If you’ve been looking for SEO services, you’ve seen many ‘SEO Packages’ being offered. They look something like this:
TripleGold SuperPremium SEO Package – $1000/month
On Page Optimization
Submission to 1,000 Search Engines
100,000 Social Bookmark Links
5000 Directory Submissions
500 PBNS
Plain and Simple- These cookie cutter SEO packages will destroy your business.
First off, every business is different and has different operational, marketing and strategic needs. This goes for SEO as well. What is good for client “a” may not be what client “b” needs. Every client PBM works with gets a custom strategy that fits their needs.
Secondly, and more important- Google, the search king- will fry your website. Google’s whole job is to provide the most relevant results pertaining to that person’s search query. If they see you are trying to game the system, they will penalize your site which means you will not rank and sometimes not even be shown.
So why do people offer these? These used to be the signals of relevance that Google looked for. Google has gotten much more complex and smart in the way they use their algorithm to offer relevant content, however the best practice is and has always remained the same- offer incredible content people want to share. They are easy to scale and manage. Companies that offer packages often get a client for 3 months, they see no results, go find another sucker. I hate companies like this.
PaperBoat Media first makes your onsite architecture is correct so the spiders and search engines can accurately know what your site is about and then we can do the off-page stuff. (Learn more about the difference between on-page SEO
1) PBM are Marketers First
The first reason stems from our belief that a marketer isn’t worth his/her salt if he didn’t take the time to learn about your company and your goals, your target audience, your branding and positioning strategies etc. Without that basic information, what kind of marketing would you end up doing?
Would you hire even a freelance graphics designer before going through at least some of these things in detail?
It’s impossible for an external SEO specialist to know your business as well as you do. An SEO consultant just knows SEO better than you.
2) SEO Packages are Typically Bad for Your Brand
As a business leader, you work your tail off trying to build your brand. It means something to you (or your bosses); it stands for something. Google itself is big on brands. There’s a process for creating your marketing collateral such as brochures and advertisements. These are checked and double-checked to ensure that they comply with brand guidelines and don’t contain embarrassing grammatical errors.
Many snake oil SEO industry to do some ‘SEO copywriting’ – they just try to slot in as many keywords as they can. Doesn’t make your company look good, does it?
And the content that’s created are filler content that’s further spun and distributed across thousands of article directories you’ve never even heard about (and neither have your customers). Also, in most cases these SEO packages build links automatically, which doesn’t make for a natural backlink profile (so important after the Penguin update).
To use an analogy – Have you ever bought traditional media before?
Let’s imagine a salesperson comes in and tells you about their media package – you get a 30-second TV spot, 3 full page magazine ads, 20 classified ads and 2 radio spots, all without asking you anything about your business.
You wouldn’t pay for that, would you?
You’d want to know how all of that fits into your business strategy, who the target audience is and how it will affect your brand image.
3) SEO Packages are only about Big Numbers That Look Impressive
500,000 Links!!! Versus me. I will try to get 3-5 natural links this month.
Or A Page #1 ranking guarantee. Smoke and mirrors. I could promise that too for whizbangs and thingamjigs keywords – page one, even position one mean nothing if it isn’t the right keyword. Now don;t get me wrong, I have plenty of competitive keywords that rank number 1 locally and nationally ( ask me for a list and I will gladly show you the proof- One I am most proud of? Orlando PPC or Malibu Rhinoplasty- number one on the world)
You want the keywords you’re ranking for to bring in traffic – qualified traffic. And you want to be able to convert that traffic to leads and ultimately, revenue.
SEO packages don’t care about those. Their only aim is to fulfil the conditions of the package and try to rank keywords – even if those keywords don’t generate traffic and conversions.
4) Different Levels of Competition
Here’s something fun you can try – call an SEO company that offers a fixed-price SEO package with a Page #1 guarantee (which Google keeps saying they can’t give) and tell them you want to rank for ‘insurance’ and ‘online gambling’ in the United States (i.e. Google.com). Tell me what they say (seriously).
Every keyword has a different difficulty level and that becomes a factor in how much SEO costs (among other variables). Depending on how difficult it is, you might either be overpaying or not doing enough to see any lasting results.
5) Packages Ignore Your In-House Competencies
This is perhaps one of the most important reasons why we don’t want to place every SEO engagement into neat little boxes. Without doubt, companies touting SEO packages will ignore any in-house competencies you have. SEO then becomes an isolated activity, removed from your brand reality.
We’re sure you’ve spent years building up a great team. They’re committed, they know your culture and are great at what they do. Most of the time, they have interesting, related stories they want to share.
We consider them to be one of the most important resources for any SEO program. We enjoy working closely with your in-house teams to come up with customer insights or content that differentiates your company from its competitors.
If you have talented in-house writers, let us help build content that are not only keyword-targeted and attract links but move your clients further along your sales funnel.
Do you have subject-matter experts? Let’s work together and create a white paper that solves a common customer problem.
If your front-end staff has interesting customer or brand stories, lets turn it into a blog post and share it.
By working closely with the experience and talent you already have, we can together create content that appeals not only to search engines but to your prospects as well. Let’s create content that helps persuade your prospects to turn into your customers.
That’s what marketing is all about, isn’t it?
Also, how much work you can do in-house will effect how much our SEO engagement will cost. For example, we can charge less for content creation if we come up with an editorial calendar and your in-house writers do the actual writing. If they don’t have the time, we can do it for you, of course.
In return, your staff will learn a lot by working with us. This helps incorporate basic SEO considerations into your day-to-day marketing efforts.
Get the Most out of SEO and PaperBoat Media