SEO Agency Research 2012

If you're thinking of hiring an SEO or are an SEO - this is a must browse

Earlier in January, you may have seen a useful piece of research completed by SEOmoz that looked into the costs and service structure of SEO agencies.

I've included that below, but the main reason for this post is to alert you to this excellent summary by Dan Barker (one of our Expert commentators) which features the UK and, in my opinion, is far clearer and so useful.

You can checkout the full post and research on SEOmoz here.

Turning to the UK data, from Dan, the most interesting for me, which prompts questions you should ask of your agency are...

• What services do you provide? Surprisingly few do content creation or promotion - surely a core 2012 SEO technique. A surprising number don't provide link-building recommendations
• What charging models do you use? Fixed price is offered by 51.9%, so if you're paying on an hourly basis you may not be getting the best deal. Pay per performance based on rankings or traffic is relatively rate (sub 10%) but revenue share is higher.
• How much do you charge? This gives a nice map to see whether you've got a great deal or not, but as we all know, you generally get what you pay for. Don't you?
• How long have you been operating? Over a quarter have been operating for less than 2 years. I'd never recommend an agency with this little experience. SEO is a craft acquired over many years. If the main people have more experience then this is fine, but it shows that its still a lucrative area.

All data by SEOMoz, Graphic by Dan Barker

Here is the original SEOmoz infographic covering a range of countries.