Tips for Choosing an SEO Service That Meets Your Needs

Pairing with an SEO service can be one of the best decisions you ever make for your business. It can take a lot of the strain off of your marketing department and help you pull in more leads than you thought possible.

That doesn't mean you should say "yes" to just any old search engine optimization agency. You need to take a handful of factors into consideration before you ever sign a contract. This will help make sure you select the perfect fit for your continued growth.

1. Understand that SEO is difficult

A lot of agencies like to promise "rapid results" and "immediate leads." While that sounds nice in theory, the reality is much different. Search engine optimization takes a lot of time, effort, and patience. Anyone who is promising you lightspeed results could be using some underhanded tactics to secure your rankings. This is commonly referred to as black hat SEO. Black hat tactics include methods like link spamming, keyword stuffing, and duplicating content.

These are problematic for a few reasons. Link spamming often requires a large volume of low-ranking websites to send links to your site. Keyword stuffing entails clogging content, metadata, and titles with the same keyword to get a search engine to notice. And duplicate content is seen as low-effort. Each of these can get you penalized by Google and, in severe cases, de-indexed. An agency should be transparent about the effort and time your campaigns will take.

2. Be specific about your business goals

An agency won't be able to help you succeed if you don't give your support team much to go on. Goals like "rank better" or "get more leads" sound sensible but they aren't specific enough to really count. You should forecast projected business growth, conversion percentages, and key results that will help you track how your campaigns are performing. Goals that are too vague—or even unrealistic—can sabotage the potential success of your SEO efforts. If you're not sure of what shape your goals should take, an agency can potentially help you to an extent.

However, when discussing future campaigns and strategies, it's good to have an outline of what your goals might look like. A talented SEO service can take this foundation and help you refine it a little. When you're developing goals, you should keep two things in mind: They should be both specific and measurable. Abstract goals that can't be quantified aren't as useful.

3. Prioritize good communication skills

Strong SEO performance is incredibly valuable. In a business relationship, though, communication often takes the cake. An agency can provide you with the best services in the world but if they don't communicate effectively (or, sometimes, at all), it can make it harder to convey performance metrics, needs, and results. It's imperative that you find a search engine optimization service that provides open channels of communication. If you have questions, you should be able to get answers. If you request updates, you should receive progress reports.

Companies like Link Laboratory don't just take your campaigns, toss them into their world-class link lab, and wait for results. They work with businesses to find out what makes them tick and craft campaigns that fit your unique needs. These kinds of partnerships are a two-way street. Instead of thinking of yourselves as client and provider, think of it more as a give and take. After all, you have to work alongside your agency to achieve true search engine success.

Choosing an SEO agency is a major step for your business. You should vet an agency thoroughly to make sure you're comfortable with everything these services entail. This sort of partnership can truly push your business to new heights as long as you make the right decision.