SEO does work, if you do.
People are naturally sceptical about whether SEO services do actually work. The truth is, SEO (search engine optimisation) works if you and your SEO agency both work together.
This is not a service that you just hand off to someone while you watch your website suddenly shoot up into Google’s top-ranking spot. (Any agency who promises you that this is how it works, is lying to you.)
YOU need to play a role in your company’s SEO success.
Some things are easy to outsource, and many elements of SEO CAN be outsourced. An agency can manage the technical SEO, on-page SEO, and keyword research, among other things.
But it can’t ALL be outsourced. You, as the business owner or manager who is responsible for your website’s SEO and marketing, will need to get involved.
You can decide whether you’d rather spend more of your time or more of your money, but both things will be required.
1. You will need an SEO Agency
As you are not a web or SEO expert, you will need an agency on your side to handle all the things you aren’t able to do. An SEO agency will help you to optimise your content for your users, point out usability issues, and fix technical errors.
They will also work with you to refine your list of target keywords. This might be one of the most important services they offer.
You can’t optimise a website unless you know what you are optimising it for. Do you want to sell your product, or get more quote requests, or encourage users to sign up for your subscription?
You must know three very important things:
- What you want your website to do
- Who your competitors are
- Who your customers are
Only once you have these three answers, can your SEO agency help you with your keyword research. They will examine each answer and compile a list of target keywords that you might like to rank for.
You need to know your customers and offerings well enough to sign off on the keywords, or update the list of target keywords as required.
You MUST have a list of keywords you want to rank for, before you can start building a site that targets those keywords.
If you want to sell pet supplies, your website should be the expert on pet supplies.
2. You must add excellent content regularly
Owners and managers are always, understandably, running out of time.
However, good SEO rests on new and valuable content being added to your website on a regular basis.
This can include updates to current content but sometimes there’s only so much you can update before it’s perfect.
You need to be writing fresh and interesting content regularly – ideally publishing something new for visitors to read every two weeks.
This sounds daunting, and it is. It’s also absolutely imperative.
But many people don’t have time to write, or they simply don’t like to write. They feel they can’t decide on a topic or have more urgent matters to address. They might struggle to type quickly, are exhausted, or just don’t have enough hours in the day.
These are all valid reasons, but they are going to hinder your search engine optimisation progress.
New content must be added regularly, and someone must write it.
3. Avoid the AI-generated content trap
When website owners realise that SEO progress demands a consistent flow of new content, they inevitably turn to ChatGPT or any AI tool. It’s around this time that your SEO expert will start to get twitchy.
As AI has become more popular, everyone is using it to pump ‘new’ content onto their website. For a while it worked, but it didn’t take long for Google to slam that door shut.
Google does NOT like AI-generated content. They have clamped down hard on AI-generated articles and can now boot websites out of their ranking positions if they detect AI content on a site.
It was fun while it lasted, but Google has decided beyond all doubt that AI-generated content is a big fat NO.
They want content of a higher standard, and better quality.
Google uses E-E-A-T to score content on websites.
These factors are used to determine the quality of content and to ensure that websites provide accurate, reliable, and trustworthy content:
- Expertise
- Experience
- Authoritativeness
- Trustworthiness
E-E-A-T is centered around trust and helps to evaluate the performance of the search ranking systems, making sure that the content is unique and beneficial for people.
To improve your E-E-A-T score with Google, it is essential to:
- Create original and helpful content
- Avoid duplicating content
- Include relevant and high-quality images and videos to enhance the user experience and credibility of the blog
- Add a personal touch by including your own experience and insights
- Ensure your content is written by experts in your field and is authoritative and trustworthy.
If you understand how AI works, you will know that this is not the content that AI tools generate. You can use an AI tool to draft an article, but you should edit and refine it dramatically to make it usable and valuable for SEO.
4. You could hire a copywriter
Copywriters are amazing individuals, and they can weave magic. But the good ones are not cheap, although I personally think they are worth their weight in gold.
Excellent copywriters research topics thoroughly and often specialise in an area that they understand. They fact check their work and know how to make their writing SEO-friendly. They are priceless, unless you don’t have the budget for them.
If your business can’t afford a copywriter, you’ll need to write articles yourself. Alternatively, you could nominate a staff member to write your content inhouse, but it must still be high quality content.
Whichever path you choose, you must make sure that the content they are generating is following Google’s guidelines.
It must be SEO-friendly, and target your chosen keywords, if you want it to help your SEO.
5. You’ll sign off content topics
You, as the website owner, need to direct your own marketing strategy.
Whether you use a marketing agency or not, only you can decide on the final message you want to convey to your customers.
You can pay someone to write, but you will need to guide them on what to write too. You should have final say on any content that makes it to your website.
SEO services work if you do
If you are truly invested in the success of your website, then you can’t ignore SEO. SEO works if you work with an SEO expert, and you stay involved in the optimisation process.
Your role is in keyword and content topic signoff, and possibly content generation.
Your SEO agency (and a copywriter if you decide to use one) should handle the rest, but you should meet with them regularly to ensure the process is still on track and meeting targets.
Everyone’s time is limited, but you need to take part in the process to see the search ranking results and website activity you are hoping for.
Please contact us if you need some help with your SEO.
