Starting a business is only the beginning of the struggle. You have a website, you have a product that you know your target audience wants, but you find that they don’t know you exist. This is where Search Engine Optimization comes in. SEO is a marketing tactic that anyone can learn to do, and you can certainly do it yourself when you are still starting out. However, as your business grows, so do your responsibilities. Maybe you have more things to do now than trying to get Google to find your site. Maybe now you want to chase after bigger contracts, maybe you are tired of scavenging the crumbs left by the heavyweights in your niche and you want to be a serious competitor and rank for the most popular keywords. If that describes you, then we recommend outsourcing your SEO needs to the Philippines.
The Philippines is the destination that makes the most sense to outsource because of its low cost of labor, internet-savvy population, and remarkable English language skills.
SEO means optimizing a page for a keyword that people search for. When people search for something on the web, they use keywords that a search engine recognizes and then produce results that it thinks are the most relevant for the keywords used. The purpose of SEO is for search engines to know that your website has the content that people are searching for.
On-Page SEO is done by distributing the relevant keyword throughout the content of a page.
Off-Page SEO deals with how much authority and credibility your site has though links going to that site.
If you run a small business around a niche site, with a keyword research tool, you can do SEO by targeting long-tail keywords that are low-competition but with a good enough search volume.
However, it’s very difficult to rank for popular keywords when your site is new because search engines will decide that older and more established sites as more credible. In these cases, you would need someone to do SEO for you full-time.
You may have heard that SEO doesn’t work anymore. Some internet gurus out there say that you should write for people, not search engines, because SEO is dead and if you try it Google will penalize you and you will never be able to rank.
It’s likely that those gurus used outdated SEO tactics in the past, refused to adapt, and because they refused to adapt they paid for it.
In the past, SEO just meant bombarding your page with a keyword everywhere and getting spammy links, but with Google’s Penguin and Panda updates, the entire game has changed. Methods used by SEO specialists 10 years ago to rank a page are now sure-fire tickets to get a website penalized in the rankings, or worse, de-indexed.
Search engines are always updating, making SEO an ever-shifting battleground that’ll get you burned if you get complacent.
SEO isn’t dead, it just wiped out all of the trash. It is true that you should write for people but you should also make sure that people see it in the first place. In order for them to find your article amongst the billions of other articles out there, you need to have good SEO so Google can reward your website; therefore allowing people to find your website.
Dennis Seymour, the co-founder of Leapfrogger Inc. and one of the most respected SEO experts in the Philippines, categorizes SEO providers into four groups:
We recommend you use only white hat techniques to ensure success for your business in the long term.
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Yes! Filipinos are very eager workers and they speak English really well. Living expenses in the Philippines are lower so the cost of labor is cheaper.
Are they all good?
A lot of them are really good, in fact, the Philippines is one of the leading countries in SEO in Asia. Despite that though, you still need to choose carefully. Like anywhere else, there are those who don’t really care about what they are doing and are still using spammy tricks that simply don’t work anymore.
You also have to think about price vs. quality. It’s true, the Philippines is cheaper, but prices still vary. If you’re looking for ‘dirt-cheap’ SEO packages then you should know that there’s probably a reason why they sell their services so cheap. Most likely because they leave a lot of footprints that Google can track.
Even if you go for the best and most experienced white hat SEO providers in the Philippines though, they are still cheaper than the ones found in the U.S.A. or Australia.
SEO is a rising industry in the Philippines due to a young population well-versed in technology and the internet. The Philippines offers a variety of SEO services in the form of SEO companies, freelancers, or online workers for a full-time salary.
SEO agencies benefit from having a team of people that already know what they are doing. Not only that, but they could get you results much faster. Because of this, they are far more expensive and we think that that’s more suitable for bigger businesses.
For small businesses, we recommend looking for a virtual employee, it’s less expensive and the quality of the work is still high. You would have to train them though. It is unreasonable to expect that your outsourced worker would know immediately what she has to do, even with experience.
Price usually scales with experience. If you’re low on budget, you can hire someone inexperienced but you must be open to training them in exchange for that very low hourly rate. You don’t have to train your employee yourself or if you don’t know much about SEO, you can either pay someone else to do the training or refer to a free SEO course online. You also can hire very experienced SEO employees, but keep in mind that the hourly rate will be much more.
It is important to note that you can’t always trust experience when we talk about SEO. An SEO specialist could tell you that he has 10 years worth of experience but that would be totally worthless if the methods he uses are still the same ones he used in 2008.
The same is true for SEO companies. Just because they’re an agency does not mean that they’re good. It’s best to check if they rank on Google, see who their clients are, check if they are familiar with your niche, and make sure their strategies aren’t outdated.
The most important traits in your SEO provider should be adaptability and perceptiveness to the shifting SEO currents. Google updates its algorithms all the time and if you’re not careful all of the progress you spent months working on would be lost in a day.
You can’t build your site and then take the first SEO provider that comes your way. You need a solid marketing strategy to succeed.
If you decide to outsource an employee directly, head over to Onlinejobs.ph and find the perfect candidate to handle your SEO. If you think an SEO company is something you need and can afford, head over here for a list of the top SEO agencies in the Philippines or select one of the SEO providers listed here.
If you contract a company, research thoroughly their background or their methods. If you go for a virtual employee, take the time needed for training. Whatever path you choose, it’s helpful to know a bit about SEO in order to make the right decisions.
You can’t just get an SEO provider and say “I want to rank number 1 for this keyword this week” and expect good results. The only way you really can do that is with black hat techniques. Good SEO will take time. You will need to explain your business, your goals, your situation, and the history of the website to your employee so she can do a better job of ranking your website for you.
Did your website incur a penalty in the past? Do you have any other goals besides ranking? Are you launching a new site? If you keep your SEO provider in the dark then they won’t be able to work properly and you won’t get the results that you want.
This would be the time to bring out the marketing strategy you have prepared in Step 1 and share it with your chosen SEO provider. Make sure both parties understand each other and you are in agreement.
Results won’t happen immediately, this should be expected when you set up your timeframe.
If you hired a virtual employee to do SEO work for you, it’s going to take some time before you see any good results. The good thing is that you can communicate easier with a virtual employee and track their progress better.
With an SEO company, they won’t immediately reply to your inquiries because you are not their only client. Even when they are really good, they still can’t control Google and you still would have to wait for the desired results.
SEO is a long-term game, this is why you hired white hat SEO companies or employees. It’s better this way rather than using black hat techniques to rank temporarily and then get into trouble later. You will need to be patient.
Say you’ve waited and your audience still can’t find your website, then this would be a good time to pinpoint what went wrong and re-evaluate your marketing strategy.
If you achieve the results you desired, then congratulations! Now people are finding your site and you just have to deliver on your business’s promise (no pressure).
SEO is still alive and still as relevant today as it ever was. It has become harder, yes, but thankfully you don’t have to do it alone. Outsource to the Philippines to achieve high-quality results at affordable prices.
Know what to look for, have a solid marketing plan in place, work closely with your SEO provider and you might be able to reign over the rankings.
Let us know if you have any comments!
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