Our SEO service should really be called WTS (Website Traffic Service)
Why WTS?
Most SEO agencies won’t tell you this, but since Google changed the placing of its adverts in 2016, organic traffic has suffered. Google has removed the ads from the right-hand side (because they weren’t being used) and added more ads at the very top of the page. To give an example, Wayfair noted a 25% drop in organic traffic.
Although organic rankings still get the vast majority of traffic, it shows us that we need to have a more holistic strategy to gain maximum quality traffic through to your site.
The importance of SEO since Google’s changes
Well to be quite honest, it reduces the importance of SEO if all you do is concentrate on Google rankings alone. However, if you practice SEO correctly, you would be targeting other relevant websites with high trust value and traffic to gain inbound links. If your SEO agency does this well, you will not only get good Google rankings because of the inbound “link juice”, but great traffic from referral sources (as defined in Google analytics).
What does an SEO Agency do?
This can depend on you and your in-house capabilities, if you have non, then the agency will do everything from technical SEO, content creation, link building and management. However if you would like to create your own content and have an in house web developer with a good understanding of SEO, the we can be used for strategy, analysis and ongoing management.
Every project is different, from the websites you are working on, to your competition and the goals of your website. for instance the strategy for a local retailer would be very different to that of an eCommerce business.
What makes the best SEO Agency?
We like to think when choosing an agency you should be looking for three simple but essential USP’s:
Transparency – Before the project starts, there needs to be a clear understanding of the search terms you would like to be found for, the strategy and complete access to all statistics available. Don’t just rely on the reports provided, have a guided look through all the tools such as Google search console, analytics and the agencies chosen software such as MOZ, Serpstat, SEMRush etc.
Flexibility – Don’t get tied into a fixed term contract with a fixed monthly price, everything can change, whether it’s your business, your competition or Google’s algorithm. There’s no reason for an agency to demand more than 3 months notice of any changes with the agreement. SEO should be a long term partnership, not just a service.
Experience – Because SEO isn’t taught in school or University, everything has to be learnt in the real world. This isn’t helped by the fact Google doesn’t tell anyone how their algorithm actually works. SEO practitioners are left to their own devices to learn from testing again and again and……
