Even when technology is central to a company’s value proposition, it isn’t all they do. No company is solely a tech company. Ultimately, every product or service is intended for people’s use: to save us time or money, to make our lives better or easier.

At the same time, businesses whose core value propositions aren’t inherently technical still rely on technology for sales, marketing, operations, finance, and more. At my company, for instance, we’re revolutionizing the property management business by using technology to optimize rates and improve operational efficiency. Thinking like a tech company — regardless of your value proposition — can set you up for success with customers and investors.

Here are three pieces of advice for building a strong business, whether you’re focused on tech or not:

Assess Your Co-Founder(s)

We recommend making sure that at least one of your co-founders has a strong background in software development. This early investment in technical expertise establishes you as a tech company, regardless of your product or service, and ensures that decision-makers are well-versed in technical challenges and solutions. Also, you’re going to start vetting outside vendors sooner than you think, and you’ll need someone at the executive level who can make a realistic assessment of the costs and advantages of those offerings.

What if you are the technical co-founder? Be honest about your ability (and your bandwidth) to handle the other responsibilities of leadership. Can you build relationships, reach out to investors, identify customers, map your buyer’s journey, create a marketing strategy, support sales efforts, and establish operational processes? If not, find someone who can — even if they’ve never written a line of code in their life.

The key is to write a strong story for both sides: the technical and the operational. It’s tempting to emphasize one side over the other when appealing to different audiences, but the truth is that no business is entirely technical or purely operational. Your company will intertwine the two, using technology to support operations and vice versa. Co-founders who reflect this intertwined approach will make a powerful team.

Invest in Technology Early

Just as it’s important to find a co-founder with some technical prowess, it pays to invest in a strong technical team at every level. Whenever you can, hire employees rather than contractors as your engineers, developers and analysts. A substantial and early investment in technology (in human capital as well as tools) will help you scale effectively.

Because we don’t sell software, we buck the traditional definition of a tech company. However, we’ve always employed many talented software developers and invested heavily in both out-of-the-box and purpose-built software solutions to meet our evolving needs. And even though we’re vacation rental property managers, technology is at the core of our value proposition. It only makes sense that we would make such consistent and significant investments in it.

Consider Building Instead of Buying

Our company went from using no external software services to using many external solutions. This evolution happened naturally, as a consequence of our rapid growth. As our business model became more advanced — and as our needs became more complex and more narrowly defined — we realized we needed a more diverse toolset.

Eventually, however, we became a “build” company, using our own purpose-built property management system. We simply couldn’t find an out-of-the-box solution that could keep pace with our unprecedented growth and swiftly evolving business needs. Which brings us back to the importance of investing in technology, from the technical co-founder to the development team: If you have these experts in place, you can properly assess your company’s technical needs at every stage.

Every company is a tech company. The more you think about technology and its essential role in your business, the more successful you’ll be.

Unfortunately, many companies don’t understand why an SEO strategy that worked just last year might not be the optimal approach today. Sometimes, even if I do convince someone to change his strategy, he still tends to dwell in the past, focusing on links and rankings and not taking the user experience, RankBrain, and other recent algorithm advances into consideration. Updates to SEO strategy don’t happen every few years. They happen constantly, as small changes stack up to build a strategy that evolves with the search engines themselves.

Challenges to Effective SEO

When I work with companies trying to master their SEO, I see several challenges arise time and time again.

For one, many decision makers I’ve met aren’t up to date on the latest news and changes to Google’s algorithms, making it difficult for them to understand why their strategies should change. Last year, Google started using mobile-friendliness to rank search results, and it bolstered that approach this May. Last fall, Google started to rely on RankBrain to monitor and refine its ranking processes. The search rankings world is always changing, and a good SEO strategy must change with it.

Likewise, I’ve had conversations with many leaders who don’t realize that there’s no one-size-fits-all approach. Every industry and business is different, so we customize each program based on an agile approach where decisions are made based on tests, data analysis, performance, and KPIs. Many decision makers want the full picture upfront, but a good strategy requires analysis and refinement over time. Prioritizing the ability to pivot strategies is more important than creating a comprehensive plan at the outset.

In the past, when Google made changes to its algorithms, a few on-page tweaks were enough to stay on top. Now, a successful SEO program requires more time, effort, and variety than ever before. As Google gets smarter, SEO strategies must incorporate well-written authoritative long-form content, a technical SEO program, a website with a stellar user experience, social signals associated with the brand (likes, shares, etc.), and a natural linking strategy.

No modern SEO strategy can be successful without fresh content, a strong branding strategy, and constant reevaluation of opportunities for UX improvement. Google wants something simple: to deliver the most relevant and useful results for any given search phrase. Meeting the challenges in today’s SEO world means keeping the customer at the center of the website experience and keeping it easy, inviting, educational, and enjoyable.

Creating a Strategy That Lasts

All industries deal with change in one form or another, whether that means staying on top of the latest product enhancements, keeping up with competitors’ service options, or staying ahead of customer demands.

Handling those challenges means embracing the inevitability of change. Fighting or avoiding the discomfort around change only makes it more difficult when change becomes the only option left. While uprooting processes, making website changes, and thinking differently about the customer journey might seem like a headache at first, the end result of better SEO is worth it.

To build a better SEO strategy, follow these four steps:

1. Keep up with the news. Stay on top of what’s happening in your industry, and build yourself up as a thought leader in your field by publishing on different websites. No executive should ever be behind the times regarding his industry’s latest trends.
2. Place value over flashiness with your content. Content that appears on your website and content published in other places are critical for a comprehensive SEO strategy. Think of your customer — not the almighty Google — when putting that content together. What do your customers want to hear? What do they need to know? How much information are they looking for and in what format?
3. Constantly improve the user experience. Your website should always be a work in progress. Focus on making the conversion process as seamless as possible. The more user-friendly your site becomes, the more your potential customers will engage with you on your own turf. Utilize click tracking (Crazy Egg is good), eye tracking, user testing, and voice of customer analysis tools.
4. Meet your audience members where they are. Know where your customer base is talking, and get involved there. Share relevant content, provide excellent customer service, and be genuinely useful. Social signals in the form of likes, shares, comments, tweets, and more will contribute to your overall SEO ranking.

When our clients are behind the times, convincing them to revamp their SEO strategies can be tricky. But for the companies that do want to build a better strategy, using these steps — staying up-to-date, creating relevant content, focusing on UX, enhancing the customer journey, and being visibly social — will pave the path to success.

Create a strategy that can evolve and adapt with the times so that when inevitable changes occur, you will be ready to meet them.

Clearly pretty important, right?

Of course it is it! Who doesn’t want to be the No. 1 search result on Google? Well, that’s exactly how someone at an SEO firm will put it. But is it really that easy?

The problem is the process of maximizing your search result position has changed, and no one is talking about it. Or worse, they’re selling less-than ethical services based on old, outdated methods that not only don’t work but could negatively affect your ranking. Quite frankly, this angers me. But I’m getting ahead of myself. So let’s take a step back and talk about where this all started.

It’s 1994 and all search engines that exist are coded, run and updated by people manually. Then Brian Pinkerton creates the first web crawler, with the job of indexing entire webpages. This crawler is groundbreaking. It’s the first of its kind and will go on to get acquired by AOL, and ultimately wind up leading the foundation of all automated spider crawling indexers. You know, the things you rely on to return your essential “what taco places are still open at 3 a.m.?” queries.

The Problem

In the 1990s and early 2000s, it was easy to get these crawlers to notice you. Their programming was simple, especially compared to what we have today. At their core, the crawlers would search sites for keywords and then return results based on people searching for those words.

So now I know what you’re asking:

If these crawlers are returning results based on keywords, then couldn’t you just pack your pages full of commonly searched keywords to move yourself to the top of what the crawlers were returning, regardless of whether those keyword made sense or not?

The answer? Yes, and you’re asking yourself the same questions people in 1994 who would go on to become “SEO experts” were asking. The next decade and a half would be a battle of search engines changing the way they index, and people gaming their sites and methods to rank higher than they should. A back and forth that took place until Google came up with search algorithms called Panda and Penguin.

This changed the game. These algorithms are good. I mean, really good. They not only gave the axe to any sites utilizing spammy approaches but actually penalized them. Since then, things have changed. The secrets of SEO are no longer secrets. There is no magic trick that will put your site at the top of the list. No amount of keyword cramming, link stuffing, or duplicating content will make you win.

What will? The simple answer is a lot of hard work and following best practices:

Create content that answers your customers’ questions and helps provide value. Make your meta description accurately describe what’s on the page. Run your site though free tools (like HubSpot’s site grader) to see where you can improve. Follow URL best practices. Make sure your title tags are in check. Post and live on the platforms that your audience uses. Follow MOZ like they wrote the SEO bible (because they did). Engage. Communicate. Ask. Answer.

In the words of Seth Godin, “You will win once you figure out the simple mechanics of turning strangers into friends and friends into customers. No magic, no superstition. Just planning and measurement and hard work.”

A version of this post originally appeared here. 

As the founder of a digital marketing company, I’ve unfortunately seen many companies run into trouble with SEO agencies. Whether they’re using black-hat SEO tactics or not spending as much time on your account as you had originally contracted for, SEO companies can get away with a lot these days, especially if you don’t know what to look out for. If you’re experiencing any of the following with your SEO company, it may be a sign that they aren’t being completely forthright with you.

You talk to a different person every time.

When you’re constantly being passed around from person to person, your account may not be receiving consistent work. How are you supposed to know if what you discussed with so-and-so was completed if you’re speaking with a different person this week? You can’t. If you haven’t seen tangible proof of work and are talking with a different person each week, you may have a reason to be concerned.

You should also look out for key account managers or project managers being replaced on your account, as this can point to internal issues within an agency. If the agency doesn’t have a strong culture to maintain stability, motivate their team and align them with the agency’s vision, it can lead employees to seek other opportunities, and in turn, negatively affect your campaign. It also leads to disruptions in workflow and communication, which aren’t what you paid for.

However, there are always exceptions: maternity leave, employees relocating, medical emergencies, etc. Find out why people are leaving the agency before you jump to conclusions. Glassdoor and other review sites can provide you with good information.

You don’t receive regular status updates.

This could be a sign that your SEO company isn’t monitoring your progress. Obviously, it would be ridiculous to assume that your agency would email you every time you attract new traffic to your site. However, you should receive status reports at least once a week, and at the very least, once a month. How else would you know if what they are doing is actually working? Even if traffic and conversions are down, a good SEO agency will update you and provide you with a game plan for how they plan to solve the problem.

Requesting weekly updates via a short phone call or a well-documented email is ideal. Also, make sure the end-of-the-month reporting is thorough and done in-person or via conference call and screen share. During the reporting, you are going to want to match up the workflow being generated to the results in Google Analytics or whatever platform you are using to measure performance.

You hear the word “guarantee” a lot.

Very few things in the SEO world can be guaranteed. If your SEO agency is making lofty promises left and right, be wary. Here are a few promises or guarantees to look out for in particular:

• “We guarantee you will be on page 1 within the first six weeks.”
• “We can rank you No. 1 for the most popular keyword in your industry.”
• “We’re good friends with Google, so we can get you on the first page for any keyword you want.”

Any of those sound familiar? If so, be warned that these promises likely won’t be fulfilled.

They can’t explain their processes to you.

Good SEO shops love talking about SEO, from the importance of meta data to latent semantic search. When an SEO company tells you it can’t explain its processes to you because they’re “too complex,” a red flag should pop up. Yes, SEO is a complex process with a lot of independent variables, but a good agency will help you understand what they are doing and why.

If you’re given a standard boilerplate that doesn’t align with your specific needs and goals, you may want to consider taking your services elsewhere.

They don’t present you with hard data.

Your SEO company tells you that since you hired them, your site has received a 200 percent increase in organic traffic, a 50 percent increase in conversion rates, and has gotten 100 backlinks to your site. That all sounds great! But have they actually shown you the numbers to prove it? Without any hard data, you’ll have no way of knowing whether something is being exaggerated or not. Be cautious of custom reporting platforms that aren’t directly exporting data from Google Analytics. If you are just looking at Excel spreadsheets and taking those at face value, they could have been manipulated.

Not all SEO companies are dishonest. In fact, most SEO agencies are completely transparent with their clients. These are just a few of the big warning signs to look out for in order to protect you and your company.

According to Internet Retailer, the growth of e-commerce was up 14.6% in 2015. As this trend becomes more prevalent, so too does everyday business chatter centered around SEO. But sometimes – especially for small-to-medium sized businesses that have legacy clients from a strong local brand (think restaurants or auto shops) – the term “SEO” delivers the purest form of dread.

Some people might have gotten ripped off by a hack SEO agency, and now refer to everything SEO-related as a scam. Then there are the ones who simply say SEO is dead, and their online presence can do without it.

But there’s no doubting it – the higher your business ranks in Google, Bing or Yahoo, the stronger your business will be. SEO ensures that customers can easily locate and index your website’s pages, and ultimately serves the potential customer in an effective way.

Before you either seek out a reputable agency or work on SEO in-house, take a look at these simple questions to make sure you’re on the right track.

Is My Content Diversified?

Is the bulk of your content simple text and a few photos? This is the case for many, but one must think like an investor who knows a diverse portfolio is key to achieving success. A well-diversified website contains a lot of content, mainly text in the form of product copy, blogs and reviews, along with photos, videos and infographics.

But you must make sure each one is optimized. Are you using the proper keywords in your headlines and copy? Do your photos contain descriptive ALT text and captions to keep visitors engaged? Did you compress your videos and PDFs to make sure site speed is on target?

Are My Technical/On-Page SEO Metrics Finely Tuned?

Start with technical metrics. Are your hosting configurations tuned? Most hosting companies like GoDaddy or WPEngine offer free support, and you can ask them simple questions such as, “How’s the overall health of my hosting configurations?” They may find something simple that will vastly improve your website.

Also, there are various online tests to help check the site speed. Analyze the basics of on-page SEO, such as page titles (Do you have correct/catchy keywords?), URL length/structure (Are there keywords up front? Are they fewer than 512 pixels?) and meta descriptions (Is the marketing message clear?). A tool like onpage.org can help.

How About Visitor Metrics?

Every business should understand how to read its Google Analytics report. There, you can find some crucial visitor metrics that can help you optimize your site – both from a content and a technical perspective – to garner more traffic, and ultimately more sales.

Here are the top metrics you should be studying:

• Click Through Rate (CTR): You want this trending positively. Tweak notable elements that influence CTR like page title, meta description and URL structure.
• Bounce Rate: This is when a person visits your page but quickly returns to the search engine page. The higher the bounce rate, the lower the authority, thus bringing it to the bottom of search engine results pages (SERPs). You want to stay below a 40% bounce rate. Quicker load times and more appealing content are the notable factors to optimize.
• Time on Site (Visitor Engagement): This tells you how long a visitor was on your site, and which pages they spent the most time on. The longer the better, because it drastically improves the above two metrics. Notable factors for additional engagement include content length and types, such as video, information image captions, and the number of resources you have.

Is My Content Trustworthy and Authoritative?

Visit every page and ask yourself this very question. Think like an editor, and only have the most trustworthy and authoritative content on your site. Solve problems. Add value. Did you check all the facts? Would readers view it like it was written by an expert in your industry? If not, revise accordingly.

Grammatical errors and false facts can immediately dethrone your authority. Look at the page from a designer’s perspective, and make sure the layout is crisp and easy on the eyes – especially on mobile, which is surpassing the desktop as the viewing platform of choice.

Well-written, trustworthy and authoritative content naturally becomes linkable assets, which helps build the holy grail of SEO: backlinks. When other reputable sites link to yours, search engines see your site as authoritative, thus increasing its ranking in SERPS. This is a solid content strategy for obtaining links from places like industry-relevant sites, directories, press releases, .edu sites and social media.

Answering these questions is the first step toward bringing your website to the top of SERPS, which will not only help grow sales, but also play a fundamental role in building brand awareness.

However, that does not necessarily mean that the information is accurate, up to date, or even easy to find. If you’re not managing a well-maintained SEO marketing strategy for your business or website, then you could be missing out on more lead conversions than you even realize. But as a successful entrepreneur, you may already know more about SEO than you thought.

It’s easy to hear phrases like “SEO,” “Panda algorithm update,” and “Google quality rater guidelines” and get lost in a sea of confusion. But trust me when I say that internet marketing is not as difficult as people make it out to be. I started my internet marketing company in my basement, knowing almost nothing about the industry. Fast forward 14 years, and I’m one of marketing’s top influencers. Get a head start on your internet marketing efforts with my three-step approach to building an online authority.

Research the Need for Your Services

When you came up with the idea for your business, you probably noticed a lack of availability for something that you were looking for, or had difficulty finding it. In turn, you also may have asked around to see if people would pay for that kind of service if it were more available to them. Hence, you were able to do some research and find the value or demand for that service. It probably helped you to better understand your target audience as well.

With an effective internet marketing strategy, you want to do the same. Make sure you are not attracting just any customers, but rather the right customers. Let’s say someone is looking for a car engine, and you own an auto body store that mainly provides parts for foreign vehicles. If that potential customer is specific with their search and you’re specific with your keywords, then they are more likely to find you right off the bat. Let’s say they type “Subaru Outback engines” into their search. If you use this keyword effectively, then they’ll be able to find you right away. Effective keyword research and application is a big step in the right direction of targeting potential customers and closing a sale.

Attract New Customers

Without customers or the need for a service, there really is no possible way for a business to thrive. If consumers are not investing in your product, then you won’t have income. So naturally, you want to get the word out about what you have to offer.

Before the internet, people found out about services through the Yellow Pages, television and radio ads, magazines, newspapers and word of mouth. Now, people are searching for products and services on their mobile devices and having hundreds — even thousands — of results available to them within seconds.

You want to attract as many new leads as possible, including both people who have never heard of you and are searching for your product, as well as people who have heard of you and are becoming more curious about your services.

So, how do you place your brand front-and-center for your audience to see? It all starts with highly-targeted content creation with the user in mind. Without question, content should be the heart of your brand. From blog posts and original landing page copy to downloadable white papers, the content on your site is ultimately what drives new audiences to your brand. Make sure your brand is in a position to succeed by creating user-oriented content that provides your audience with trustworthy information. Keep in mind that it should be content that they actually want to read.

Publish on Social Media Channels

Most new businesses start out small and begin by offering services to family and friends. The results are then talked about and shared with other family and friends, thus perpetuating word-of-mouth marketing.

Today, practically everyone we know has at least one social media account. Most people like to share their experiences with businesses and services on social media because it’s a quick and easy way to tell others about their experience. If you are not advertising your business on any social media websites, you could be missing out on a lot of potential customers due to a lack of exposure. If someone receives a wonderful service from you, encourage them to share it with everyone they know online. Something as simple as a quick review on your Facebook profile could do a lot for your business’s exposure to new customers and clients.

When preparing to effectively optimize your online SEO marketing strategies, there’s quite a bit of research to analyze. Just like when you’re starting out in a new business, doing your due diligence and considering all your options will lead you to higher quality clientele and ROI.

New algorithms increasingly account for user behavior metrics, such as site speed, structure, and mobile optimization, rather than just trawl for keywords. And marketers must follow suit. It’s time to leave search engine optimization in the past and embrace search experience optimization instead.

Human Experience vs. Machine Experience

Too many marketers still focus exclusively on links and rankings. While these metrics have their place, they’re not the most important elements anymore. Businesses need a more holistic approach that combines traditional practices with new methodologies to place users at the heart of the process.

CURL, which stands for content, user experience, RankBrain and links, are all influential factors in Google’s ranking algorithm. This methodology provides a model framework for optimizing the search experience. The first two CURL factors are fairly self-explanatory: How relevant is the content? And has the website been developed with the user experience in mind?

But RankBrain is a little more technical. This is Google’s latest machine-learning artificial intelligence system, which helps provide relevant search results for users. While the specific elements it considers are unknown, it shows us that Google is transforming its algorithm’s ability to function like a person.

Links are also more complicated than they used to be. Not all links are created equal, and instead of focusing on quantity, it’s time to target quality. A small selection of reputable, relevant and resourceful links is worth a lot more in today’s SEO than an abundance of links.

Creating Unique Customer Journeys

By ensuring a strong, responsive user experience, marketers can increase the likelihood that website visitors will follow a call to action. And with the average conversion rate for U.S. websites at under 4 percent, it’s clear that more needs to be done.

Customer journeys are always morphing and evolving, and each website visitor will create his or her own path. These five steps will ensure the best possible experience:

1. Conduct surveys. Voice of customer surveys are essential. Ask visitors and customers how their experiences could be improved and send out Net Promoter Score surveys to discover how likely they are to recommend you to family and friends. Change your website based on these responses. My company also conducts exit surveys from specific pages, such as shopping carts or product pages. Based on customer responses, we can direct them to an appropriate notification, offer a discount if the price is too high, start a live chat, or provide upgraded shipping.
2. Optimize the UX. The user experience cannot be ignored. Free products like Crazy Egg can find where visitors click and scroll, while eye-tracking reports uncover where users look, gaze and fixate. As the co-founder of LookTracker, an eye tracking technology company, I have seen first hand how insightful it can be to see through a visitor’s eyes as they navigate a site or app. Likewise, testing with Optimizely can help uncover the strongest website design. These tools all provide insight into how users engage with a website and offer valuable feedback for improvements. A client of ours had just launched a new website with an unfortunate loss of conversions. Utilizing the above products, we determined where users were overlooking CTAs, shifted the arrangement of the site and tested new layouts. The site saw over 350 percent more searches, a 4.6 percent increase in conversions and a 32 percent rise in monthly sales, just from a few small adjustments.
3. Publish killer content. Content comes in all shapes and sizes. It could be a long-form post that offers authoritative and detailed information, or it could be a video that breaks down a complex issue into easily digestible takeaways. Whatever the content, ensure it presents your business as an expert in the space and offers trustworthy advice. Not only does this help with customers, but with Google as well. On a recent piece, we had the lofty goal of ranking on Page 1 in Google by Super Bowl Sunday. With the right imagery, videos, headings, keywords and CTAs, the content saw a healthy 188 percent boost in viewership by kickoff.
4. Be available. Customers want information tailored to their needs, and that sometimes means going beyond standard website information. The most responsive websites will offer quick access to a rock-star customer success team via live chat features, ensuring that any gaps in the content are quickly addressed. Based on Qualaroo surveys for one client, we found that customers were frequently looking to ask questions about a product. Installing a live chat tool on its website not only helped this company improve its user experience but the efficiency of its customer service team.
5. Keep improving. Just as SEO has evolved, marketing overall won’t be the same in 2020 as it is today. Never stop looking for ways to improve your website to meet customer needs. Look at qualitative and quantitative feedback and implement changes responsively.

Every customer journey is unique. While old SEO approaches were focused on machine experience, the new search experience optimization is all about offering value to end users. SEO is about people, not machines. Taking customers out of the one-size-fits-all sales funnel can increase web traffic, improve user engagement and raise conversion rates: all keys to a better bottom line.

The concept of search engine optimization (SEO) is simple: Set your website up correctly to rank for particular keywords within the organic search results on Google, Bing and Yahoo. In contrast, the process of SEO is complicated, and costs can add up. Through my years in digital marketing — including founding Pepperjam (an online performance marketing and technology company now owned by eBay) and founding LSEO.com and APPEK Mobile Apps (which was selected as one of the top boutique mobile app development firms in the U.S.) — I’ve learned that when outsourcing your SEO, a strategy to identify the best company for you is critical.

One easy way to compare companies is to leverage an independent research company like Clutch.co. Clutch conducts research and reviews on top development, design and marketing companies. A recent study by Clutch looked at reasons that small businesses select SEO firms and found the following:

• 45 percent of choices were based on established relationships.
• 43 percent stated that company attributes factored into their decision, including thought leadership, knowledge, staff experience, reporting and transparency, or customer service.
• 15 percent wanted to use a local company.
• 14 percent explicitly mentioned evaluating past performance, such as online reviews, references, case studies and client lists.
• 13 percent mentioned culture fit or personality.
• 12 percent emphasized price or value as a deciding factor.
• 11 percent cited the importance of company focus, as in the company specializes in the exact type of service that they needed.
• 5 percent decided to work with the company after receiving a cold call or email pitch from them.

How can we use this research to ensure you consider all of your options and make the best selection? Based on my experience advising businesses in the past 18 years, I suggest that you consider the following four key areas when choosing an SEO company: expertise, past performance, company attributes and value.

Focus Areas of Expertise

When choosing an SEO company, always seek one that is focused on what you need. Some SEOs offer things like mobile optimization and on-site SEO, but not local SEO or website redesign; others offer everything. For example, if you’re a restaurant or a plumber with a fixed geographical customer base, you’ll want to focus on local SEO.

Most of this information is readily available on a company’s website, but never be afraid to reach out via telephone; a company can’t bluff you as easily on the phone. Do some research and be prepared to ask questions — the more questions, the better.

Past Performance

Past performance should always be a factor when researching an SEO company. Check for client testimony on the SEOs website and websites like Clutch.co, and don’t be afraid to reach out to the testifying company for input. If an SEO firm is presenting positive work, its customers should offer positivity. As well, always ask about customer service, which should be at the top of any company’s profile.

Company Attributes

When researching an SEO company, pay particular attention to the following: reporting and transparency, customer service, thought leadership and knowledge transfer, and company position on outsourcing work.

The first is an absolute must: Concrete reporting and complete transparency are imperative for success in any company, especially an SEO firm. The reporting will not only show performance results from work completed, but also signify areas that need improvement.

Customer service will be apparent from the first meeting. If possible, meet with the team members of the company, which will also help you evaluate the company’s thought leadership. Also ask about knowledge transfer and if any members of the team speak at conferences or events in the SEO space. The importance of leadership is that it often equates to structure, which equates to smooth processes. As for knowledge transfer and attendance at conferences, these attributes help strengthen the company’s brand. To make things easier, simply Google some names on staff; the ones with a reputation in the SEO space will surely stick out.

Ask about outsourcing as well. If any work is outsourced, find out the name of the company that is being used. Outsourcing isn’t necessarily bad, but it should be investigated and vetted.

Value

Within the SEO sphere, you usually get what you pay for. Sometimes a company may charge much more than a competitor, but if you find all the things mentioned here in this article, it may be worth it to make it work. For SEO, cheaper is not always better.

Free SEO Company Evaluation Tool

To help companies select an SEO company, Clutch has developed a valuable SEO Company Evaluation Tool (which can be downloaded in an Excel format here). Luckily, selecting an SEO company that delivers on its promises doesn’t have to happen by chance.

Kristopher Jones is Founder of LSEO, a full-service SEO Company, and co-founder of APPEK Mobile Apps, a mobile app development agency.

Because of the rapidly-evolving nature of internet marketing, one of the most common questions I hear from my clients year in and year out is, “What changes do you expect in the online marketing world?” This is an astute question — and, although some changes are truly unexpected for everyone, there are always a few trends that offer clues into the future. In this article, I will share three trends that I am confident will continue to influence the world of online marketing over the course of 2017.

Trend No. 1: Algorithms Will Change

Of the three predictions I am making, this first one is by far the least controversial. Virtually anyone who works in the world of online marketing — or even pays attention to the industry — would be inclined to agree with me. Search engines have been constantly updating their algorithms on a very consistent basis ever since the days of Ask Jeeves. So why have I included such a straightforward trend? Because it is probably the most important — and, despite this, many professionals in the industry ignore its inevitable consequences.

Every search engine out there is always working to update its algorithms and provide better, more relevant content for its users. A few possible updates to expect from Google in 2017 include a stronger focus on e-commerce and mobile compatible sites, as well as a gradual “stamping out” of ultra-low-quality results. Apps may also become more heavily featured. Ultimately, however, I recommend that my clients not stress too much over such details.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t work on mobile friendliness or on adding e-commerce; I’m simply stating that you shouldn’t work on these features only for the sake of SEO. In the end, the constantly-changing nature of search engine algorithms renders any effort to follow specifics exactly for the sake of a higher result futile. Instead, as most successful SEO marketers understand, you should focus on creating high-quality content. After all, this is what search engines are ultimately seeking, and it is the best way to ensure that your content stays valuable and relevant for a long time to come.

Trend No. 2: Mobile Will Continue to Grow

This is another trend that certainly has a historical precedent: The growth of mobile over the course of the past few years has been off the charts. Businesses have bent over backward to ensure that their e-commerce functionality remained intuitive, effective and secure in order to boost mobile sales, and results show that these decisions have paid off.

Some experts predict that the explosive growth of mobile may begin to plateau here in the U.S., but I disagree. The entire growth of the internet has been largely based on convenience: Music, business listings, phone calls, letters, rental movies and a million other in-person services already existed before they become inexorably tied to the internet. The continued rise of new wearable mobile technology will also be a contributing factor to the ever-increasing popularity of mobile. Google’s own insistence on increasing the SEO value of mobile-friendliness should function as a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Trend No. 3: Native Advertising Will Grow

Defined as advertisements designed to blend right into the content of their host site by imitating every element of the host site’s style, these advertisements strike a real nerve among many journalists and internet activists who claim that native advertising degrades journalism and can even be grossly misleading, “tricking” unwary readers into thinking that the ad they are viewing truly is a news piece. Many advertisers and news companies, however, argue that native advertising is a way of turning the formerly stale ad industry into a source of content that readers really enjoy, all while helping to make news organizations profitable once again.

Because of this controversy, some online marketers predict that native advertising will decline in 2017. In my opinion, this is simply wishful thinking: Native advertising, as problematic and polemic as it may be, is effective. Therefore, it is here to stay. As commendable as the effort to boycott or ignore this type of “news” article may be, it will ultimately be ineffectual, as there are always going to be those willing to produce and host such content. Instead, creating ethical native advertising is ultimately a more meaningful way to effect change. If you believe that native advertising serves your company, by all means, go for it, but be sure to set a good precedent. Ensure that your articles offer real value while also being thoroughly factual — and be sure to include a visible disclaimer.

The simple takeaway that readers should consider? Understand how your online marketing strategy can place stronger influence on both quality and convenience. By offering this to your clients, you can ensure long-lasting impact from all your digital marketing efforts.

Google argued that e-ventures’ claims violated the First Amendment. e-ventures had allegedly exploited loopholes in Google’s algorithm, thus enabling the company to propel low-quality and irrelevant content higher in the rankings. Google, which ensures its users can easily find high-quality, relevant content, responded by manually removing e-ventures from search results.

e-ventures took legal action, despite lawsuits like this having been determined unfounded numerous times in the past. “Google’s site, Google’s rules” would be an apt (albeit informal) paraphrase of the standard legal decision.

This year, however, a Florida judge decided that e-ventures’ case was, in part, valid. After all, Google holds a great deal of control over the web, which is a public space for discourse; therefore it should be held to a high standard.

The case between Google and e-ventures offers plenty of valuable insight into how you can optimize your own company’s online presence. In this article, I plan to share how business owners can develop a long-term SEO strategy that insulates them from the volatility that instances like this can present.

How does this case impact your SEO efforts?

Manually removing e-ventures was viewed by some as a rather troubling decision. That’s because “search engine manipulation” could describe pretty much any SEO activity, whether you’re redesigning your website to be more user-friendly, or are writing new website copy, integrating new forms of media, or building a solid collection of backlinks.

SEO is a highly integral part of many companies’ marketing strategies. A growing number of businesses now invest heavily in improving their rankings: a project that often entails hiring web designers, writers, video crews and other content generators. So whenever the “rules” that search engines use to determine rankings change, it’s a big deal for businesses.

That’s why, in the face of such changes, I highly recommend that business owners make an effort to adapt in order to stay competitive.

Take the rise of mobile-friendly design, for example: When Google decided to prioritize mobile-friendly design, thousands upon thousands of businesses responded virtually overnight by investing in mobile-friendly development. Those that did saw their rankings skyrocket. Those that failed to respond to these changes saw their rankings fall. This was known as “Mobilegeddon” to those of us in the SEO industry.

So, how should your business respond?

As an SEO expert, I find the notion that “Google is trying to kill SEO” to be exaggerated. Over the years, I’ve seen search algorithms change and evolve countless times, and every change inevitably inspires a few self-proclaimed industry experts to state that SEO will “never be the same.”

The truth is, search algorithms are always going to be updated and remodeled, and SEO must adapt to these changes in order to remain successful. The best way for you as a business owner to react is to understand that, despite such changes, the basic principle of SEO is always going to remain the same: Google and other search engines want to provide their users with the highest quality content.

This is a concept that I always stress to my clients, especially when they worry about changes in SEO. The details of SEO, though relevant, will never be as important simply providing a good user experience.

To stay ahead of the curve, Google actually created a website optimization mini-course, Google Webmaster, that includes tips for how website administrators can rank better among other helpful topics covered. The SEO section of this course makes a clear distinction between what is known as “white hat” and “black hat” SEO, and notes that dishonest attempts to improve search rankings are likely to be counterproductive.

Google also has a page on what are considered to be “good” SEO techniques. To put it in the broadest of terms, good SEO strives to connect content with the audience that will most sincerely be interested in it. It uses creative yet concise language, along with a diversity of media formats and user-friendly design to give visitors an optimal experience. It also enables savvy companies to promote themselves to relevant audiences effectively and efficiently.

The best long-term strategy you can take as a business owner is to provide excellent content. Offering a quality experience to your users should always take priority over the minutia of SEO, because quality is the one characteristic that we know all search engines promote. By focusing on website quality, you will be setting your company up for online success both now and in the future, regardless of whatever court cases, algorithm changes or technological advances the future may hold.