How Has SEO Gotten Easier and Harder?

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) was born in 1999 (one year after Google launched), during the first ever SEO Conference hosted by Danny Sullivan.

For over a decade, SEO was somewhat of a silver bullet approach to obtaining high search engine rankings and non-paid organic website traffic. As a result, many SEO service providers adhered to the ‘by any means necessary’ premise.

As a result, SEO has gotten EASIER and HARDER.

SEO is easier because search engines (like Google) constantly update their algorithms, which in turn has instituted regulations over the SEO-as-a-Service industry. That’s good news, right … or is it?

Google and Bing have demystified SEO. They provide a SEO playbook for practitioners to follow. We have online SEO libraries & repositories of proven strategies, tactics, and techniques that show us how to grow non-paid website traffic. We have powerful SEO software and tools at our fingertips.

SEO consultants & practitioners simply have to follow the rules and a significant stream of non-paid organic traffic to your website is achievable.

Here’s Why SEO is Harder

SEO is harder because some SEO companies & service providers have caused mistrust in SEO-as-a-Service, due to SEO malpractice.

A True SEO Story I Experienced:

Once, a SEO company contacted me for SEO consulting services. Credit to them, they signed a handful of new SEO clients in about 3 months. Each client was paying about $5,000 per month for SEO services.

When I arrived to the consultation, I was impressed by their beautiful office … but bewildered why there was only a few employees at the company.

After conversing, I learned that none of them had actually done SEO before and their clients were starting to ask questions.

When I got back to my office, I intensively researched the owner of the SEO company. I learned he had a reputation.

The owner had started other SEO companies, dissolved the companies within a year, and skipped town with a lot of angry people’s money.

Essentially, he was a great salesman … but had no real experience providing SEO services or solving SEO problems.

I told them thanks, but no thanks … and wished them good luck!

That’s A Good Reason To Hire A SEO Consultant

SEO is something that requires a third-party audit from time-to-time. Non-paid website traffic from the search engines is an asset. It’s a luxury. And conducting a third-party SEO audit of your website from time-to-time is smart business. It’s guaranteed to produce a favorable return-on-investment. That’s based on my experience.

SEO audits are good if you currently employ a SEO agency or if you keep SEO in-house. The purpose of the SEO audit is to help you and your team use the audit findings to increase your non-paid website traffic and enrich your asset.