Hiring the right SEO specialist or agency can make a real difference to your business. So you want to make sure you're looking for the right things and avoiding the red flags. Here's what you need to know.
It's a red flag if they're promising a number one ranking. You want to make sure that they're also speaking to technical terms, so things like indexing, site speed, are they looking at on-page optimisation.
You want to look for someone that wants to improve your brand's presence online in the digital space, and that now includes many channels including AI search.
Look for a team who's going to look at improving your rankings on traditional search engines to AI search engines, and also looking towards leads and revenue as the end game.
You want to make sure they have a few case studies, so not just screenshots:
Because at the end of the day, you're looking to boost your business and gain that additional revenue, so those kind of KPIs need to be something that you understand.
That's not really what an SEO specialist does fundamentally.
Day-to-day responsibilities will be:
An SEO specialist can spend around 20 hours a week looking at the site, looking at data, looking at software such as Search Console.
So they're able to use tools like:
Any knowledge of coding is also a bonus, as there are oftentimes when someone will need to jump in and take a look at the code or any coding errors or plugins to reduce JavaScript or CSS. That would be part of the E-A-T principles of SEO.
As SEO has evolved, it's become a space where you are more and more likely to be collaborating with other team members such as:
A large part of the job is also content, so looking at content gap opportunities, looking at new content. It might be you're creating content for PR, so as an SEO expert it would be great for the person to have knowledge in this area and somebody that can also align their copywriting with a designer or a developer and think about these sort of elements when putting together a piece of content.
They don't just do the current job; they also look outside the box. So they're looking for future opportunity, so not only solving things that can be done now, where the site can be taken in a year's time. And this means any innovative ideas as well.
When you're evaluating potential agencies and partners:
It's important that they have local market knowledge. So perhaps they know the area or they know how to target suburbs that are important for your business if you've got a need to scale across different suburbs, Australia, or even internationally.
You know, there are a lot of cowboys out there (and cowgirls!), so let's have a look at some red flags now.
Just be aware of this. This is just nothing that should be promised if you are an SEO expert, because the algorithm changes all the time and there is a lot out of our control now, especially with AI tools and AI search coming in to play.
This is also really looked down upon by Google, and you can get a severe penalty for this.
If someone is trying to lock you in for a super long time, that's a red flag as well.
If you're not really receiving any reporting, that's a bit of a red flag as well because you can't see where your money's going.
If you're looking for an SEO specialist or agency that ticks all these boxes, get in touch with The Digital Hub. We've got the case studies, the technical expertise, and the track record to help your business grow online.
We focus on real results like revenue, leads and traffic, not just vanity metrics. Let's have a chat about where your business can be in the next 12 months.
If you visited your own website and were greeted by a warning, it's easy to assume something has gone wrong. Maybe your web developer mentioned installing an SSL certificate, or you've noticed your website still starts with HTTP instead of HTTPS like many business owners, you may be doubting whether it's something you need to […]
Many business owners question whether digital marketing is worth spending their budget on. A deeper look at how much time people spend online makes that question much easier to answer. The typical person now spends around 6 hours and 38 minutes on the internet every day. In Australia, that number is even higher. According to […]
Six weeks of football is generating one of the more useful case studies in search behaviour we’ve seen in years. Keyword demand spiking in real time. Brands fighting for visibility that money alone can’t buy. A live look at how Google Business Profile handles a global event as it unfolds. According to Forbes, Sistrix data […]
