But there’s a problem: finding a great Auckland SEO company isn’t easy. Right now there are a lot of opportunists out there, looking to cash in on the current crisis. And many of them simply lack the experience and expertise to deliver the results you want.
Worse still, a bad SEO agency can actually hurt your brand long-term. Black hat practices, for instance, can cause lasting damage to your domain authority. And poor link-building strategies can undermine your ability to beat out your rivals.
In this post, therefore, we equip you with the knowledge you need to choose a top SEO agency. Here are the six mistakes you should avoid when canvassing the market.
Mistake #1: Choosing A Provider Based On Price Alone
Thanks to the current economic conditions, thousands of people are piling into the SEO space, looking to make money from what has become a significant growth industry. Many are offering bargain basement prices, hoping to tempt their business customers with massive discounts. After all, most businesses are trying to save money at the moment.
Unfortunately, this means that a lot of brands wind up paying for junk. Instead of getting a service that actually helps them rank better, they end up throwing their money away on poor content and low-authority backlinking, leaving them no better off than they were before.
What’s more, companies offering massively discounted prices don’t always offer the best customer service. So when problems do come up, you’re waiting for days before they get resolved.
Want our advice? Don’t be afraid to shell out a little more for established professionals, like us. Going ultra-cheap has a nasty habit of leading to false economies.
Mistake #2: Using A Company That Doesn’t Have Experience In Your Sector
SEO agencies are just like any other company – they have specific expertise. However, a lot of client brands just assume that there’s no real difference between agencies.
Here’s the truth: if you want a great SEO experience, it pays to go to a company that specialises in your industry.
They often know the exact type of keywords you should target. And they have a good sense of the most competitive keywords – as well as opportunities. What’s more, they frequently have established relationships with relevant third-party sites, which is great for backlinking.
Mistake #3: Failing To Do Your Research
The best-known agencies in the SEO space aren’t necessarily the top-performing. Many get ahead through clever marketing and sophisticated data tools. But when it comes to the nuts and bolts of search engine optimisation, they don’t offer the kind of performance you need.
For this reason, we suggest that you always look for proof that agencies are delivering real value for clients. Look at reviews and case studies to see the kind of results the outfit managed to achieve in the past.
At Just SEO, we make this process easy by listing our performance on the front page of our website. You can see the results of our work, and feedback from clients.
We’ve helped brands get to the top of search engine results for some of the most difficult keywords out there, including apparently impossible keywords, such as “payday loans.” Not many SEO agencies in Auckland can say that!
Mistake #4: Choosing A Black Hat SEO Company
SEO companies will usually describe themselves as “white hat” in the fine print. All this means is that they obey Google’s rules. In other words, they don’t use disallowed tactics to game the system. By contrast, black hat agencies will do whatever it takes to help you rank.
What do we mean by breaking the rules? Well, usually it involves setting up phony links or creating pages that don’t offer real value to users.
At Just SEO, we don’t believe in black hat practices because they ultimately wind up hurting brands. Eventually, search engines notice something is wrong and punish you, sometimes by manually down-ranking your site. Once you have a mark against your brand, it’s hard to recover.
Mistake #5: Prioritising Speed
Every brand needs to be at the top of search results for their chosen keywords. Hence, SEO agencies in Auckland offering “fast results” are extremely popular.
Don’t be fooled by these sites. Anyone who knows anything about SEO understands that the process takes a long time. Nobody can generate results overnight – even with all the resources in the world. That’s simply not how Google and other search engines work. They actually include a time element in their algorithm and, as far as we know, SEO agencies don’t have time machines.
Moreover, it actually makes sense to build your SEO over time, instead of just aiming to get to the top spot by next week. Doing it organically looks more natural to users. Your audience may detect foul play if your site suddenly comes from nowhere to dominate your rivals overnight.
Results take around three months to show up. If an agency promises faster than that, they’re almost certainly misleading you.
Mistake #6: Buying Into “Secret Techniques”
A lot of SEO agencies promise “inside relationships” or “secret techniques” to rocket you to the top of search results. And while these offers might sound persuasive, you should treat them with caution.
In general, agencies don’t have special relationships with search engines. So take any promises of preferential treatment with a pinch of salt. Remember, at the moment, most search engines are battling to maintain their credibility in the face of mounting censorship. If news came out that people were paying them (outside formal advertising) for visibility, that would undermine their entire business model.
So the bottom line is this: ignore anyone promising secret techniques. They are probably making it up, or, worse still, implementing banned strategies.