
Hiring An SEO? Hear From Google What SEOs Do
This Google video “How to hire an SEO” isn’t new but it’s to the point and vital to setting expectations. I encourage both SEOs and clients to watch this video and learn what Google says you should look for in an SEO.
How to hire an SEO
Transcript |
hi I’m Maile Ohye and I work with Google |
search I like to share advice to help |
you hire a useful SEO and prevent hiring |
a bad SEO one who you might pay a lot of |
money without positive results or even |
worse one who implements shady practices |
on your website that result in a |
reduction in search rankings SEO stands |
for search engine optimization – some |
SEO seems like black magic having worked |
with Google search for over a decade |
what I’ve learned is that first it’s not |
black magic and second if you want |
long-term success |
there aren’t any quick magical tricks |
that an SEO will provide so that your |
site ranks number one it’s important to |
note that an SEO potential is only as |
high as the quality of your business or |
website so successful SEO helps your |
website put your best foot forward so |
that it ranks appropriately in the spot |
where an unbiased potential customer |
would expect your site to be seen |
a successful SEO also looks to improve |
the entire searcher experience from |
search results to clicking on your |
website and potentially converting a |
good SEO will recommend best practices |
for a search friendly site from basic |
things like descriptive page titles for |
a blog or small business to more complex |
things like language markup for a |
multilingual global site SEO is ensure |
that you’re serving your online |
customers a good experience especially |
those coming from a search engine and |
that your site is helpful whether |
they’re using a desktop computer or |
mobile phone in most cases the SEO will |
need four months to a year to help your |
business first implement improvements |
and then see potential benefit my |
strongest advice when working with an |
SEO is to request if they corroborate |
their recommendation with a documented |
statement from Google either in a Help |
Center article video or Google a |
response in a forum that supports both |
one the SEO description of the issue |
that needs to be improved to help with |
ranking and to the approach they |
prescribed to accomplishing this |
tasks requesting these two bits of |
information will help prevent hiring a |
poor SEO who might otherwise convince |
you to do useless things like add more |
words to the keyword meta tag or by |
links because if you search for google |
advice on this topic you’d see blog |
posts and videos from us that clearly |
explain that adding keywords to the meta |
tag wouldn’t help furthermore while |
google uses links for page rank our |
documentation highlights that we |
strongly advise against the approach of |
buying links for the purpose of |
increasing page rank one basic rule is |
that in a majority of cases doing what’s |
good for SEO is also doing what’s good |
for your online customers things like |
having a mobile-friendly website good |
navigation and building a great brand |
additionally if you’re a more |
established brand with complicated |
legacy systems then good search friendly |
best practices likely involved paying |
off some of your site’s technical debt |
such as updating your infrastructure so |
that your website is agile and able to |
implement features faster in the long |
term if you own a small local business |
you can probably do the initial work |
yourself check out our 30-minute video |
series on how to build an online |
presence for your local business now if |
you still believe you want to hire an |
SEO here’s a general process one conduct |
a two way interview with your potential |
SEO check that they seem generally |
interested in you and your business to |
check their references three act four |
and you’ll probably have to pay for a |
technical and search audit 4 decide if |
you want to hire let’s break this down |
and start with step 1 conduct a two-way |
interview in the interview here are some |
things to look for a good SEO doesn’t |
focus only on search engine ranking but |
how they can help your business so they |
should ask questions like what makes |
your business content and/or service |
unique and therefore valuable to |
customers they want to know this |
information to make sure it’s |
highlighted on your website for your |
current and potential new audience |
– what does your common customer look |
like and how do they currently find your |
website 3 how does your business make |
money and how can search help for what |
other channels are you using offline |
advertising social networks 5 who are |
your competitors what do they do well |
online and potentially offline if the |
SEO doesn’t seem interested in learning |
about your business from a holistic |
standpoint look elsewhere it’s difficult |
to do good SEO without knowing about a |
business’s goals their customers and |
other existing marketing efforts SEO |
should complement your existing work the |
second step in hiring an SEO is to check |
references if your potential SEO |
provides prior clients be sure to check |
their references you want to hear from |
past clients that the SEO was able to |
provide useful guidance and worked |
effectively with their developers |
designers UX researchers and our |
marketers a good SEO should feel like |
someone you can work with learn from |
experiment with and who generally cares |
about you and your business not just |
getting your site the highest rank as |
ultimately those techniques rarely last |
long if they work at all they’ll want to |
educate you and your staff on how search |
engines work so that SEO becomes part of |
your general business operations step 3 |
is to request a technical and search |
audit if you trust your SEO candidate |
give them restricted view not full or |
right access to your Google search |
console data and even your analytics |
data before they actually modify |
anything on your website have them |
conduct a technical and search audit to |
give you a prioritized list of what they |
think should be improved for SEO if |
you’re a larger business you can hire |
multiple SEO to run audits and |
prioritize improvements see what each |
has to say and then determine who you |
could work with the best in the audit |
the SEO should prioritize improvements |
with a structure like one the issue to |
the suggested improvement 3 an estimate |
on the overall investment in other words |
the time energy or money it would take |
for your developers to implement the |
improvement and for Google search as |
well as searchers and customers to |
recognize the improvement the SEO will |
need to talk with your developers to |
better understand what technical |
constraints may exist for the estimated |
positive business impact the impact |
might be a ranking improvement that will |
lead to more visitors and conversions or |
perhaps the positive impact comes from a |
back-end change that cleans up your site |
and helps your brand be more agile in |
the future five a plan of how to iterate |
and improve on the implementation or |
perhaps how to experiment and fail fast |
should the results not meet expectations |
that covers the structure of the |
technical and search audit now let’s |
talk about each of these audits |
individually in the technical audit your |
SEO should be able to review your site |
for issues related to internal linking |
crawl ability URL parameters server |
connectivity and response codes to name |
some if they mention that your site has |
duplicate content problems that need to |
be corrected make sure they show you the |
specific URLs that are competing for the |
same query or that they explained it |
should be cleaned up for long term site |
health not initial growth I mention this |
because lots of duplicate content exists |
on web sites and often it’s not a |
pressing problem in this search audit |
your potential SEO will likely break |
down your search queries into categories |
like branded and unbranded terms branded |
terms are those with your business or |
website’s name like a search for Gmail |
is a branded term while the search for |
email is an unbranded or general keyword |
an SEO should make sure that for branded |
queries such as Gmail your website is |
providing a great experience that allows |
customers who know your brand or website |
to easily find exactly what they need |
and potentially convert they might |
recommend improvements that help the |
entire searcher experience from what the |
searcher sees in search results to when |
they click on a result and use your |
website for unbranded queries an SEO can |
help you |
better make sense of the online |
competitive landscape they can tell you |
things like here are the types of |
queries it would make sense for your |
business to rank but here’s what your |
competition is done and why I think they |
rank where they do for instance perhaps |
your competition has great reviews |
really shareable content or they run a |
highly reputable site an SEO will |
provide recommendations for how to |
improve rankings for these queries and |
the entire searcher experience they’ll |
introduce ideas like update obsolete |
content they might say your site is |
suffering because some of your well |
ranking content is obsolete has poor |
navigation a useless page title or isn’t |
mobile-friendly let’s improve these |
pages and see if more website visitors |
convert and purchase or if they can |
micro convert meaning that perhaps they |
subscribe or share content improve |
internal linking your SEO might say your |
site is suffering because some of your |
best articles are too far from the |
homepage and users would have a hard |
time finding it we can better internally |
link to your content to feature it more |
prominently generate buzz the SEO might |
say you have great content but not |
enough people know we can try to get |
more user interaction and generate buzz |
perhaps through social media or business |
relationships this will help us attract |
more potential customers and perhaps |
garner natural links to your site learn |
from the competition your SEO might |
explain here’s what your competitors do |
well |
can you reach parity with this and |
potentially surpass them in utilities or |
can you better show customers your |
business’s unique value again a good SEO |
will try to prioritize what ideas can |
bring your business the most improvement |
for the least investment and what |
improvements may take more time but help |
growth in the long term |
once they talk with you and other |
members of your team such as developers |
or marketers they’ll help your business |
forge a path ahead the last thing I want |
to mention is that when I talk with SEO |
s one of the biggest holdups to |
improving away |
site isn’t there recommendation but it’s |
the business making time to implement |
their ideas if you’re not ready to |
commit to making SEO improvements while |
getting an SEO audit may be helpful make |
sure that your entire organization is on |
board else your SEO improvements may be |
non-existent regardless of who you hire |
so that wraps it up thanks for watching |
and best of luck to you and your |
business |
Hits: 2