When should you hire a SEO?
Deciding on whether or not to hire an SEO can by quite a frustrating task even if you only have basic knowledge of what Search engine optimisation is all about. Often I get calls to do interviews for company’s looking to hire in house, but are not sure what they should be looking for in a potential new employee. Even recruitment agencies have a major lack of understanding of what they should be looking for in a candidate’s CV.
When to start looking for a SEO Consultant
Ideally SEO should begin from the start of a site build as website architecture and crawl-ability are big factors in search engine optimisation and is often overlooked as the design takes preference. If search engine spiders have issue crawling your site then you’re not going to get even close to the potential visibility you could ultimately achieve in organic search results.
Other on page factors includes:
• Use of JavaScript
• Search engine friendly URL’S
• Internal link structure
• Consistent unique and relevant Meta tags for page content (title, description, keywords)
• Proper use of H1,H2,H3, tags
• Using alt tags with all your images
• Page imagery to content ratio ( Don’t out weigh content with imagery)
What to look for in your new SEO
Before I even decide if a candidate would be suitable for an interview I look for a sign of involvement in the search industry as this shows that they have a passion for what they do. I believe a SEO that has passion for the subject would have some public involvement either being an active contributor to SEO forums or their own blog/site dedicated to the subject.
SEO involves both a technical and analytical aspect and the candidates CV should indicate a good understanding of web Development languages such as Html, CSS, PHP, JavaScript and a interest into looking at Data or at least familiar with analytic tools .
A track record of working with websites that are not owned as sideline projects is preferable. A good knowledge of search engines is also extremely important as you need to understand what factors search engines use to rank a website.
before you hire a consultant
I would strongly advise learning more about the concept of SEO and don’t be afraid to ask questions if you are unsure about a certain topic. The internet has mountains of resources online that provide great information on Search engine optimisation.
Neil
Mantra of the web
Mantra of the web
In my line of work I see a lot of brands trying to make noise through different online mediums without any real profitable goals in mind. The problem with this approach is budgets get spent on connecting with the wrong crowd, those of which have no voice or platform to share or pass on the brands message.
One of my favourite marketing Guru’s is Seth Godin , to me and many other online marketers he is the Deepak Chopra of the online marketing world . Recently I read a short post on Seth’s blog called Notice me. Its well worth a read as it’s short and straight to the point.
Become the teacher
If you’re a big company or a small niche market website, then following principle applies to you, “be the master of your own domain”. Providing useful information that other companies do not have access to help’s you to become the teacher.
Sharing your knowledge with others will help you gain trust, respect and inspire people to carry your message to the next town. I bet your brain is saying why the hell didn’t I think of that before or I already tried that but nobody listened to me. My advice is to be yourself, be real, love what you do and others will like you for it.
Cheers,
Neil
Blog
Welcome to the new seoclient.org website; I have recently decided to move from just a personal blog to a full service website as i need a home for my work, I will still be posting SEO articles as Seoclient is still my personal site but with a major upgrade.
Cheers
Neil
I work as a full time SEO consultant with one of the biggest Digital marketing companies in Ireland. this is my personal site were i consult on SEO and share my random thoughts and tips.
