When it comes to advantages and disadvantages of SEO, this marketing asset behaves no differently from other tools. Search engine optimisation comes with features unquestionably unique to the service… and disadvantages you may not have thought of.
Before we delve into the benefits and not-so-beneficial features of it. Let us remind you what you can expect from a kent seo services.
Let’s quickly recap the basics of SEO benefits for websites
Before the advent of online marketing, all forms of advertising were nothing more than a form of shouting and trying their best to attract the attention of the customers. Ineffective and unreliable, traditional marketing could be described as obsolete, compared to digital marketing. Lets dive into advantages and disadvantages of SEO
SEO is the equivalent of luring the customer towards your website. Rather than pushy advertising material and spammy promotional messages, SEO takes advantage of the Google algorithm to make sure your content is seen before your competitors. Meaning you will get online sales much more efficiently with a SEO marketing service.
Keywords, tagging and fully understanding this service are just a few of the things you have to keep in mind if you want to truly shine on Google.
This makes the employment of an SEO specialist simple and effective. The right specialist will work with your goals in mind. These are some of the things you can expect to receive:
- An SEO strategy unique to your practice
- Web design and copywriting tips
- Clear communication of results and achievements.
Fortunately, Blue Moxie’s SEO service can offer all three – and a lot more! However, let’s not focus on that right now. Here are the advantages and disadvantages of SEO as a marketing tool:
Advantages of SEO
SEO offers some of the most unique benefits available on the market. Many rewards are yours to reap, provided you employ the right strategy. Using SEO as a form of marketing is something you should choose to do depending on the nature of your business. Of course, there’s no simple solution to advertising! Size, budget and location are all things to consider.
This article will provide you all the information you need to make the best decision for your business. To start with, here are the advantages of using SEO:
Creating the ideal user experience – Advantages and disadvantages of SEO
SEO is highly reliant on user experience in order to function properly. Website speed and layout will affect your place on the Google search results. This makes ideal user experience mandatory for SEO to be effective!
Here are some of the improvements you can expect as you utilise SEO, or an SEO service:
- Mobile speed will improve, meaning no latency to mobile users
- The quality of your website copy will improve, leading to better brand image and conversion rate. You can learn how to write copy with our guide, or hire a professional copywriting service for this.
- Your website traffic is localised, meaning that you will attract the right kind of audience to your content – thus, making the prospect of obtaining customers more likely.
SEO experts can take advantage of specific keywords that customers in your demographics are searching – Thus actively attracting the audience towards what they are looking for. Whether you use content to solve their problems or not, SEO will give your users the best experience for their search and improve your business’ image.
Improved brand image
Every brand in the world wants to prove themselves as the leading authority in their industry. SEO can help you with that, and the explanation for how is actually really simple:
When you look something up on Google, do you ever go past the first page of your search results? No? Nobody does. You probably google something else.
Some consider this a sign of “being lazy” or “looking for convenient solutions”: They couldn’t be farther from the truth.
The results appearing on the second page of Google tend to be unreliable and unprofessionally edited, meaning that you will not find what you are looking for, or what you’ll find will be poor and cheap – and nobody wants to give money to those they don’t trust -.
Credibility is improved when your business appears immediately on Google because people attribute better ranking to better authority. Essentially, if your content can dominate over others, then your products will follow.
It gives you an advantage over your competitors that do not employ SEO strategies.
Furthermore, ranking number 1 will allow you to establish your online presence as a leading authority simply due to time. SEO takes time before becoming effective, allowing you to produce plenty of valuable content users can then read and enjoy.
Improved brand awareness
SEO is all about generating traffic, essentially. Of course, the more traffic your website gets, the more people will recognise you above your competition. This establishes online brand awareness no other marketing tactic can quite achieve.
Furthermore, SEO is a constant upward trend: Once more people find your website, the more likely they are to share the content online, on social media, blogs or even through messages.
Therefore, that is an overly complex way to say that more traffic = more traffic, with SEO, and it will allow your content to be placed in front of your demographics whenever they are looking for solutions your business provides.
This ensures that your brand image will stick around, even if the users aren’t actually buying from you right now, they probably will in the future thanks to the awareness SEO strategies help you achieve.
That blog they saved on their notes may not get you any money now, but they will look it up in the future and buy from you then.
Further social media reading: Does my business need social media marketing
Consistently producing leads
SEO marketing strategies differ from other online marketing assets due to the lack of “peak times” or “Cost per lead”. Whereas the effectiveness of stuff such as Pay Per Click is directly proportional to your marketing budget, SEO doesn’t. It’s a very low maintenance form of marketing, one that will only be affected by the quality of your content.
Day and night make no difference to SEO strategy. Your ranking won’t be affected by anything but your authority and credibility.
Hiring an SEO specialist is a long-term investment since you can enjoy the benefits of their work even months or years after paying that last invoice.
Furthermore, it is one of the most convenient marketing tools, accounting for its high ROI: This is because SEO is the only marketing tool capable of targeting golden clients only, rather than giving you an endless stream of unlikely prospects.
SEO is a long term strategy
You can’t hire an SEO expert and expect results overnight. SEO strategies are designed to run for three to twelve months, and most businesses will begin seeing results only after this time frame.
However, just like planting a tree takes a long time, think long term: You’ll soon be reaping the fruits of your labour. SEO is a long-term solution, and as such, its results will be much longer-lasting than any other marketing strategy.
Sure, you can consider other strategies, such as email marketing or Pay Per Click, but this is directly related to your budget and your willingness to invest high amounts of money which, essentially, you’ll be risking with every investment you make.
However, SEO is the equivalent of buying an ETF instead of short term trading a stock: Over the long term, you will see better ROI than any other digital marketing strategy.
Further reading: How much should SEO cost
SEO can be Free
Both Advantages and disadvantages of SEO is the fact it can be done for Free if you have time. Despite the possibility of hiring SEO specialists, the basics of SEO are free and easy to learn. Our blogs will offer you some of the best advice, completely free of charge. Here are some of the material you can read today:
- 8 essential tips for content writing to boost traffic
- What Is SEO and How Does It Work
- How Much Does SEO Cost UK?
- Remove old content from google
- Tips for driving immediate traffic from google
Disadvantages of SEO
We believe that SEO is fundamental for any successful business. Nowadays, having a website and a strong online presence is almost mandatory to establish brand awareness and credibility. Fortunately, SEO can do both of these things, and much more, making it one of the most effective – if not the most effective – digital marketing assets at your disposal.
However, it would be a lie to state that everything about SEO is amazing. Drawbacks are common, and you have to learn some of the most important disadvantages of using SEO to advertise your business.
SEO is a Long term strategy
Probably the most significant disadvantage of a SEO strategy! As effective as it is, SEO does take about three to twelve months before it starts becoming effective – and small businesses may not have the resources to wait that long.
If you have an experimental business or a completely innovative product (One of those “I didn’t know I wanted that!” products, to be precise), maybe SEO isn’t what’s right for you. However, social media marketing may help you significantly more in this case, and we are here for you.
Not all leads are golden
Despite SEO being such a strong lead-making machine, no marketing asset in the world will be able to give you 100% golden leads 24/7. Low quality leads are bound to happen, and they are bound to waste your time.
Also, you may have accidentally used the wrong keyword, meaning you will attract the wrong type of audience and miss on those customers your business needs to grow.
Further reading Tips for creating your best content this year
At Google’s mercy
Nobody likes to be dependent on someone else, especially so in the world of business! However, SEO is always going to be at the mercy of Google’s algorithm – An algorithm the developers change and update every three months, to be precise, meaning that your SEO efforts have to adapt accordingly.
Room for human error is non-existent, when using SEO: The algorithm is merciless, and you will not be alerted of any mistakes – and the computer will not be fixing them either, leading to painful consequences unless you do everything perfectly.
SEO is a great marketing asset, but you should also be diversifying your efforts. These are some of the things you can do to develop your business if SEO isn’t the only place you want to focus on.
- Email marketing
- Traditional marketing
- PPC
- Social media marketing
However, we would like to remind you that SEO is still highly effective, if done just right – and we understand how hard that can be, which is why our SEO services are the easiest solution to increased revenue.
Growing too fast?
Imagine a balloon: You blow and blow, and you can see the rubber SLOWLY expanding. And it expands. And it expands … more, and more, and more… And then boom! It blows up, and latex bits go everywhere!
That is SEO for you.
Sometimes, SEO operates in a way that gives you little to no results over a long period of time until a sudden burst of traffic and success. Sure, this sounds great, until you actually put it into practice.
More traffic means more demand, and more demand means that your business needs to be ready for the heavier workload. Failure to prepare for the sudden boom in demand sometimes means low quality products or services being delivered to unhappy customers – resulting in poor publicity, poor performance and poor brand image.
Of course, you don’t want that. You really don’t want that to happen.
In constant SEO competition
We like to see SEO as the nucleus of all competitiveness that lies in the marketing industry: As well as the natural competition you are facing from brands to deliver high quality products, SEO will have you compete for keywords, content, images and more.
SEO is not for the faint of heart! This constant competition against the entire Internet can be stressful at times, and the racing to push content out can take you away from your other responsibilities.
Which one outweighs the other?
As previously mentioned, there’s no simple solution to anything, really. An online eCommerce selling stereos will require a different approach than a garden centre looking to increase their footfall.
SEO’s advantages significantly outweigh its disadvantages, overall. A strategy perfectly suited for most businesses, employing the right strategy will reward you ten times more than any other marketing asset.
Conclusion Advantages and Disadvantages of SEO
Advantages and disadvantages of SEO is more than just writing keywords. It’s about strategy, planning and meticulous execution. SEO is highly effective, but it’s quite difficult to do on your own.
Sure, you may not want to hire an SEO specialist, but the return on investment will be much greater: As well as landing on page 1 much faster, the right exposure will give you a revenue that far outweighs the fees paid to an SEO marketing agency.
Discover how we have helped Reuthes, The Lost Gardens of Sevenoaks quadruple their revenue, and how we help businesses in the UK achieve the results they always wanted, everyday. Read the case study
If you enjoyed the advantages and disadvantages of SEO don’t forget to share! If you have any questions get in touch with our team