At some-point most business have explored outsourcing "SEO", although recently more businesses I speak to are bringing it back in house. A recent guide from Hub Spot sparked this blog post as they have created a short guide to identifying a "Bad SEO Service" you may be interested in. You can check it out here.
While 
their guide is good, I think it can be distilled down even further & I would even say you should even question whether you need an SEO agency at all!
Here are the questions prompted by the guide:
While some of what SEO used to be is quite technical & requires particular skills it is very process driven & easy to read about online and therefore should be relatively cheap, this work should be restricted to the build of websites or half yearly checkups.
If your question & indeed opportunity is in improving your presence in Search Engines you should instead be asking yourself : How do I create something worth finding?
This is a question I pose often when working with clients at Smart Insights & First 10. When you consider it from this angle you start to realise that to do this you need:
The skills required to get this right are therefore very different to that of an SEO agency.
You are looking at sourcing:
By creating amazing items of content & sharing / marketing these well you will have created strong content rich pages on your website that creates links because people want to share it, write about it etc. As a result of this work you will improve your search presence as well as grow your reach through 3rd party websites.
Unless your Search Agency are experts in your products / industry, have a deep understanding of your customers & have the ability to create amazing content you should be wondering what they are doing to add value each month!
By Chris Soames
Chris Soames is a Smart Insights blogger and consultant, he has worked in digital marketing for over 6 years with the last few years managing international web strategies for a leading travel brand. Now the Commercial Director at First 10, an Integrated marketing agency, he helps clients get clarity on their marketing strategy and create campaigns engineered to engage with their consumers to help drive sell-through. Most of all, Chris enjoys working with talented people who want to create great (& commercial) things not just tick boxes.
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