Search Engine Optimization Services

Company Focus

Many web designers and web hosts are addingsearch engine optimization (SEO) services to their offerings. Usually their efforts aren't worth much. SEO is a complex endeavor and should not be added as an afterthought. Look for a company that specializes only in search engine optimization services.

Some design and hosting companies outsource their SEO services, and that's fine. As long as your website's optimization ends up in the hands of full-time professionals, it's okay for the designer or host to act as a reseller. If you contract for optimization services in this manner, get the name of the SEO company and contact them directly to ensure they know what they are doing.

Beware of Spammers

Search engine optimization services are a favorite subject for bulk emails, and these providers are about as reliable as other spammers who offer you stock tips and enhancement drugs - in other words, not very. SEO is too important to hand off to any stranger who comes knocking at your website's door. Research local companies and meet them face to face. You are looking for business professionals, not quick-buck artists.

Guarantees That Guarantee Nothing

Any company that guarantees you a #1 position on Google is either lying or doesn't understand search engines. A company might reasonably offer a top 10 or even top 5 position, but no one can legitimately offer a #1 position.

Beware of sites that guarantee only to get your site ranked on the search engines. That's no guarantee at all because all sites are ranked as soon as the search engines find them. What matters is where your site is ranked.

In the end, guarantees aren't worth much. Referrals are much more important. Check with business associates to see what company optimized their websites. Get feedback from a potential SEO firm's other clients. This tells you much more than guarantees will.

Ethics of Search Engine Optimization Services

With any company you deal with, it is advisable to check with the Better Business Bureau for complaints. However if there are no complaints, you still need to be cautious. SEO is a new field and there are grey areas where techniques are not actually illegal but are unethical. These techniques are called "blackhat" as opposed to legitimate "whitehat" techniques.

Typical blackhat techniques include:

• Doorway pages
• Redirects
• Hidden Text
• Link Farms
• Submission Spam

Some whitehat SEO techniques are:

• Use of meta tags
• Optimized search phrase distribution
• Inbound links from quality sites
• Manual submissions to legitimate link directories

Blackhat techniques may pay off in the short run, but search engine programmers are smart enough to see through them. Sites that use these techniques score lower on searches, particularly on Google.

Backlinks Are Critical

One sign of an amateur operation is a company that emphasizes keywords over backlinks, which are links to your sites from other sites. Keywords are certainly a critical part of optimization and are easy to grasp, which is why some attempts at optimization focus on them.

It is because keywords are easy that they are weighted less by search engines than in the past. Backlinks are at least as important and possibly moreso. Anyone can pepper a page with keywords, but you have to have a high quality site to get links from other high quality sites. An SEO company that doesn't realize this doesn't really understand what they are doing.

Maintenance

Search engine optimization services are not a one-shot deal. The Internet changes, and your site must change with it. A good SEO company checks your rankings regularly, at least twice a month, and makes changes when needed.