For a modest budget, maybe $300-600 a month, you can advertise on the most popular search terms for your business, and target only local prospects. Over a few months, you will gather data on what search terms are resulting in traffic, which terms actually turn into business, and how much it costs to be present when people are shopping. Since a full SEO program costs at least a couple thousand dollars a month, PPC advertising can help you test the waters and see if search marketing is profitable for your business. This is a test we recommend, before you make the financial commitment to use SEO to show up on top of the rankings, based on your site’s merits and not ad dollars. If PPC works for you, and you know that only 18% of B2B prospects click on those ads, then SEO starts to look like a better investment.
Tags: pay per click, PPC, search engine optimization, seo
March 28th, 2008 at 3:50 am
The article you have posted has great information about marketing and thanks for your advice to go with PPC. Search engine optimization (SEO) is a process for increasing the ranking of a website in search engine listings. SEO service is essential for a firm to increase targeted traffic to their websites.
March 28th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Breisgau
If you feel depressed because of the stunning amount of effort it requires to hit upon what you are looking for, cheer up because you are one step closer to your goal.