What is SEO?
It’s hard to imagine that at this time and age, there are people who have never heard about SEO.
We’ll be going on a limb here by taking you through the very basics of SEO before diving into the meaty part of this article.
SEO is a lot simpler than you think.
SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation, refers to the process of improving one’s search engine ranking. It’s all about improving your search engine visibility. When users run a search query that relates to your business, product, or services, you want your site to be among the links that show up.
It’s that simple.
Google and other search engines only display results that they deem relevant and authoritative. While relevancy is assessed based on keyword optimisation, authority is measured by analysing the number of quality sites that are linking back to you.
Your authority increases the more other high-quality sites link back to you. Every page on the web has the potential to rank high on search engine so long as there are other pages on the web linking back to it.
Sample SEO Pricing in Singapore
Each agency quotes its SEO package in Singaporean dollars.
SEO Pricing (Tier 1)
Package Specifics |
Startup Pricing $250 |
Corporate Pricing $350 |
ECommerce Pricing $450 |
Dedicated SEO Consultation | YES | YES | YES |
Constant monitoring | YES | YES | YES |
Guaranteed Top 5 Results | YES | YES | YES |
Constant Monitoring | YES | YES | YES |
SEO Pricing (Tier 2)
Package Specifics | Starter Pricing | Business Pricing | Premium SEO Pricing |
Maximum Keywords | 25 | 50 | 75 |
Bookmarks | 25 | 50 | 75 |
Directory Submissions | 50 | 100 | 200 |
Link Requests | 200 | 300 | 400 |
Pricing Information | Starter Plan | Business Plan | Premium SEO Plan |
Minimum Contract | 6 Month | 6 Month | 6 Month |
Setup Fee | Nil | Nil | Nil |
Starting Monthly Fee | $250 | $350 | $500 |
Discount if Paid in Advance | 10% | 10% | 10% |
SEO Pricing (Tier 3)
Package Specifics | Standard Pricing | Professional Pricing | Enterprise Pricing |
Total Cost In 6 Months | SGD $6120 | SGD $12480 | SGD $186600 |
Rate Per month | SGD $1020 | SGD $2080 | SGD $3100 |
KEYWORD OPTIMISATION
|
YES | ||
Keyword Targeting | 4 | 8 | 12 |
LINK DEVELOPMENT
|
YES | ||
Manual Link Requests | 40 | 110 | 180 |
One Way Links Creation from Directory Submission | 50 | 100 | 150 |
One Way Links Creation from | 400 | 900 | 1800 |
SEO Pricing (Tier 4)
Package Specifics |
Deluxe SEO SGD $900 Per Month |
Advanced SEO SGD $1,200 Per Month |
Premium SEO SGD $2,000 Per Month |
Target Keyword | 20 | 40 | Unlimited |
Minimum Guaranteed Keywords | 5 | 10 | Between 10 to 50 |
Industry Niche | Medium Competitive | Competitive | Very Competitive |
Optimisation | Basic On-Page optimisation | Advanced On-Page optimisation | Advanced On-Page optimisation |
Monthly Ranking Report | Yes | Yes | Yes |
How to Make Your Website Appear in Search Engines
Your website will appear in Google or any other search engine when your content is quality enough. People will also be encouraged to link to your webpages once they find your content interesting.
Search engines, on the other hand, benefit from this because they’re interested in showing what’s interesting and authoritative in their search results. The more online users are able to find relevant and most useful content every time they run a search query, that means search engines are doing a commendable job.
Users will learn to trust them even more, thus increasing their usage.
What Are the Benefits of SEO?
When surfers search for something on Google or any other search engine, they’ll first land on the first page of Search Engine Result Pages. In which case, many of them will choose a link among those that appear at the top of result pages.
And that’s partly because many of them tend to assume links that appear at the top of the SERPs are the most relevant or high-quality.
So, ranking at the top of the SERPs means your link will be enjoying a high number of clicks as opposed to ranking at the bottom.
Backing this claim up is a 2010 research conducted by Chikita, and which sampled upwards of 8 million search results. According to the study, the number 1 spot in the SERPs enjoys about 33% of all the traffic garnered through search engines.
Here’s a simplified table summarising everything.
The Percentage Traffic of Google Page Rank (1 to 10)
Google Result Page Rank (Position in the SERPs) |
Average traffic Share (The Share of Traffic that each Link Gets) |
Position 1 |
33% |
Position 2 |
17.6% |
Position 3 |
11.4% |
Position 4 |
8.1% |
Position 5 |
6.1% |
Position 6 |
4.4% |
Position 7 |
3.5% |
Position 8 |
3.1% |
Position 9 |
2.6% |
Position 10 |
2.4% |
As you can see, securing position #1 means you’ll be getting a third of the traffic, while the remaining two-third is left to be shared among the rest of the links.
That’s what SEO does for you. It strives to propel you up the search engine ranks, thus increasing the amount of traffic that you’re able to drive.
The Financial Incentive of SEO
A top position in the SERPs for a list of valuable keywords will result in huge financial gains for your business. The higher you rank, the more traffic your website will be getting – and with all the other factors held constant, that translates to more sales and revenue for your business.
That explains why the top positions in the SERPs are fiercely contested. Every web owner wants the first position or to at least secure a spot on the first page.
These financial rewards are responsible for the increase in the number of SEO consultants and service providers.
What are the various types of SEO?
A well-rounded SEO strategy occurs in three layers: on-page SEO, Off-page SEO, and technical SEO.
These are the three aspects to focus on when strategising about SEO.
On-page SEO: On-page SEO refers to the content that you publish on your site. It covers the strategy you employ in optimising a webpage for a relevant list of keywords.
It’s through on-page that search engines are able to understand a webpage and weigh on its degree of relevancy.
It’s what search engines use to understand your content and assess if it’s a valuable source of information that a certain section of online users might find valuable.
The tactics employed in on-page SEO include:
- Keyword Research: This is the first step of running an effective on-page SEO campaign. You have to begin by searching for a list of the best and most relevant keywords to target. Find out what search terms your prospects and customers are using to find businesses or products that are similar to yours.
- Content creation: After you’ve found a list of relevant keywords, the next thing you want to do is create high-quality content around them.
Find a way to turn those keywords into topics that you’ll be using to come up with interesting articles that your prospects may find useful.
- Keyword Optimisation: You’re not just sprinkling keywords on every blog post or piece of article you come up with. Your keywords have to be used appropriately and in the right places.
For instance, you’re expected to use the keywords in the meta tags.
There are tools that are dedicated to helping you out with on-page SEO. One good example of such a tool is Alexa, which handles every aspect of on-page SEO.
You can use their Keyword Difficult tool to find relevant and popular keywords to optimise your site for.
They also have an on-page SEO checker that you can use to analyse individual webpages and find out if they’re been properly optimised.
Technical SEO
Non-technical SEO refers to the non-content aspect of your site.
It includes all the strategies that are meant to improve both the frontend and backend structure of your website. It also includes readability, and how easy it is for search engines to crawl and index your site.
Lastly, technical SEO tries to cover usability. Does the site generate a good user experience? How’s the engagement rate?
How does the site load on a mobile device? Is it responsive as required?
This type of SEO relates to things such as:
- Site speed
- Site architecture
- Mobile-friendliness
- Crawling
- Indexing
- Structured data
- Security
Again, there are tools that you could use to analyse your site for technical SEO. These tools include:
- Alexa SEO Audit Tool
- Screaming Frog Crawler
- Google Search Console
- Google Analytics
- Web Developer Toolbar
- WebPage Test
- Google Page Speed Insights … and so forth.
Off-Page SEO
It’s through off-page SEO that search engines can assess your website for authority. Essentially, it’s meant to strengthen the relationship and influence your site has with other websites in the industry.
It includes strategies that build your reputation and establish your website as a trustworthy authority voice.
Search engines use off-page SEO to evaluate your website and to find out if it’s reliable, reputable, and a trusted source.
Off-site SEO is about securing high-quality backlinks for your website. You win it with off-page SEO when you succeed in getting a large volume of relevant and authoritative websites to link back to you.
It goes to show that these people find your content useful and quality enough to suggest it to their readers. It’s like getting endorsed by these sites, and which leaves search engines with no option but to echo their sentiments.
Again, there are tools that are specifically designed to help you out with off-page SEO. These tools include Ahref, SEMRush, and Alexa’s backlink checker.
With Alexa’s backlink checker, you can enter up to 10 of your competitors’ site URLs to receive a report of all the sites they’re linked to. They also provide you with a competitive analysis that you can use to develop a strategy on how to build links on the same site.
Is SEO a Reserve of Larger Enterprises only
The answer is NO. SEO is a marketing tool or strategy that can be utilised by virtually any business with an online presence, regardless of size.
Whether you’re a small-scale entrepreneur or a large multi-national corporation, SEO stands as a great marketing tool, and which you wouldn’t want to turn your back on.
It doesn’t matter if your business is already doing well, not investing in SEO places you in a far worse position than a poor performing company that’s dedicated lots of its resources and time to optimising their site for search engines.
So yes, every business, regardless of size and the success they’ve had thus far still needs SEO, and here are all the convincing reasons why this is so:
- SEO can help you Create a User-friendly Website
SEO may appear like something you do to appease search engines, but that’s not what it is. Its focus is on the user. It’s about making your site relevant, easy, and more useful to the people you’re targeting, and search engines are the overseers in this through SEO.
- Find New Customers and Position Your Website for Growth
The main reason you have a website is to expand your outreach and target a new customer base. Research shows that businesses that have websites grow twice as fast as their counterparts that don’t have.
It’s through SEO that you’re able to increase your online visibility, thus increasing the number of visits that you’re getting, and essentially garner more customers.
- Explore New Markets
The web is the fastest-growing market in the world’s economy. It’s through SEO that you’ll be able to find a new market and explore a new economy.
By working on your SEO performance, what you’ll be doing is boosting your traffic levels, thus exploring new markets.
- Improving Your Conversion Rate
SEO is good for building trust. It’s what you use to showcase your expertise and educate your visitors on various things.
Plus, the customers that come to your site after finding you on search engines definitely have an interest in your products and services. You have a fair chance of converting them into customers or loyal visitors of your website through SEO.
- Building Brand Awareness
The more users view your site in the search engine result pages, the more popular it grows. Even without taking any further action, by just clicking through your link to read your site’s content, the more the name of your business registers in their mind.
So, if not for anything else, then you might want to consider investing in SEO for the simple reason that it exposes your brand to an even bigger audience.
- Helps You Build a Dedicated Customer Base through Email Marketing
A good SEO strategy can be tied to a good email marketing strategy aimed at helping you build a dedicated fan base.
Email marketing has existed for long, even way before social media and search engines. It’s an important lead nurturing strategy that you may use to get the bulk of your subscribers to take action and increase your revenue stream.
- Open Your Business 24×7
As long as the internet is open, SEO will ensure there’s a steady flow of traffic to your site 24×7. So long someone runs a search query, they’ll always be directed to your website to learn more about your business or to place an order. There are no restrictions as to what time you can be found, unlike a physical store where you’re only open during the day.
How to Budget for Your SEO Campaigns in Singapore
A common question that business owners ask all the time is, ‘how much will it cost me to run an effective SEO campaign.’
Well, there’s no direct answer to this question, other than the obvious one, ‘it depends.’
For a start, your allocation for SEO will always vary depending on the goals and objectives that you have. What do you wish to achieve?
You have to begin by looking at the big picture of your marketing campaign and strategy. It’s after you’ve figured that out that you’ll be able to work a marketing budget for each marketing channel, including SEO.
Here’s the trick: the easiest way to come up with an appropriate SEO budget is to go ahead and run an SEO campaign with whatever budget you’ve got, however small it is.
From there, you can gauge the amount of traffic you’re getting through the campaign. The next thing you want to do is figure out the value you’re getting from the campaign. What returns are you getting from the SEO investment you made?
Now, depending on the goals you have or what you wish to achieve, that should give you a rough idea of how much to invest in your SEO marketing campaigns.
In Singapore, the amount an SEO company charges depends on the tier category of the company. There are three tiers of SEO companies which organize campaigns and achieve site optimisation through different techniques.
Tier 1 Companies
Tier 1 companies use intricate file organization to achieve optimisation. They usually charge between $900 to $5,000 every month for worldwide campaigns or $600 to $1,000 monthly for local campaigns. For basic search engine optimisation, they can charge between $1,200 and $4,000 per one-time project. File organization is applied in optimisation by employing lateral linking (the process of linking from one mini folder from another) or simply linking through the actual navigation to a group of tier 2 pages which represents the client’s content silo.
They usually ensure that there is one tier 1 landing page for every 3 pages created (flat style architecture). Large websites almost never use three tiers. Instead, they settle on tier 2 and tier 1 keyword-stuffed landing pages. However, one advantage that comes with services from tier 3 companies is the fact that they can build a huge number of pages in the root
Tier 2 Companies
They complete optimisation in such a way that a range of pages acts as a single springboard for many other pages located on the site. The type of theme, conversion items or services determines which themed/alternative links appear in the set navigation schema for all the involved pages or which links in the context prevail as preferred outbound links in the body text. As a result, you can assess the link structure from footer links, contextual links, navigation blocks or alt attributes and linked images within each page. The designing company decides on which type of links to use (to the page or from any page on the website). To know the appropriateness of each link, they assess the amount of content present in the website, competing sites or other factors which challenge your efforts to climb to top ten results for the wanted keywords. Organizing Tier 2 pages is a little more sophisticated compared to Tier 1 pages and that’s why Tier 2 companies charges fees that are a little higher compared to that in Tier 1 companies.
Tier 2 companies charges between $200 and $500 for basic search engine optimisation.
Tier 3 companies
Companies in this group often concentrate in creating tier 3 pages which act like solitary pages that equally function as their own mini-site. Tier 3 pages can be supported externally from any page possessing a higher ranking factor (such as group or contextual links and inbound links from unrelated pages). However, the rankings and buoyancy of tier 3 pages are made to depend on the three factors:
- The competitiveness of the keyword variations
- Amount of content present on the page to reinforce its relevance
- The amount of authority acquired from off page or on page optimisation
Tier 3 companies charge a monthly fee of $250 per keyword but can go all the way up to $280.
Why you should consider hiring Tier 1 companies instead of Tier 2 and Tier 3 companies
Tier 2 and Tier 3 companies are not the best options for you. There are various reasons why you should consider hiring the service of Tier 1 Company instead. For instance, Tier 2 and Tier 3 companies tend to employ software which automates some of the optimisation processes. In most cases, however, such companies use the black-hat technique in site optimisation.
The black-hat technique involves identifying and exploiting weaknesses in the algorithm of a search engine to improve the overall ranking of the website on the search results. The technique works tremendously well and fast.
However, it is important to know that black hat techniques are contrary to Google’s strict code of guidelines that oversee the SEO practices relating to its search results. If a website is discovered to have achieved rankings through such practice, Google tends to sanction it thus leading to a cascade of operational problems.
Another reason why you should avoid hiring the services of lower-tier companies is their tendency to do a shoddy job. Please, imagine having your valued business website getting flagged by Google for flaunting ranking regulations. Think of cost incurred in missed deals and other related setbacks. Even after correcting the issues, you may have your reputation badly damaged already, a think you don’t want to happen.
Your website is more likely to malfunction if you procure the services of Tier 2 and Tier 3 SEO companies. Tons of clients have come to us (MediaOne) complaining of dysfunctional back-links, website operation problems due to black-hat optimisation among other mess left behind by Tier 2 and Tier 3 SEO companies. We have fixed it all and brought their websites to life again. Our practice is clean and reliable so don’t expect any inconveniences.
In a nutshell, we recommend hiring the services of experienced and reliable Tier 1 SEO companies. Talk to a consultant or any relevant expert and get advised on which Tier 1 firm to hire. You will be shocked at the great amount of money you will save.
Factors Affecting SEO Services Pricing in Singapore
As outlined above, different companies have various pricing points. However, you need to look into different companies and get the best one affordable Singapore SEO service pricing. Here are the factors that will affect the cost of SEO in Singapore:
Services and Benefits
Singapore SEO service pricing largely depends on the services offered by the company or agency. The top SEO companies offer inbound marketing techniques that include content creation, improving organic presence, content distribution, visual content, video tutorials, and more.
However, not all companies offer these services and it is up to you to decide on the best Singapore SEO service packages depending on your budget. Preferably, you ought to start with the basic services such as on-page optimisation, link building, and content creation, to name a few. You can then move to more complex services if your marketing budget allows.
The Company’s Experience
It is obvious that experienced companies in Singapore charge more than inexperienced or start-up companies. Besides, they have better Singapore SEO service packages. The bottom line is that you will virtually find hundreds of companies purporting to be experts in SEO, to the point of providing instant search results ranking.
They might be more expensive, but you will get better results compared to the inexperienced companies. A proper SEO company will first do a free site audit, suggest the changes and improvements needed, and then issue a quote on their cost of SEO in Singapore. They will then suggest several services that will help you improve the reputation and SERP ranking of your website.
Time to Results
Ideally, it takes between six months and a year for a website to rank on the first page on Google. However, it might take longer if you do not have an authority website. However, an SEO company in Singapore will carry out several services that will help you get better rankings over time.
However, some companies will promise results in half the time. As good as that might sound, they could be dealing with black-hat SEO. While these practices might get you ranked higher, they will get your website penalised or blacklisted.
Guaranteed Results
Unfortunately, there is nothing like ‘guaranteed rankings’ in SEO, and any company suggesting so is lying. This is irrespective of the quality of their Singapore SEO service packages. Instead of falling for false promises, look for the agency that has a realistic approach.
Ideally, any SEO agency or expert in Singapore will strive to rank 20-30% of your top website keywords on the first page within 6 months.
Custom SEO Pricing
Some companies will offer you custom Singapore SEO service pricing plans based on your desired results. With that said, SERP rankings are all about increasing visibility and ultimately, increase sales and revenue for your online store.
You could negotiate a plan with an SEO agency where you will only pay for the services when your keywords start ranking on the first page. You could also agree to pay for the services when you start seeing an increase in the number of leads and sales.
Unfortunately, you will have to do much research since not all companies have this option. Some are very expensive and they will lock a customer in a contract for several years. However, you could suggest the services you want and agree on a price. This could include keyword research, on- and off-page SEO, website design, and more.
Why is SEO Charged Monthly?
Most of the agencies you will find have monthly pricing plans for their Singapore SEO service packages. SEO is an on-going process and if your competitors start doing better than you, then you will be pushed down and off the first page.
Moreover, Google keeps on making changes to its search engine algorithms. This brings about the need to prioritise a variety of factors to rank as well as negating the effect of others.
The main reason is that the SEO agency or expert will charge monthly because they have constant pressure to strengthen page authority. However, you can always negotiate with the agency or expert on the best pricing model for the SEO services in Singapore.
Alternative SEO Services Pricing in Singapore
SEO in Singapore can run very high and this has made it virtually impossible for SMEs and start-ups to take up professional SEO services. These are the alternative SEO pricing models you can discuss with an agency or expert:
Pay by Commission
This is a payment plan that SEO agencies use when they determine that the pay out from the results will be high. Typically, they charge a percentage of the generated revenue from the entire SEO and digital marketing campaigns.
Most brands will quickly jump on this option, but there is a disadvantage associated with it. For example, it can be really difficult to determine the attribution of every sale made. You might also get locked in a contract spanning two years or more.
For this reason, agree to the pay by commission model only if you are certain that the agency will be committed to the success of your SEO strategy and campaign.
Pay When You Rank
This is a common Singapore SEO service pricing model that SEO agencies and experts use to lower the risks on their client’s end, especially of the SEO activities that do not work as expected. In this model, you will not pay if the website fails to rank at all.
It is also known as a performance-based and it can be costlier to the traditional SEO pricing models. You should only use this model if it is certain that the revenue can offset the cost when you rank for your desired keywords.
You should audit the authenticity of the ranking reports and traffic to your website brought about by the keywords. Typically, the pay-out will be significantly higher for each keyword that you are ranking for in a certain period and the following months and years.
Additional Information About Cost of SEO in Singapore
The cost of SEO in Singapore is like a puzzle box. You can never be sure of what to expect. You hire a professional SEO agency, and they charge you $400 a month; you hop to the next SEO agency, and you’re slammed with an exorbitant price of $4, 000 a month. It’s that confusing.
Again, two companies approaching an agency for SEO services can get two different quotes. And that’s because no two companies have the same SEO needs. What you’re charged can vary depending on the specific SEO needs of the company.
It’s simple logic: where there’s much to be done to improve your SEO score and propel your site a notch higher in the SERPs, the agency will be compelled to raise their charges to accommodate all the extra work.
The truth is, some sites are weaker and therefore need more work than others. Some keywords are also more competitive, which makes them harder to rank than others.
Meaning, the amount of SEO work required will always vary depending on the strength of your site and the competitive nature of the keywords you’re planning to rank on. If the site is relatively new, you may have to exercise a lot of patience and raise your SEO investment. Otherwise, you can forget about the whole idea, and any company that promises to sort you out in a relatively short period and at a low cost might as well be trying to sell you snake oil.
In its place, a good agency may recommend paid search as you gradually work towards raising your SEO score.
Remember, SEO is a long-term marketing strategy. It takes time for results to show. This is not to burst your bubble, but there are situations whereby SEO might not be the silver bullet to achieving your goals.
A more sagacious approach would be to go slow on SEO in favour of something that generates immediate results as you formulate a long-term SEO strategy.
The Cost-Benefit Analysis of SEO in Singapore
After talking about the cost of running an SEO campaign, the next most logical thing to do would be to zone into the benefits. Normally, clients will want to know what they gained from their little investment.
There’s no denying that SEO is a powerful weapon in a marketer’s arsenal. If worked right, it can be a distinguishing factor or what sets you miles ahead of your competition.
As a matter of fact, about 60 percent of marketers in Singapore consider SEO the top priority in inbound marketing, according to a recent HubSpot survey.
When you hire an SEO expert, you expect them to work on on-page optimisation, link-building, and an enchilada of other techie stuff.
That’s what they do on their end, and it’s not your job to dig for details of what it is that they did unless you want to. What you’re more interested in your end are the results that follow.
This work did cost you money. So, it behooves you to know if it was a worthwhile spend or if it was just another random act of clueless business people running their hard-earned cash down the drain.
Things get even trickier when you consider the fact that SEO results don’t show up immediately. You have to wait for 3 to 6 months for the effort to start paying off.
So how do you know that your money has served its purpose? What do you use to gauge results and measure progress?
The Usual Disclaimer – Rankings are not Guaranteed?
One way to look at SEO is that you’re in competition with other business people for more online visibility. You’re competing for a top slot in the SERPs. So, unless your competitors aren’t doing anything on their end to claim the spot, you can’t be sure of anything.
Also, the chances are that your competitors have also hired an SEO agency. This makes it a war of agencies, which agency is more skilled or competent enough to claim the spot.
However, you have to note that there’s a difference between guaranteeing and offering a guarantee. Guaranteeing leaves no room for other possibilities, while offering a guarantee sets the record straight. It lets you know what you’re up against so you can develop realistic expectations.
Any agency that’s confident about their SEO services will not guarantee you anything; instead, they’ll be offering a guarantee. They’ll not guarantee you the first position in the SERPs, but they’ll promise to improve your SEO score, which is all that matters in this.
Google speaks the same language. They have insisted so many times that no one can guarantee a top ranking (link: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35291?hl=en). Any agency that tries to convince you otherwise is obviously a scam and should be avoided like the plague they are.
So how exactly do you Measure SEO work?
This is where things get a little too complex. Assuming an agency manages to rank your site for a particular keyword in less than one month. Does that mean they deserve a pat on the shoulder for doing a great job?
Certainly not.
And that’s because your position in the SERPs is only part of the results and not the main KPI as some people would love to assume.
There’s also a fair chance that the company might be using Blackhat SEO tactics. These tactics may earn you a top ranking, at least for a shorter duration of time, until Google slaps you hard on the face with a penalty that will see to it that all your effort goes down the crapper.
If the company is using Blackhat SEO, then they’re doing your business a huge disservice and should, therefore, be fired with immediate effect (or even sued, where possible).
By Blackhat SEO, what we mean is that the agency is linking your site to a buttload of dubious sites. Search engines may pick on it and reward you with a higher score. But what such agencies are doing is gaming or manipulating Google’s system.
But it’s not like search engines are that dumb, they’re bound to catch up on the blatant ploy soon or later and blacklist your site. The sad fact is that you may never live to recover from this penalty.
The other truth is that SEO is not cheap. There’s nothing cheap about the tools involved, hiring a qualified copywriter, spying on your competitors, and analysing everything. It only gets cheaper when you take the shortcut, which may make things cheaper until they expose you to a risk that will be haunting you for the rest of your life.
Trust me; this is one situation you don’t want to find yourself in. If SEO sounds a little bit too expensive for you, don’t settle for a cheaper alternative. As a matter of fact, you’re better off teaching yourself about SEO basics and taking charge of your own campaigns.
There’s nothing Hepburn about recovering from an SEO penalty. First, you need to disavow all those dubious links you were served and hope that Google will be able to pick on it and consider reinstating your website.
Of course, they’ll do. But you can’t be sure about how long it’s going to take. For what we know, the Google algorithm is one large giant black box that no one knows what’s inside.
As we said, the results you get out of your SEO work also depends on how weak or strong your website is. The three or six months may elapse without the rankings materialising. That’s no enough reason for you to castigate the agency or fire them altogether. Neither does it mean the agency is a fraud or incompetent.
In the link we shared, Google itself makes it clear that no one can guarantee a rank, even Google itself. Everything you do in the line of SEO is to position your site on the good side of Google’s algorithm. If your job is legitimately good, then rest assured your SEO position would have improved a great deal.
How do you Evaluate SEO
The best way to evaluate any assigned SEO work is by looking at the job done, or the SEO work itself.
SEO comes in three distinct layers. That means you have to take your time to evaluate each of these layers and how much has been done to improve each one of them. You don’t have to be a computer geek to pull this off.
Here’s how you can get it done using some tools:
For Technical SEO: If you already have a website, the first thing the SEO consultant you hire will do is evaluate it for SEO strength. Where the site falls short in a few things, the SEO consultant may have to involve the services of a web developer.
Among the things they’ll be addressing is how search engines view the site, as well as its speed and whether or not the site is mobile friendly.
To find out if anything has been done to boost your site speed or make it mobile-friendly, you might want to test it out using these two tools: site speed and mobile-friendliness.
On-Page SEO: To find out if your site has been optimised well enough for search engines or if it has a good site architecture, you can run it through SEO Analyser before and after the work and find out if there’s any improvement. By doing that, you should be able to find out if your site is doing any better.
Another trick would be to have at least one page that’s been specifically optimised for each of your primary keywords.
Off-Page SEO: Technical SEO and On-page SEO lay the foundation. But this is the layer that finally makes all the difference. This is the layer that generates results or determines your position in the SERPs.
As you read this, remember that none of the efforts that you apply to this layer will generate results if the foundation is not set right. Meaning, before you rush into conclusion or decide to fire your agency, take your time to understand what they’ve been doing first.
Not to justify their failure to generate results; because then again, good SEO is all about planning. But understanding some of these things can help you set your expectations right and know where to direct your frustration should you feel like things aren’t working right.
To assess your site quantitively for off-page SEO and domain name authority, consider running it through this fee tool, Moz link explorer.
Besides checking your domain authority, the tool will also be assigning you a score. But even with this, nothing beats checking your backlinks manually to find out more about where they’re coming from.
White Hat SEO vs. Black Hat SEO
The approach used to improve your ranking in the search engine results pages can be broadly classified into white or black.
The difference is usually determined by the off-page SEO activities conducted. Agencies that specialise in blackhat SEO do almost nothing to improve your site’s on-page SEO and technical SEO. They prefer taking a more cosmetic approach by using spam bots to deal out your site links to any open site out there.
To find out if the agency you hired has been using blackhat SEO tactics, find out more about the backlinks and where they’re coming from.
In general, where an agency offers to generate backlinks to a count of a hundred or a thousand, no need to ask more– they’re definitely employing blackhat SEO tactics.
Blackhat SEO involves generating low-quality backlinks from forums, other site’s comment section, fiverr sellers, and dormant blogs.
So instead of being concerned about the number of backlinks you’ll be getting from your deal, you should be more focused on the quality of sites linking to your site.
Whitehat SEO steers clear of shortcuts. It’s like losing weight. In which case, you have the option of taking slimming pills and waiting for results to show up the next day or hitting the gym and observing your diet.
On the off chance that the pills work, you’ll shed tremendous amounts of blubber, but the results will be fleeting at best and harmful at worst.
It’s the same case with SEO. Shortcuts are only meant to fool clients into believing they have conquered. But in reality, they’re only setting themselves on the wrong side of search engines and laying the ground for something catastrophic.
Your only safe bet in this is employing white to grey hat SEO tactics, which basically involves editorial backlinks, PR mentions, infographics, guest posting, and resourceful page links.
The other thing that sets white hat SEO experts apart from their blackhat counterpart is the relevancy of those links. Everything they link back to your site has to be related to your line of business. From the website itself, the anchor text, and the link domain, everything has to feel natural and connected and quality enough to convince search engines’ algorithms to raise your rank.
What to Consider
Google and other search engines such as Bing and Yahoo will give precedence to companies that offer relevant, valuable and high-quality content. If you can churn out interesting and valuable content, then you can carry out your PR outreach and rank organically without the help of off-site SEO services.
This will call for you to take into consideration the concept of customer lifetime value. The take away points from all this include:
- Do not compromise your SERP ranking by opting for the cheapest SEO option you can find. However, expensive SEO services do not always result in good results
- Always choose value over price
- Learn the basics of SEO to ask the relevant questions when interviewing potential SEO agencies for your campaigns
- Get quotes from multiple agencies
- Ask for referrals from brands in your industry
The cost of SEO in Singapore is varied and with the factors outlined above, you will be able to choose the best company that will offer you value for your budget. However, you must carry out proper research to find the agency or expert with the best pricing model that fits your budget.
Contact us for professional SEO services in Singapore. Our support team is on hand to provide you with a free and non-obligatory quote.
How much does SEO cost in Singapore?
The cost varies from company to company. Some companies will offer you custom Singapore SEO service pricing plans based on your desired results. These are the alternative SEO pricing models you can discuss with an agency or expert:
– Pay by commission
– Pay when you rank
How much should I pay for SEO?
There’s no direct answer to this question, other than the obvious one, ‘it depends.’ For a start, your allocation for SEO will always vary depending on the goals and objectives that you have. Here’s the trick: the easiest way to come up with an appropriate SEO budget is to go ahead and run an SEO campaign with whatever budget you’ve got, however small it is. Now, depending on the goals you have or what you wish to achieve, that should give you a rough idea of how much to invest in your SEO marketing campaigns.
How much does basic SEO cost?
Tier 1 companies usually charge between $1,200 and $4,000 per one-time project. Tier 2 companies charge between $200 and $500. Tier 3 companies charge a monthly fee of $250 per keyword but can go all the way up to $280.