For much of 2012, owners of small online businesses have been under the hammer. For most entrepreneurs, the parlous state of the U.S. economy has been enough to contend with, but Google’s monochrome menagerie has been throwing its own spanner in the works since mid-2011. Companies that relied on Google to deliver business growth are suffering more than most, as once-accepted SEO practices are coming under the microscope, and websites are falling out of SERPs with no sign of a parachute.
Small businesses are at greater risk than most simply because they’re small, and typically have limited resources for search marketing and optimization. Owners with no real understanding of search take on the task themselves, or engage low-cost SEO companies that employ dubious tactics. The result – websites, loaded with weak content and surrounded by a vicious circle of spammy inbound links, that are entirely open to the attentions of Panda and, since April 2012, Penguin.
Education, Education, Education
Business owners have only themselves to blame for failing to understand the risks of spammy SEO. The very accessibility of the Internet makes it easy for even complete novices to grasp the fundamentals of the art, and that’s exactly what anyone intending to hire an SEO company should do. Understanding what contributes to a website’s ranking performance is a bare minimum, and Google’s Webmaster Guidelines make a good start point.
Find out why Penguin is the inevitable result of spammy SEO companies that persist in generating poorly written, irrelevant content and posting it on low-quality blogs, purely and simply to build backlinks. The majority of the SEO community ignored the large part of Google’s regular warnings, which only made the consequences more painful when they arrived – and pain-loaded they have certainly been.
Understand also that putting all your business eggs in Google’s basket is a bad move. Learn about other online strategies that can help spread the risk, and develop a marketing strategy that isn’t dependent entirely on natural search. Difficult – and expensive – this may be for a small enterprise with limited resources, but it could save your business from failing.
“Fail to Prepare” Equals “Prepare to Fail”
The web is littered with stories of Internet businesses that, through no fault of their own – other than ignorance – went out of business as a direct result of Penguin. In a high-profile example, the U.K.-based Children’s Furniture Company discovered that its first-page rankings were founded on thousands of spammy links, put in place by a now-fired SEO company. Faced with a complete site rebuild and a restart from scratch, the only option was to close the company.
“When you’re running a business you can’t do it all yourself,” observed one of the owners, “and It’s the obvious thing to buy in a specialism [like SEO] … I don’t think I would have done anything different.”
Many search-marketing professionals disagree, but this cautionary tale underscores the need to know enough to spot a bad apple in the SEO tub.
Choosing Only the Best – Know Your SEO
“There’s no such thing as cheap SEO,” asserts Search Engine Journal, offering a check-list designed to separate the good from the bad and the white from the black. Research comes top of the list – researching prices, the company, and its tactics. Use only reputable companies with satisfied customers that you can talk to, and a long-term track record of success. Don’t accept promises of overnight results – it won’t happen unless it’s black-hat, and it won’t last.
Look for a good spread of tactics that contribute to an overall SEO strategy. Expect to hear about content marketing, professional link building, high-quality blogging and guest-posting, all of which build your site’s authority over time. Don’t accept jargon-loaded attempts to get you off-topic, and ask for a written plan of action. Only then can you start to relax, and then only marginally.
The final word is best left to Google’s Matt Cutts:
“The main thing is that people should avoid looking for shortcuts. In competitive market areas there has always been a need to figure out how to differentiate yourself, and nothing has changed today. Think about how you can create compelling content or a compelling experience for users.”
