Top 5 Tips On Hiring Great SEO Consultants

The unavailability or lack of SEO consultants is never a problem for any businessperson who is ready to invest. The problem, on the other hand, is due to a large number of SEO consultants claiming themselves the best in the business. It might seem almost impossible to choose one from the pool of professionals, all offering the exact same services. However, it is important to figure out the traits of a real expert as there are many professionals who are not well-versed with the best SEO practices. So, here we are giving you five practical tips on hiring the right SEO consultant for your business.

1. Verifiable Portfolio

Claims done by professionals about their expertise are useless if such claims cannot be verified from their portfolio. You need to ask SEO consultants about the work they have done in the past for other local businesses in your area and cross-check the information with these clients. If you are visiting the website of reputable SEO consultancy like Surfaced Media, you won’t even need to ask for their past works as the portfolio is already listed on their website.

2. White-Hat Strategies

Don’t ever hand over your project to any SEO consultants without having a clear idea about their SEO strategies. Stay away from those who talk about short-cuts and quick-fixes. There is a high probability that the quick-fixes and shortcuts are spammy methods that can attract penalization from Google. You need to work with those who take Google’s guidelines in planning the SEO strategy rather than trying to cheat the search engines. Short-cuts are never beneficial in the long-run.

3. Realistic Promises

You need to understand that no SEO consultant comes with a magic wand to bring you to the top of search results overnight. If you don’t understand this, you can easily get into the trap of unrealistic promises made by some SEO experts. SEO is a procedure that works slowly and steadily and no one can predict its result beforehand. So, run away from the consultants who claim to bring you to the top in 7 days, 15 days, 30 days, etc.

4. Holistic Approach

While discussing your SEO strategy, you should make sure that the consultant has a holistic approach. SEO has three main aspects – on-page, off-page, and technical. You will find a lot of professionals claiming to be experts in the area, but they talk only about building backlinks. And then there are some who only chant the mantra ‘content is the king’. Backlinks and content are very important but they are not the only factors affecting your ranking and performance. So, it is in your best interests to hire a consultant who gives importance to all the aspects of SEO.

5. Transparency And Professionalism

The SEO expert you hire is going to handle a big responsibility of your business. So, it is important to choose one whom you can trust. Will you trust a professional consultant who is not transparent about the strategies being implemented in your business? So, be sure to choose a consultant who is willing to discuss the strategies with you and work as a team to attain your business goal. If the consultant seems reluctant to share strategies and regular progress reports with you, you should look for some other options.