SEO is a critical aspect of Internet Marketing.  If you have a website or a business that is looking to start a website, it is a good idea to do SEO on it.  While I’m sure some of you have had tons of emails come in from SEO “consultants” guaranteeing that they can get you a top spot on Google. What you may not be aware of is that it’s almost impossible to guarantee anything – especially SEO results. In the end, Google makes the decisions who is ranked and how they are ranked, depending on factors such as inbound links, quality of a website’s content, the structure of the site and so much more. If you are looking for a good SEO consultant/company here are a few things to consider during your search:

1. Have you received a cold call? – If you have a consultant cold calling you trying to get you to use their service, you need to stop and think. If they were really good at online marketing, don’t you think it would have been YOU who found them? Not the other way around. This, right away, should be a huge Uh-Oh and red flag to stay away.

2. Was that an email blast? - This again is another Uh-Oh red flag – the same as cold calling. You should be the one finding your SEO consultant, not the other way around. If they are emailing you trying to get you to use their services, they obviously aren’t doing there job. So why would you hire them?

3. Do they have their own website? – Sometimes people claim that they can work wonders and get you to the top of search engine results. They may even have examples to share with you. The story is though, unless you have spoken to their past clients there’s no real way to tell if they are legitimately telling the truth. If the SEO Consultant doesn’t have a website with past work and examples, those examples could be fraud. There are people in the world who actually lie. So beware!

4. Are the prices too good to be true? If you have a consultant that will do SEO for less then $200.00 per month, I don’t think they are are going to do what you really need. A good SEO Consultant will need at least 15-20 hours a month to write great content and work their magic. Someone who comes to you saying they will get you 100 links for $30.00 might get you 100 links, but they are going to get you horrible easy low-pr links. Even if they say they are going to get you high quality links, it’s impossible to get you that many links for that cheap. Remember, you get what you pay for, so watch carefully what you’re spending (even if it sounds like a great deal).

5.  Do they have negative online reviews? If you search a company and on the first page you see a bunch of bad reviews, that’s a big No-No. First off, if your good at SEO, you would know how to push bad reputation to the back burner so no one can find it (unless they really dig). Every company will most likely have a hater. There are an endless amount of people in this world, all with significantly different opinions about how to do business, especially when it comes to their business.  So having one or two negative comments isn’t the end of the world. Just compare them to the positive feedback to make sure that they have less than 5% negativity. If you think of it on a larger scale – companies like Apple and Google have their haters who blog and post negative reviews and rants all the time; but we still use them, right? Why? Because they are also mostly known for the great work and service they put out into the world.

6.  How good is their website? Anyone can throw a website up. Above, I said to make sure that they HAVE a website, but don’t just use that as a gauge by itself. Make sure to consider the quality of their website along with the rest of the items on this list. You want to work with a company who shows that they know the web. Having a website that is pleasing to the eye, easy to navigate and memorable for users are all indicators that the SEO company has somewhat of an idea of the website industry and those they are working for.

7. Are they available now? If an SEO consultant is really good, there will be a bit of a wait. If you call at 9:00 AM on a Monday and the company says they can start at 9:30 AM that day, that leaves some room for concern regarding where their time is being spent and how busy they actually are. Try to figure out how big of a company they are, how many staff members they have and the number of current clients they might be working for at the time.

8. Do they write original/unique content? This is a really important one. If you go to a company that asks you to write the articles, that’s a huge No-No. Unless you have someone who specializes in SEO content writing, they should be writing it. Now, coming up with ideas, or telling you to come up with a concept before they complete the task isn’t that bad. But if a SEO company asks you to put your content together from start to finish and don’t revise what you wrote – that right there should tell you to run. Original content is everything in the world of SEO right now. Just like you, Google doesn’t want to read the same thing over and over again.

9. Do they understand SEO? The science of SEO changes every day. So SEO consultants have to be able to adapt and read up on all the new trends. In order for SEO experts to understand what they are doing, they need to stay up to date on the latest trends.  In order to get a better read on how much of an expert your potential SEO specialist is, act dumb and pretend like you do not know anything about SEO at all. Ask the company to send you a sample report that they send their customers every month. Doesn’t have to be fancy, but needs to have the information that you need. If your not sure what you should be looking for here’s what we suggest:

• Reviewing all of the data from all of the months they have worked on a site. Meaning: Traffic Analysis, Social Media Analysis (if they are doing social media as well), PR Ranking, Domain Authority, etc. You want to analyze this data and make sure the general number is up. Now it’s common that it may NOT go up every single month but if you were to make a chart, the average look should be inclining. If it’s horizontal or declining, you need to avoid the company or fire them pronto.
• Look for the keywords they are targeting with the average number of searches of the keyword, it’s difficulty (either out of 10 or 100) to obtain number 1 spot on the search engines, The rankings of the keywords each and every month, and the URL/URL’s that they are targeting for these keywords.

10. What’s their Rank? You know that old saying – “Do as I say, not as I do”?  Well, that doesn’t apply to SEO at all. If you’re going to be hiring a company to help you improve your SEO rankings and move up on the scale in terms of Google, Yahoo or Bing search results – you want to work with a company who practices what they preach. So make sure you check out where they stand in terms of search results.  If an SEO company isn’t putting in the effort to maintain their own rankings, why would they put the effort in to truly help you? Do as many searches as you can for the SEO companies you are looking into.  If they don’t come up on the first page of at least a couple types of searches, this is a huge No-No, so move on to the next search for a new SEO company.

SEO is like any other type of service on the market today – as a buyer you need to beware! You need to be aware of when you might be getting duped into making the wrong decision about going with an SEO company.  So the next time you’re looking for some SEO help, make sure to help yourself first, by making some detailed assessments/evaluations about your options.  A couple questions and a little bit of research go a long way.

What do you get when you combine just about everything cool that Google has to offer? The answer is Google+. The company recently went public with its previously top secret social media network; launching a limited public release of what are are calling Facebook’s newest competitor.

Google+ essentially ties in most Google products with a social network at its core. The Internet giant’s latest initiative brings new lingo like the Stream, Circles and Sparks to the world of social media. But what does it all mean?

The Stream is similar to Facebook’s News feed, in that it allows users to share multimedia like photos, videos, links or their location with friends. Circles is the most innovative aspect of Google+, which helps to separate it from Facebook. The Circles system allows users to target their sharing with various social groups. Thanks to HTML5, Circles enables the user to simply drag-and-drop friends into and out of various social circles; whether it be friends, schoolmates, co-workers, family or a customized group.  Sparks is the content recommendation engine behind Google+. Using an algorithmic system that relies on information from other Google products like Search; Sparks is a collection of articles, videos, photos and other content categorized by interest.  Users can search for various topics of interest throughout these collections and then share their discoveries with friends.

Other features that we can look forward to with Google+ are its group chat feature (which is being called “Hangouts”), an Android mobile app that has an auto-upload capability for photos or videos, and a whole lot of +1 buttons throughout the web from here on out.

Although a great deal of speculation regarding the anticipated success of Google+ has been mostly positive, let’s not forget that this is Google’s second attempt at creating a super social network. So what kind of obstacles should Google+ be on the lookout for in order to prevent any minuses this time around? Let’s take a look.

1. Will the population really leave Facebook?

Yes, we live among a generation of the “bigger and the better”. But how many of the millions of people who are already established (that have been building their profile for years) are going to leave Facebook? I know I don’t want to risk losing the past five years of photo albums. Sure, some people became Tweeters, but how many people do you know that completely left Facebook for another type of social media network?

2. The Twitter-Facebook Alliance.

Speaking of Twitter and Facebook; is it me, or do you feel like these two have become like a married couple?  It’s almost as though, you can’t have one without the other and they need to be linked at all times.  That said, I’m not sure where Google+ will fit into this match made in social media matrimony?

3. If you look up privacy in the dictionary…

Google is probably the last thing I would associate with privacy. The issue of maintaining users private information has become a hot ticket surrounding social-networking sites like Facebook, who recently received public and legal scrutiny for misleading users about the safety of people’s information that was being stored. Google itself received particular criticism regarding privacy issues, after it launched Google Buzz.

4. When you want to know something – you Google it.

One of Google’s biggest challenges in becoming the worlds great social networking site could also come from within. Google’s done such a great job branding itself as the number one way to search for anything, that this is what people now associate the company with. For most people right now, Google means search, Facebook means to share with friends.

5. Where do Bing and Yahoo fall into all this?

Although Bing doesn’t quite compare to Google, it is known to be gaining market share – something for Google to think about as it continues to fall under various legal scrutiny from organizations like the FTC. Although its no longer king of all the search engine giants; Yahoo, still makes up a significant segment of search market share and maintains a stronghold in other sectors such as email, finance, news, etc. Part of the Google+ strategy is that it extends across various other Google products, some of which compete directly with those of Yahoo’s strong points: another battle that Google should consider before it spreads itself too thin.

Regardless of whether Google’s attempt at creating the next social-networking phenomena is a plus or a minus, its sure to be interesting as usual watching it all pan out.

What is Panda?

For those of you who don’t know, Panda is Google’s new search algorithm that was launched back in March. The purpose of the update was to favor higher quality sites and get rid of the websites with low quality links. This approach is opposite compared to the other search engine’s such as Yahoo.

Has It Affected Me?

If you have a huge dip in your Google analytics charts then you have most likely been affected by Panda. Check your charts regularly and make sure that your stats stay consistent. It’s never going to be exactly the same. For instance, there are definitely more popular days of the week when people are going to shop for clothes versus looking for a web design company.

How Do I Stay Clear of Panda?

The most important way to keep your site in the clear and safe from Google’s new update is to stay as legitimate as possible with your SEO tactics. Don’t try to get a million links to your small little site and build link farms. When I first started SEO, right off the bat I stayed cleared of link farms because they seemed sketchy to begin with. Who wants to go to a page full of links of random websites? Back in the day before SEO was even around, marketers posted links on websites because they wanted to bring traffic to their sites, not because they wanted to rise in the rankings. If you keep that same mentality in mind while performing SEO and social marketing you will be fine.

I Was Hit by Panda, Now What?

It’s unrealistic to say that you can 100% figure out Google’s algorithm.  I bet Google engineers love reading all the blogs and reading what people write. But there are some things that we are pretty sure of that could help you stay clear of the next Panda update, if not improve your ranking.

1. Re-evaluate your website. Make sure that all of your content is unique, original and useful for your visitors. Take the time to look out on the web to make sure that no one is copying your content as well. If they are, change it. You cannot help what they are doing, but you can help what is on your website. Promote your website so people will link to your content (legitimately). If your content is good, believe me people will share it!

2. Check your Google analytics for high bounce rates. You want to keep your audience engaged on your website. If your bounce rate is above 50 than you are doing something wrong. Between 30-40 is a decent bounce rate, under 30 is amazing.

3. Check the percentage of your site that is taken up by low quality pages. You don’t want a number of your pages to be low quality. Google would rather have a 10 page  website with all high quality pages, rather than a 100 page site that has only 10 quality pages.

So, there you have it.  Hopefully, Panda hasn’t hit your site too hard, if at all.  Continue to be on the lookout for the affects of Panda and how you can maintain strong search engine results by checking back with us regularly.