If you’re a small business person with a web site, you’re probably working 12-hour days to keep things running. You may or may not have heard of search engine optimization. If you have, you’re wondering what you can do to get a better position in Google and receive more traffic. Hiring an SEO might be the answer.
I say “might” because search engine optimization isn’t for everyone. I know, it’s a strange thing to say on a site devoted to SEO, but it’s true. Hiring an SEO to help you with your web site is an important business decision, and if you’re not ready for it, it can cost you a lot of money. If you hire the wrong company, it can cost you a lot of money plus your position in Google’s index. I’m not kidding; I just finished reading some horror stories about TrafficPower, now 1P, a scamming SEO company that has its own hate site and a thread in the SEO Chat forums.
So how do you know whether you should hire an SEO? SEO Engine suggests that you should ask yourself three questions:
Are my customers searching for my products and/or services online? That’s easy to determine by putting the appropriate keywords in Wordtracker. It’s not just about whether people are searching for your kind of offerings online, though; it’s also about how many people are searching. If too few people are looking for you online, SEO would be a waste of money.
Are my competitors showing up for the terms I want to target? This could indicate that your competitors have found it worth their while to spend money on SEO. That doesn’t automatically mean that you will as well, however.
What effect would an increase in targeted traffic to my web site have on my business? This is really the most important question. If your web site effectively converts traffic into sales already, then you can expect SEO that increases your traffic to also increase your sales. If it doesn’t, more traffic is not going to translate into more sales.
So let us assume for the moment that you think your web site and your business will benefit from SEO. (If not, you can stop reading and get back to doing the kinds of things that will really benefit your business!). Should you do the SEO yourself, or hire someone else to do it? That’s a valid question, and I’ll address it in the next section.
Search Optimization 
