Thanks to the geographical boundary-destroying power of the internet, outsourcing digital marketing and SEO work is now easier than ever. Companies across industries need and benefit from SEO on a daily basis, and can attest to how worthwhile an investment in quality SEO is. Watching your business climb up the ranks on the search engine results page is a thing of beauty, but achieving these results requires strategy, time and investment. Below are 6 reasons why outsourcing your SEO is a great investment.Â
Geographical Comparative AdvantageÂ
Geographical comparative advantage refers to the cost savings a firm can realize by outsourcing SEO to a firm or individuals located in different countries. The savings here are largely currency and local purchasing power. If an American or British company searches SEO Brisbane, for instance, the rates charged by Australian SEOs will likely appear quite favourable when converted to local currencies.Â
SpeedÂ
There are a lot of moving parts to an SEO campaign and a series of chronological steps that must be taken in order to execute one successfully. These will be second nature to an experienced SEO agency, whereas trying to plod along without this experience can result in significant time delays and can reduce the effectiveness of an SEO campaign, which is very often dependent on being able to execute quickly.Â
Speed is also an important element to consider when factoring in how much time you will not be able to allocate to other efforts. If digital marketing is not your bread and butter, your time is likely better spent, dollar-for-dollar, on your core operations.Â
Results
There are many reasons companies hire out their SEO work, chief among them being a desire for predictable results. If you find a good agency or SEO professionals with a solid portfolio of work and a long list of satisfied past and current clients, there is every reason to believe they will make your project a success as well. You might be able to rank for some keywords and do a passable job with your own SEO, but a professional agency or freelancer is going to be able to provide you with SERP ranking results that would likely be difficult for you to reach on your own.Â
Expertise
SEO is very fluid and constantly in flux. A single announcement from Google can completely upend strategies and business models, and so successful SEO requires being on the cutting edge. You need to be attuned to industry shifts and trends so that you aren’t blindsided by new rules and best practices. If your core business is not SEO, it can be difficult to achieve and maintain this level of expertise. Staying plugged into your own industry’s goings-on is challenging enough.Â
Outsourcing your SEO to professionals ensures that you are paying for SEO work and advice from people who only think about SEO. This is what you ultimately want in the long run and what you need to establish a solid SEO digital marketing foundation.Â
Savings
SEO is ultimately an investment, not a cost. The aim of SEO is to build a long-term marketing foundation that will stand the test of time and produce results and drive organic traffic for you for years. Building up to this takes time and requires upfront costs, but what you are ultimately paying for when you hire SEO services is marketing that, in many ways, takes care of itself. PPC, social media, YouTube and other forms of marketing have their place as well, but they are going to be far more expensive tactics over the long haul.Â
Opportunity CostsÂ
At the end of the day, whatever effort you expend on doing things that are not firmly within your wheelhouse and leveraging your core competencies is an opportunity cost. If you are great at activity A and only mediocre at activity B, ideally, you would spend all of your time on the former. When you outsource your SEO, you must also consider it a strategic freeing up of your time and resources.Â
ConclusionÂ
While outsourcing SEO is by no means a new phenomenon, there has been an explosion in digital marketing, and particularly SEO services, over the last ten years, meaning that what’s out there runs the gamut from sublime to terrible. It is important to do your due diligence before signing a contract with an SEO agency or deciding on one or several freelancers to handle your SEO needs. If you are still on the fence about whether you should handle SEO in-house, keep the above reasons to outsource in mind and build an SEO campaign and digital marketing foundation that will last you the life of your business.Â