Do You Know Enough To Do Your Own SEO?

In many areas, a little knowledge can be just as dangerous as no knowledge at all. After all, if you admit to yourself that you don’t know how to do something, you’ll most often do one of three things: do nothing; learn how to do it yourself; or find an expert you trust to handle it for you.

But if you think you know and you really don’t, you are very likely to make your situation worse. This is totally true of Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

Doing Nothing

Even though I’ve been immersed in SEO since 2003, I have to admit that if someone creates a website in a way that is useful to their human visitors and doesn’t try to do any SEO on it at all, it is possible for it to rank well and get plenty of targeted traffic. Of course, saying that it’s possible doesn’t mean it can or will happen. It just means that I have seen instances of this, especially when the business was early to get a website or in a fairly uncompetitive location or industry.

It is more likely, though, that doing nothing means Google will see duplicate content on your site or not see the valuable content on your site at all. It can also mean that Google has a hard time figuring out what your pages are about, so it’s unsure what terms to rank them for. Either of these problems can have an enormous impact on your rankings. So, doing nothing really isn’t your best choice, especially if your competitors are doing good things for their own SEO and surging ahead of you in the rankings.

Learning To Do SEO Yourself (DIY)

This is a tried-and-true method that plenty of small business owners have adopted over the years to help their enterprises succeed online. Some of them have become so good at it that they have pretty much become full-time SEOs and turned their original businesses over to others to run.

SEO certainly isn’t voodoo, and anyone willing to put in the time and effort can learn to be pretty darn good at it. However, in the world of SEO, change is continual and occurs at a rapidly accelerating pace. If you think you are keeping up, check out this list of recent Google updates to gauge how well you’re doing.

Some of these algorithm changes are minor and benign. Others, like the ongoing Panda and Penguin updates, have widespread, drastic impacts on rankings. If you have been hit by them and need to recover from their negative consequences, you probably need new tools, new skills and a new way of thinking: not just about SEO, but about your overall internet marketing efforts, as well.

You can do your own SEO, but if you are not willing to commit to keeping up with all the changes in the industry, you will quickly be left behind, and may not even realize what your problems might be or how to correct them.

Doing your own SEO may not be very cost effective, either, especially if your time is better spent making sales and earning money. A professional SEO consultant spreads out the costs of research, testing, skill building and professional tools over all of their clients, while a DIY-er must carry the burden of that time and money expenditure on her own.

If you rely on your web designer, developer or in-house IT department to do your Search Engine Optimization, keep in mind that they need to be continually upgrading their SEO knowledge and skill set, in addition to executing their primary functions. What has worked in the past certainly doesn’t work now. Heck, tactics that produced great results just 6 months ago could actually be penalizing your site today.

Find an Expert to Help You

Think about how valuable a well-performing website can be to your business. Consider your current skills and how much time and effort you’re willing to devote to improving your site on an ongoing basis. Then, if you need it, get some professional help.

When you’re ready for some assistance from a professional SEO team, fill out the form here.