Although the Average Hourly rate may be up-to 50%-100% more, you will still save money by hiring a Search Engine Optimization Consultant. Here are some of the reasons why:

Employee Expense Savings ($$)

-Your company doesn’t have to pay unemployment benefits

-you don’t have to pay pension plans

-no holiday pay

(these alone can add another 50% to the hourly rate of an employee)

-no RRSP/401(k) contributions

-no expense of health plans / health care

Office Space (Sp)

-you won’t need to find permanent space in your office

-if the consultant can work from home they won’t have to charge you for travel/commuting expenses and won’t take up ANY space in your office

Payment Terms (PT)

-you often don’t have to pay a consultant until the job is complete (if the hours are under 40), although most due charge an up-front fee

-some consultants may be willing to work on a combination of contract/commission or straight commission meaning they don’t get paid until you have success – they better you do the better they do

-when the job is complete obviously you don’t need to pay them anymore

Time Savings (T)

-almost all communication can be done via: phone, email, Webmeeting, Twitter, MSN etc, saving time with on-site or off-site meetings which usually take much longer

-consultants know they won’t be paid until the job is over so they will work quickly to get the job done.

-in a consulting firm you may have multiple people working on your site compounding the time savings, and multiplying the ideas, creativity and resources

Experience (Exp)

-SEO consultants are often more experienced than their employee counterparts because they have worked on multiple projects and usually come with a vast portfolio and years of experience

-consultants are often more familiar with a greater variety of the tools in the industry because they have worked with different companies’ needs and can pinpoint more closely which software/tools/products will work best for your website

-consultants are often networking and honing their skills more than the average employee keeping themselves abreast of new changes in the industry.

-the new skills that that a consultant learns is on THEIR own time not on yours

-since your results will affect their portfolio and therefore future prospects, SEO consultants have a vested interest in getting you great results in the search engines- it looks better on them

Tools (Tool)

-consultants usually come equipped with their own laptop/cell phone and software saving the company in $1000s of dollars in extra expenses

Social (Soc)

-you don’t have to add in another personality into your company mix and see if they fit in

Legal (Leg)

-if the consultant you first choose doesn’t work out – you just find someone else without the possibility of labour law issues

If you are looking for a Search Engine Otimizer to help optimize your website for higher rankings in the Search Engines, and for driving traffic to your site, please contact us at:   stephan @ stephanbevan . com

There are approximately 20-30 BILLION web pages on the Internet TODAY all trying to drive traffic to THEIR sites.

By having a website, you open your doors to a global market to create opportunities for your company that you would never have imagined. Your sales staff are good at what they do, but they can only talk to one person at a time and are limited to a local geographic area. When your company creates a website, you literally begin marketing your products internationally, often without having to pay commissions to your staff.

Companies set up a website for several reasons:
- to let others know they are current and technologically minded
- to provide their customers with information so they don’t have to
waste valuable resources explaining their products to every prospect
- to increase their Brand Recognition
- to increase leads & convert into sales
- to set up an e-commerce program creating another stream of income

The problem with this is that most web designers (as good as they may be) are brilliant at web design but have no idea how to drive traffic to your sight. Many even claim to know but really don’t realize that theres more involved than just metatags.

Without traffic, you will have NO conversions to sales, and without sales all you have is an information site. When searching for ANYTHING on the Internet 85% of people START with one of the 3 major search engines, who all have different criteria for determining how a site will rank.

A GOOD search Engine Optimizer/Guru should help your company with these ten things:
1) Help you to determine who your on-line Target Market really is.

2) Identify who your online Competition is.

3) Selecting the proper Keywords for your Industry/Vertical for SEO and PPC.

4) Re-write your Content to make the best use of your keyword phrases.

5) Only employ the use of “white-hat” Organic practices to avoid being penalized.

6) Proper use of Metatags.

7) Make sure your site has proper Flow for visitor retention (you have a 15second window to capture a visitors in).

8)Improve your rankings with New Content without creating duplication.

9) Submit your site to the search engines.

10) Maintain your rankings by keeping up to date with search engine algorithm up-dates.

Understand that this is not an overnight process and its not cheap. It can actually take up to several months, especially the more competitive your market is. There are no promises of success either. It will involve constant analysis and adjustments to your pay-per-click campaigns. If you try to do it on your own you will likely spend more time and money than if you hired one.

©2008 Stephan Bevan

Call me today for more information or to get started.
Stephan Bevan
Search Engine Optimizer
stephan @   stephanbevan  .  com