On an average, I get around 3-4 request for SEO consulting job from this blog every month, and though I said “consulting”, some of them do not really require a SEO consultant and are primarily looking for someone who can just follow instructions blindly and carry out stuff like link exchange, directory submission etc and I politely decline those.

Now there are some other clients who actually require a senior level consultant who can create a proper holistic internet marketing strategy for their business and implement / help in implementation of the same. These are the projects that I really look forward to.

Typically with this type of clients and projects , we would have a few discussion/ email exchange to understand their business model and marketing requirements and when they are all happy and ready to start the fun begins as it comes down to pricing.

Because I am based out of India, some people would have an impression that I will work for peanuts and the most common phrase that I get to hear from them is, “there are so many other SEO experts in India who work at a much lower price” – Agreed ! but I offer much more than just that! What you get typically from those so called “SEO Experts” is what I call 90’s SEO – Keyword stuffing +link building( read: link exchange) for a few months without any effective strategy and noticeable result.
Some clients definitely understand the difference in the level of service, knowledge and experience but then there are others who fail to understand that if you pay peanuts you get monkeys.

Being in India, shouldn’t be a reason why someone would devalue my services. Of course, it does give me the opportunity to offer my services at a lower rate compared to my US or European counterparts and I do leverage that advantage by offering a much lower price compared to SEO consultants from those countries. My location doesn’t really affect the quality of service I provide and when you are looking for a premium service isn’t it natural to pay a few dollars more than usual? Though most SEO projects are priced based on a monthly fee in India, a little calculation would reveal the hourly rate to be at around $10-$12/hour. My rates are typically a dollar or two higher than this and I offer a lot more for that minimal premium.

Just to put in perspective, here are the SEO consultant rates for some of them who have been nice enough to put up some ball park figures on their website:

• Scott Hendison ( UK) : $2500 Set Up fee+ First Month, Monthly Price: $1000 or higher
• Simon Shandler ( US) : price varies by project complexity, $4000 retainer fee
• Shane Hunter (US): $1000-$2000/month
• Dream Ware Enterprise(US) : $350/hour for Telephonic consultation
• SozoFirm (US) : $150/hour Email, chat, & phone consultation
• Sheffield Marketing (Chicago, US): $150/month for telephonic SEO consultation
• iOptimal.co.uk –Cost: £6300. Delivery time: 7 months ( for moderately competitive keywords)

(The rates are taken from their respective website as on 12th January, 2011)

Now when you look at these prices, I am sure you can understand that if an equally experienced guy in India is asking you $250-300/month, he isn’t really asking the world from you.

I really don’t mean to offend anyone or come across as a snobbish high priced SEO consultant, most of my clients are small businesses and I do understand that each penny counts when it comes to small businesses. I am more than open to talk about prices, discuss and find mutually beneficial options, however, it really pains, when some potential client tells me “why can’t you work for $5/hour, after all you are in India” .

I hope this blog gives a fair idea to my readers and potential clients about the level of expertise and experience I have in this domain and while we are all looking for bargain prices, as a professional, I expect the rates to be respectable.
I would rather end this rant on a positive note. I have found some of my best clients through this blog and I take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks for all the business they have offered. Hopefully the New Year will bring in a lot more business for all of us.

The post What Rates do you Expect from a SEO Consultant in India ? appeared first on Adwords Consultant India : DigitalSRC.

Here are some SEO Myths that are most commonly found among clients as well as newbies..

a) SEO is a Sham – This is mostly prevalent among clients who have burnt their fingers once or twice with so called SEO companies. One of the key reasons for this is that these companies would often not tell you what exactly they are doing to SEO your website and would often explain the stuff they do with terms like “proprietory technique” etc and finally end up with no results. This myth has been substantially busted this days because more and more good seo companies are coming into the picture who would properly educate the client and provide absolute transparency. Also articles on SEO and search engine marketing published on leading magazines like Business Week, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, Forbes have contributed to establishing the credibility of SEO.

b)It is better to go with a SEO company that guarantees ranking – It has been said time and again by authority SEO websites and even by search engines like Google to avoid SEO companies and consultants that guarantees ranking. Here you can check what Google says.
These guarantees generally work based on one or more of the following ..

• These SEO companies would not care about a long term success but show you some short term boost in rankings and get the money out.
• In most cases they would give you a large collection of keywords and the payment terms would be based on getting ranking for atleast few of them ( 5 keywords out of 20 should have first page ranking etc ) and in most cases they would have really long tail un competitive keywords included to cover these “5 keywords”. You wont get any traffic but they get their money by fulfilling the condition.
• Some contracts require on going payment for continued ranking thereby reducing your marketing ROI. Whereas a good SEO campaign done for a proper period of time can go with minimum maintenance.
• Also, most of those SEO companies would have some fine prints in the guarantee which if you read in details you are sure to sense the bad ethics of these companies.

If you want to find a good SEO company or SEO consultant try to evaluate them by their experience, portfolio and get references for their previous clients rather than going by a guarantee. Here’s an article on how to choose a SEO consultant.

c) You should Submit URLs to Search Engines – Yes, there are SEO companies that charge their client mentioning that they would submit the client’s website URL to a few thousand websites every week.This is absolutely NOT required. The modern search engines can easily find and index your website by following the inoming links and there is no need to submit them to the search engines. Also, other than the few major search engines, the other engines that are there would hardly ever drive any traffic to your site so it doesn’t make any sense submitting to those engines either.

d) Flash is bad – No, Flash is not bad however lack of text and complete reliance on flash is bad. Also, Google has announced about its flash indexing capabilities recently which is definitely a good news.

e) Meta Keywords tag is Important – Again a complete myth. Google has depreciated the Meta keywords tags and Yahoo might be using it for non-compeitive misspellings and similar variation of keywords but definitely not for regular keywords. It would not harm to have a Meta keywords tag on your web page but it would not help you tobbost your search rankings on proper keywords.

The post 5 SEO Myths appeared first on Adwords Consultant India : DigitalSRC.

It often becomes difficult for business owners to identify proper qualified SEO consultants from the self proclaimed experts. If you are one of those people, looking for someone to help you with your Internet marketing strategy but not sure how to find the correct person these pointers might be of help.

a) Ask for Portfolio – Ask the SEO consultant to show some of the other sites that they have been successful with and the keywords for which they have achieved rankings.A successful and experienced SEO consultant would never have a problem providing you with a comprehensive portfolio. Check a few keywords from the portfolio to verify the rankings and also check the competitiveness of the keyword.

b)Ask for References – If you are not convinced by the results they show ask for references and try to speak to them.

c)Search Their Keywords – If the SEO consultant has a blog or website search for related keywords and see if it comes up. If they cannot do a good job at their own website how do you expect them to do good with yours ?

d)Ask for Process Details and Transparency – This is extremely important because a bad SEO can actually ruin your site. Ask the consultant if they would share with you their work process and how transparent would be their activities. A good SEO consultant would never have issues with sharing processes and stuff that he does on your website. If the consultant comes up with statements like “We have a proprietary method”, “we have a private process” or anything on these lines make sure you don’t waste another minute speaking to that guy.

e)Answerable – Ask your SEO consultant if he would be answerable to you for all the activities that he does on the website and about the improvements/deterioration that happens to the website. Any experienced SEO consultant should be fine with it.

f)Guarantee – When you discuss the previous point, the SEO expert might just offer you a guarantee or even if he doesn’t you can ask him for one. If your SEO consultant gives you a guarantee on search engine rankings better keep away from him. No SEO would give a guarantee on rankings. See what Google says.. Google on SEO

While the points above are cautionary points to avoid choosing a so called “SEO Expert” and putting your website and business in trouble, here are some points that you should remember and / or check while working with a good SEO consultant.

a) High Demand – Experienced SEO consultants are always in demand and can have their hands full when you approach them. Some of them might not accept your project due to this while some other might just ask you to wait for some time. If the waiting period is reasonable it is always wise to wait than to go an hunt in the dark to find another SEO.

b) Answers to Questions – While we have discussed about what all you should ask a SEO consultant, Freelance SEO consultants at times might be a bit reluctant to give out all information before the project is signed off. This happens because there are many time wasters in the market who bug these people to get useful information from them and run the campaign on their own. However , a SEO consultant would ideally never disagree from providing his credentials.

c)Only SEO or More – Check with the consultant if he is just a SEO consultant or is he also experienced in other avenues of Internet marketing.It is always betters to work with Internet marketing consultants who can help with SEO as well as other activities like PPC, Web analytics, lead generation etc. Usability is often a major issue with many website, check if your SEO consultant can help you with improving the usability of the website.

d)Payment – Experienced SEO consultants might be relatively costlier than the newbie “SEO Expert” who works for $8/hour but trust me its worth putting that extra money. Also, most experienced SEO consultants would not charge the complete payment upfront but they would definitely charge a certain amount as advanced payment and then lay out the remaining amount in periodic payment terms.

e) Working with SEO Consultants in India – Being an Indian it actually bleeds my heart to say that be a little extra cautious while working with an Indian SEO consultant. While there are some really good SEO and Internet marketing professionals in India, there are too many newbies and clueless people who are out in the market to take advantage of people who are trying to find a SEO consultant in India for cheap price. I would strongly advice, if you identify a SEO or Internet Marketin consultant in India whom you would like to work with, have a few email communication and then try calling him atleast once and speak to him – it will help you understand the consultants confidence and most necessarily his skills with the English language. Remember to be a good SEO it is important that you do fairly good with the language and also you will need to communicate with the person on regular basis. So if you find that your SEO consultant is not confident on the call or his mails are full of grammatical errors and spelling mistakes – save your money for some one better.

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