SEO has become increasingly complex and costly. There are many intricate factors involved in ranking high on search engines in 2021. But what do you get from SEO? The answer is traffic! Your site will generate more traffic and often convert higher if you rank high on search engines.
In this article, we’ll cover why SEO costs so much, how it impacts your business and whether it’s worth doing. There are three primary reasons why SEO is so expensive today:
SEO is not like an ad campaign where you start seeing results immediately. SEO takes time and patience. It is a long-term strategy, and it can take months for results to become apparent.
For example, if you’ve just launched a brand spanking new website, SEO might not lead to an immediate increase in traffic or conversions. It generally builds over time.
The best way to measure how well SEO is working is by looking at organic traffic; if that is increasing, your SEO strategy is working. If not, then your SEO agency will have to change the strategy and update your site.
It’s taking SEO companies more time and money to achieve SEO ranking positions because of ever-changing algorithms, link-building strategies, and other tactics. SEO requires a continuous effort; cost increases.
SEO is competitive. SEO is literally ‘competing against billions of web pages’ on the internet. As an SEO, you need to have a mastery of SEO and digital marketing and creative and critical thinking skills. You must outsmart your competitions, and that’s why great SEO’s can be expensive.
SEO is constantly changing, and many factors go into a successful SEO strategy. Here are some of them:
Great SEO always starts with keyword research. You need to ensure your keywords have valuable search volume, are relevant to your niche, and can bring relevant traffic to your website. If your research is on point, you’ll be much more likely to achieve your goals of boosting site traffic.
The second step is to complete a Competitor Analysis. The SEO company will check which sites are ranking in the top 10 results, their content, On-Page, and their Off-Page (discussed later), and try to find areas where they lack so that you can have an advantage over them.
Content is essential for SEO. It’s not just about having lots of content; it’s about quality and freshness as well. The SEO company will advise you on the right amount of content to produce to keep your site updated and satisfy the Google Panda algorithm, which penalises sites with duplicate or low-quality content.
‘On-Page SEO’ is the collective term for tasks that you perform on your site. It’s about ensuring target Keywords are in place, maintaining Keyword Density, Title, Meta Descriptions, Headings are not duplicated or unoriginal, website coding is clean, schema (rich snippets) is implemented, and ensure there aren’t any Broken Links to other pages of your site (or external sites for that matter).
This optimisation also considers site structure, the layout of text, images, videos, and other media.
Google measures how long your website takes for a page to load. To rank higher on Google, your site should be fast. One way to improve site loading speed is by using browser caching. This way, visitors don’t have to download all the resources on each page every time they visit the site (which increases website load time). A fast-loading website is crucial for rankings, especially when Google has recently rolled out an Update for Speed.
Off-Page SEO is about link building. Backlinks are one of the most significant factors in SEO ranking, as they show that people found your site helpful and want to share it with others. SEO companies will build links for you by creating content on other sites or forums related to your niche.
There are tonnes of SEO companies out there doing ‘bland’ run of the mill SEO and achieving likewise lacklustre results. But, if you find a genuinely incredible SEO company, hold on to them!!
SEO requires skills, creativity, problem solving and strategy. The best SEO’s can charge thousands, tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of dollars.
You can find cheap SEO companies, but they often use Black Hat techniques. Not something we suggest doing! Using Black Hat techniques to get your website rank will eventually result in a Manual Penalty by search engines like Google.
It’s understandable why capable SEO companies charge a lot. SEO is not an easy process, and it takes time, which translates to more money, especially when you need someone with SEO skills who knows what they’re doing and how the current algorithms work.
Remember! SEO is a complicated process with many variables. SEO takes time to perfect, which means you’ll have an SEO campaign in place for at least six months before real benefits are visible. But what does this mean? It means that SEO costs more initially but pays off big time over the long term!
Costs vary depending on many factors such as:u003cbru003e1. What are your keywordsu003cbru003e2. Type of website you have (eCommerce, service, or a blog)u003cbru003e3. Who is the competitionu003cbru003e4. How long it takes them to complete your SEO strategy
Up until working with Casey, we had only had poor to mediocre experiences outsourcing work to agencies. Casey & the team at CJ&CO are the exception to the rule.
Communication was beyond great, his understanding of our vision was phenomenal, and instead of needing babysitting like the other agencies we worked with, he was not only completely dependable but also gave us sound suggestions on how to get better results, at the risk of us not needing him for the initial job we requested (absolute gem).
This has truly been the first time we worked with someone outside of our business that quickly grasped our vision, and that I could completely forget about and would still deliver above expectations.
I honestly can't wait to work in many more projects together!
Disclaimer
*The information this blog provides is for general informational purposes only and is not intended as financial or professional advice. The information may not reflect current developments and may be changed or updated without notice. Any opinions expressed on this blog are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the author’s employer or any other organization. You should not act or rely on any information contained in this blog without first seeking the advice of a professional. No representation or warranty, express or implied, is made as to the accuracy or completeness of the information contained in this blog. The author and affiliated parties assume no liability for any errors or omissions.
