SEO: Learn how you can identify the right SEO expert !

With each service purchase, the price-performance-ratio should be carefully analysed. This principle applies in particular for SEO.

What is SEO ?

SEO signifies « Search Engine Optimisation » : the improvement of the organic search results of your homepage in web search machines. SEO includes technical aspects concerning the performance of your Content Management System (CMS, for example Wordpress), UX elements  (UX  = User Experience) and marketing aspects.

A professional SEO-Consultant will analyse each of these three elements and give concrete propositions for improvements.   

In the past, SEO was more or less limited to the efficient selection of attractive keywords for the texts of a website. Today, SEO is much more complex and includes as well : technical SEO, questions of backlinkings (the integration of relevant hyperlinks), the content quality (Authority Score), the quality of the site’s metadata, and of course still the smart use of keywords. 

SEO advisors must use professional SEO software tools (that cost several hundred EUR per month): to analyse the websites concerning a multitude of parameters, the identification of relevant keywords, and for the optimisation of the texts and articles on a site.  

SEO-optimisations of a site don’t work from one day to the next. SEO must mature, like a good wine in an oak barrel. SEO results will be ready after a couple of months. There is an alternative to SEO – which is with costs too : SEA (Search Engine Advertisement), the purchase of keywords for ad campaigns. 

The spectrum of people that propose SEO consulting on the market is very large. It starts with bunglers and goes up to real experts.    

Beware of SEO-offers beneath a 250 EUR day rate

A freshman in marketing who just graduated and who does not have any experience so far, can accept to work for a 250 EUR day rate – during the first months of his professional life.   

If somebody is searching for the cheapest possible price for SEO services, the following categories of SEO freelancers could be contacted (all the following examples are fictitious characters, with very strong resemblance with real existing persons):

Melanie M., 30 years, has a training as tourism assistant and worked in event management. She does a lot of Linkedin-Posts :  Always a nice picture :  Melanie, with her open long hair, drinks a cup of tea in front of her bathroom.  Or she is sitting on her couch with a laptop on her knees. Typical content of her posts : she describes her daily routine (getting up at 11 a.m., drinks a tea, checks her emails, does some Instagram posts, drinks again tea, etc). Or she informs that she is doing a footwalk to get more energy for her Insta posts. In her last post she even talks about an alleged burnout at the age of 28 …  Melanie’s services are : Personal Branding. Somewhere and somehow she informs that she does SEO too, but this is not very clear. Melanie’s day rate :  220 EUR.

Kevin K., 21 years, is a student in his second year. He studies computer science (a technical discipline) and wants to become a Fullstack Developper. Software Development and Online Marketing are two separate affairs. Besides: The free SEO tool used by Kevin is really poor – but of course he won’t tell you. What is particularly nice with Kevin : He has the likeable cheekiness of youth. His day rate : 175 EUR.

Esmeralda E., 43 years, is the wife of Esteban E., 41 years, an expat from Spain, who is now living in the UK, where he works as an engineer. Esmeralda was a bilingual secretary in Spain – and quite good in her job. In the UK since one year, she cares for her two kids (Emilia and Ernesto). On Youtube she found an advertisement of a female Influencer who proposes « Coachings for female entrepreneurs ». Esmeralda asks her spouse Esteban to give her 4000 EUR, then she hands this amount over to the Youtube Influencer. In return she gets a « Video Masterclass for SEO » (with 15 pre-registered videos). Esmeralda feels somehow lost, because after 7 videos she learns that she is supposed to buy various additional software subscriptions. This would exceed Esmeralda’s budget, and a training for this additional tools isn’t included in the « Masterclass » neither … Therefore, Esmeralda wants to practice SEO a little bit and searches her first test person (= paying customer). You can be it, if you accept Esmeralda’s cheap day rate of :  149,90 EUR.

Rabindranath R. lives in Rajshahi in Bangladesh. He can be contacted exclusively on dubious freelancer platforms. You ask yourself :  How good are  Rabindranaths skills in English really besides his native Bengali ? What is the name of the capital of Bangladesh ? (Right answer : Dacca). Which jurisdiction applies for a purchase of this service ? Rabindranath will send you by Gmail a strange link for an order with your credit card. You hesitate and think « There is something weird «. But Rabindranath’s day rate is very tempting: only 7088,34 BDT (Bangladeshi Taka), around 60 EUR.

All these examples are deliberately caricatural. Nevertheless : Just zap through the homepages of people that propose SEO, and the various profiles on Malt,  Upwork, Fiverr, Linkedin etc. – and you’ll quickly find these types of persons.    

Serious offers start at 350/ 400 EUR daily rate

Professional SEO Consulting starts at 400 EUR per day. There are good consultants that enter the scene and ask for a little less. The simple fact to pay a high fee does not guarantee neither to get a high quality service. The following aspects are to consider when choosing your SEO Consultant : 

• Serious Qualification

SEO-Consultants with an official degree are more competent than those without. There are exceptions that confirm the rule. Webmarketing is a relatively young discipline. There are good consultants over 50 with a classical marketing training, and who followed the digitalisation of their profession over the years. And there are good young consultants with a solid diploma in Online Marketing. As the digital sector evolves permanently, each serious consultant has to stay informed too on current trends, as for example the changing algorithms. 

• Capacity to understand the specific activity of clients with their respective stakes

A good Consultant understands the product or service of his client. He has active listening. He is capable of identifying the specific terminology concerning the business activity of his client. The consultant must be flexible too, as clients might come from very different areas. Some examples of my own clients : a distributor for sports articles, a manufacturer of biochemical products in the agrobusiness sector, a company for electronical components.   

• Use of professional SEO-Software
  

SEO-Consulting is more expensive than for example translation services. A good translator for English to German  can do excellent work during many years with a unique investment of only 30 EUR  – for the purchase of a good dictionary. The use of the dictionary doesn’t require any special training.

With SEO-Consulting it is completely different : Without professional SEO software SEO-Consulting is nothing less than impossible. These software subscriptions will cost at least 200 EUR per month. A good SEO advisor must know the leading SEO tools on the market. Furthermore, he must be thoroughly trained on their use – which is very complex.   

• Linguistic sensitivity

Keywords are not the whole truth for SEO, but they continue to be a central element of it. SEO experts work with enormous keyword lists (easily thousand keywords or more per project), that are identified with the SEO software. Even after 20 years of business experience, I stumble regularly on words that I’ve never seen before in my whole life. This is totally normal and part of the game. Being a careful consultant, I have to take the necessary time to understand these new words, in order to provide the best possible service to my client.   

• Accuracy

Apart from understanding the identified keywords, an analysis of them has to be done – concerning various parameters: the degree of difficulty, the number of Google searches, the costs per click etc. If a consultant works superficially, there is the risk to miss opportunities for improvements of the client’s SEO performance.

• Editorial skills

A good SEO advisor is ideally a good copywriter too. Because the texts of a homepage (product files, blog articles etc), have high relevance for Google. The good editing of the metadata in the CMS is another important element for SEO success.  

• UX competence (UX = User Experience)

What is the best organisation of informations on a website, to allow site users to find them in the quickest way ? In marketing this principle is called « customer journey ». Experts with a formal diploma possess this competence.  

• IT basis knowledge

SEO advisors are not computer scientists, but they should have a basic understanding of the technical functioning of a website : the loading speed of a site, the role of plugins, the principles of algorithms etc. Concerning this requirement, you are in good hands too, if your SEO consultant has a diploma.   

• Multilingualism – for international websites

A ployglot Consultant is precious, if you want to propose your site in foreign languages too. Even big agencies do not always have inhouse expertise for more than two languages.    

• Reputation and references of the consultant

A consultant who meets the requirements listed above, who works for well-known clients, and who teaches in distinguished  business schools, can ask for day rates of 1000 EUR or more (the presentation of a SEO training by such an expert can cost up to 3000 EUR per day).

• SEO-Agency or SEO-Freelancer ?

It doesn’t matter, if the aforementioned points are fulfilled, and if the work is well done. Generally, an agency for SEO is more expensive than a freelancer, especially if it has an office for the reception of clients, and if it has employees. By the way : I am a freelancer, but I work as well with agencies that outsource missions to me. My blog article « Freelancer versus Agency » will give you closer insights into this interesting subject.   

My Offer : SEO services starting at 400 EUR per day

Holding a Bachelor in Digital Marketing and a Master in International Sales and Marketing, I’m expert for International SEO.

Perfectly trilingual in German, French and English, I will arrange your SEO success for the three main languages in Europe, that are spoken as mother tongue by some 240 million european internet users.   

I’m working with the best SEO Tool on the market : SemRush.

High Quality SEO Copywriting is part of my service portfolio.

With a professional experience of +20 years I’m capable to understand the stakes of my clients in their respective business fields.

My SEO day rate starts at 400 EUR. The final fee depends on: the technical aspects of the task, the level of difficulty, the total duration of the mission.

Don’t hesitate to contact me for a free phone call of 20 minutes. 

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