Does SEO Work?
Yes and no. In the sense of SEO as it was a few years ago, then no, it does not work. By this I mean no quick results are possible, no killer ’secret’ techniques exist to shoot up the rankings and no ‘experts’ exist who know how to make things happen with their ‘proven’ formulas. If however, your expectations are realistic, then SEO can work.
Ask your SEO consultant for demonstrable evidence of their prowess in this field. If they are any good, they will have an online setup (a work in progress) which they use to analyse the latest trends, to tweak their own on-page parameters and to show potential clients what they know. For instance, I often use this blog as an example of what is possible. It is a small blog, offering small tit-bits of advice, but by no means a ground-breaking Google-smashing piece of research. Yet, in its own way, this blog can do what many major corporations are unable to do… i.e. it ranks well for whatever I wish to make it rank for and it does it very fast (i.e. in minutes… not hours, days, weeks or years). For my clients, this means I can show them how quickly I can rank at the top for keywords they also may want to rank well for. By using my blog I can show what I have been able to do, and by inference, what I can do for them.
Of course, to get another site to rank well for keywords which my blog ranks well for, takes a lot of time. But by being able to demonstrate this ability in my own blog, I can show potential clients that I have the tenacity and ability to make it all work for them as well. Nothing is guaranteed of course, but a little display of your own ability goes a long way to instilling some confidence. Showing clients various other sites you have optimised and which rank well for certain specific keyword phrases is very much a cheap trick and one which should be frowned upon… it is too easy to pull the wool over people’s eyes with this.