The internet has done a lot for business over the last couple of decades. It’s broadened small companies’ potential customer bases, making it extremely simple to sell products and services halfway across the world in an instant, without it costing much more than doing business locally. It’s made it possible for millions of people to work from home, with just a laptop and an internet connection.
It’s also changed the way we market ourselves. When the internet was in its infancy and only rich companies could afford a website, it was a nice-to-have, an add-on that got advertised in their regular print, radio and TV advertising – a status symbol to say, see, we’re ahead of technology.
Today, anybody can own a website, even a completely free one. So how on earth do you make sure people are finding your website, rather than your competitor’s… or even worse, simply languishing on page 900 of a Google search? By optimizing your content, of course.
We’ve gone into detail about what SEO can do for you, how to define goals, what to expect from SEO/SEM services, how to ethically build backlinks, and a whole bunch more. But today, we’d like to know, just how much SEO should you do?
Not doing enough
It’s pretty easy to do too little, or nothing at all, for SEO. All you have to do is create your website, then not do anything with it, or only occasionally update it, post a blog, or add some images. If you invest little to no effort, you may as well not have a website, because a neglected one looks worse than a non-existent one.
Doing too much
Is it possible to do too much SEO? You’re going to find some providers who tell you that it can’t be done. You simply cannot do too much for your SEO. And while they’re sort of right, it’s not the whole story.
For example: flooding a single blog post with keywords will probably make it easier for search engines to find it, but it will also make it hard to read and very obviously written purely to jam in keywords. On the other hand, creating hundreds of well-written, interesting blog posts that have natural keywords built in will certainly push your page forward.
Getting it just right
So how do you figure out how much SEO is enough for you? There are a couple of ways of making sure you’re striking the right balance.
1 – Affordability
Have a serious conversation with your SEO service provider, and discuss what they can do that fits in your budget. Also ask them for a realistic SEO pricing guide, so that you can work out how much you can spend for maximum benefit.
2 – Realistic expectations
Unless you are a massive global corporation, you won’t have infinite time or resources to dedicate to your SEO. Your service provider should be willing and able to give you a realistic picture of what they can do for you, and what a company of your type, size and location should expect.
3 – Targeting your audience
Some kinds of businesses – even small ones – do really well in the global marketplace, while others don’t… and that’s okay! For example, someone providing an online graphic design service can easily serve clients all around the world, while a vehicle mechanic, by necessity, can only serve a finite local population.
The graphic designer needs to target a specific but global audience, while the mechanic needs to target a general but local audience. Both of them will do well to have carefully targeted SEO, rather than a ton of vague SEO.
Finding your balance
Spending so much time on your SEO that you don’t get anything else done is counter-productive. As a business owner, your time is valuable and while devoting some of it to making sure your marketing is effective, you can’t spend all of it. And the same goes for your money, too!
When asking yourself, is this enough SEO, the question really should be, is our SEO effective. You are doing enough SEO if your website appears when someone searches for you, and not enough if it doesn’t.
Do you think you’re doing too much, too little or just enough SEO? Let us know in the comments.
Need an SEO partner who knows how to strike the right balance? Fill in your details and we’ll get in touch.