SEO teams often consist of a mix of professionals from various backgrounds. Some members are technical experts who focus on coding and web development, while other team members are marketing specialists who handle social media campaigns. This diversity makes SEO teams unique and can contribute a great deal towards the success of an SEO team.
However, some companies struggle to implement effective strategies across multiple channels. For example, they might lack the expertise needed to create high quality content or develop a strong brand identity.
Smaller SEO teams are less likely to have access to resources such as graphic designers, copywriters, and marketers. As a result, these teams tend to rely on their existing staff to perform tasks that require specialized skills.
Are you on a smaller SEO team who might be struggling with SEO and need guidance for outside assistance? This post is for you.
You Have Less Money to Put Towards Your SEO Projects
This is the #1 reason why SEO is harder for smaller businesses. Smaller businesses often don’t have the resources to dedicate to digital marketing like larger corporations do. They are forced to spread their budget thin across multiple channels, including paid ads, display ads, social media posts, etc.
But while many marketers believe that spending more on marketing equals better results, it doesn’t always work out that way. In fact, it’s the opposite. When budgets go up, conversions tend to decrease.
The reason is simple: More money spent doesn’t mean more sales. Instead, it could mean more wasted money.
If you’re looking to increase your conversion rates, you must start investing more into your SEO strategy. Being more creative and strategic, when access to funds is nonexistent, is key.
You May Have Less Time to Put Towards Your SEO Projects
If you work for a smaller business, chances are you have less time. If you have less money, then you also probably have less time.
On a smaller team, this means everyone is juggling more than one task and there’s no way that any of them can devote 100 percent of their time to critical SEO tasks.
There are some businesses out there who have 1 or 2 people doing everything, which makes SEO significantly harder.
And this is the case because real SEO takes a lot of time. Creating quality content, making sure your pages are optimized, promoting critical assets, and getting the required links, etc. – none of these are exactly easy tasks.
And when it comes to a head, small businesses might end up neglecting a few things, and they do a rush job. This could mean lower rankings for your site.
It Can be More Difficult to Keep Up With SEO Changes
The biggest challenge facing small businesses today is finding enough time to keep up with the ever-changing world of digital marketing. This is especially true for those running local businesses, where the competition is fierce and there are many different channels to market on.
As a result, many small businesses rely on one person to handle everything related to online marketing. While it might seem like a good idea in theory, this approach does not always work out well in practice.
While some people have the luxury of being able to dedicate themselves full-time to their online marketing efforts, most of us don’t have that luxury. We’re either working long hours already, or we simply don’t want to take away time from our day jobs.
That’s why having someone else manage your online presence makes sense. But how much time should you devote to managing your online presence? How much time should you spend reading blogs and keeping up with industry news? How much time should go into developing and implementing strategies?
The answer depends on your situation. Some companies have no choice but to delegate responsibility to others, while others can afford to put in extra effort without jeopardizing their bottom line. Either way, though, it’s important to understand just how much time you should allocate to each aspect of online marketing.
Larger Companies Have Been At the Game Longer
Big businesses aren’t born that way – they start out small and grow. There are plenty of examples of successful startups that have grown into multi-billion dollar enterprises over the course of several decades.
But if you’ve been operating as an independent contractor, doing well but staying independent for many years, it’s tough to compete against larger competitors. You’re probably used to working alone, and that makes it hard to build up a network of relationships with people who might help you succeed.
If you’ve been operating as part of a smaller team, it’s even harder to keep growing. Your work gets done, but no one else does it quite like you do.
And finally, if you’ve only recently launched your online presence, it’s much harder to establish yourself in the eyes of Google as a credible source of information.
So while bigger sites have more resources, experience, and influence, that doesn’t mean they’re better off. In fact, it’s just the opposite.
You May Have Access to a Lower Budget and Fewer Tools
Enterprises can afford to invest in really good software. These tools are designed to make the lives of marketers easier. There are even tools that allow you to focus on what matters most — creating amazing content.
The in-house SEO at large companies has access to tools that automate much of the tedious stuff involved with optimizing sites for search engines. He doesn’t have to worry about things like building out a site map, writing meta descriptions, or doing link outreach anymore. All he needs to do is write awesome content and optimize his keywords.
Small businesses often don’t have the resources to hire someone with expertise in SEO. In fact, there are plenty of people who specialize in SEO who charge $100 per hour or more. So, small businesses often turn to smaller, less expensive (or free) companies or specialists who may not have the requisite expertise.
Free isn’t always best, though. If you’re just starting off, you might not have enough data to justify investing in something expensive. And, even if you do have the money, you might not want to pay for a tool that won’t give you a return on investment.
More manual work also takes longer. When you’re working manually, you’ll waste time trying to figure out how to rank well. Or, worse, you’ll end up spending hours every week figuring out how to improve rankings without making progress.
You May Have Less Clout as a Professional for Link Building and Media Coverage
When it comes to getting links and media coverage, bigger companies usually have a leg up over small ones. They have established reputations and large audiences that make them easier to pitch to media outlets and bloggers. Smaller businesses often don’t have those things. And while larger brands can afford to pay for links, smaller businesses aren’t always able to do so.
But there are ways to work around this problem. For example, many publications take submissions via email. So, if you want to submit something to one of these publications, just send them a short note about what you do and why people might care. Most publications won’t mind sharing their submission inboxes with others.
And while big names in the industry have lots of clout, smaller companies still benefit from being associated with them. Here’s how:
1. Reputation matters. When someone searches for “small business marketing tips,” they’ll see a list of blogs and articles written by experts in the field. Those posts are generally written by well-known marketers, editors, and journalists who are recognized for writing quality material. People trust them because they know they’ve read similar content before.
2. Brands matter. Even though most people wouldn’t think of a big brand like Coca Cola as a source of information, they probably trust it more than an unknown blogger. Why? Because they’ve seen Coke ads, heard stories about Coke products, and maybe even tried Coke themselves.
3. Media Matters Matter. A lot of people assume that big brands have access to all sorts of media. But that isn’t true. Many big brands don’t have relationships with every outlet, and they certainly don’t have relationships with all of the outlets that cover their specific industry. But they do have relationships with the media outlets that cover their industries. These relationships allow them to get their messages across quickly and easily.
4. Reach matters. Some people believe that big brands have greater reach than smaller businesses. In reality, however, there are plenty of small businesses that have huge followings simply because they post frequently and write compellingly.
SEO Alone is Usually Not Realistic
Many SEO practitioners still believe that SEO is a stand-alone strategy that doesn’t require the help of other disciplines such as social media or paid advertising.
While it’s true that some very talented SEOs are able to do everything themselves, most companies need a full team of people working together to achieve success.
Some SEOs believe that SEO alone can generate leads. And while there’s nothing wrong with being good at one thing, most experts agree that you need to know how to work across multiple channels to build a strong foundation for your online presence.
The Wrong Team Could Mean Complications
If you’re looking for a way to improve your company’s digital marketing efforts, then hiring the right team can make all the difference. You may be tempted to hire a single person to handle all aspects of your digital marketing campaigns. However, doing so will only lead to frustration and wasted time.
Instead, look for a team of professionals who understand each other’s strengths and weaknesses. This will ensure that everyone is pulling his or her weight, and that the entire team is focused on achieving the same goals.
Other Priorities May Always Come First Before SEO
When you’re short on resources, and SEO-related tasks always seem to get pushed to the very bottom of the list, it doesn’t take long before you start feeling burned out and frustrated. You’ve been promising yourself that you’re going to write that blog post…but somehow, something else always seems to come first. And by the time you finally find some free time, there’s already another task waiting for you.
The good news is that you don’t need to wait until everything else is done before starting to work on your SEO strategy. In fact, you shouldn’t even try to tackle this stuff until you’ve completed everything else. If you wait to do SEO while you’re busy writing articles, building sites, creating videos, etc., you’ll never actually finish anything. Instead, focus on one thing at a time. Once you’ve finished that project, move onto the next one.
You Can’t Accurately Attribute Revenue to Your SEO Efforts
One of the biggest challenges facing any business owner is accurately attributing revenue to different areas of the business. For example, let’s say you sell widgets.
How much money did you earn last year? Did you earn more money selling widgets than you did selling clothing? It’s impossible to tell without the right attribution model in place.
SEO is similar. There are dozens of factors that go into determining how much traffic you receive from search engines. Some of these include:
- Quality of content (e.g., does your website offer useful information?)
- Number of backlinks pointing to your site (more links, more exposure)
- Domain authority (how well known is your domain name?)
- Page rank (higher page ranks higher rankings)
- Competition (do other websites link to your site?)
It’s important to remember that not every factor listed above has equal importance. For example, quality of content is far more important than number of backlinks.
However, when it comes to attribution, we often see companies attribute 100% of their revenue to SEO. While this might seem like a logical assumption, it’s simply not true.
For example, if you run a small ecommerce store with just 10 products, you could potentially, eventually, earn $10,000 per month. But if you were to spend $5,000 on advertising, you’d probably only bring in about $2,500 per month. So why would anyone think that spending $5,000 on SEO would result in bringing in $10,000 per year?
Also, if you don’t vet the professional before hiring, there could be further issues down the line as well.
In reality, most businesses don’t generate anywhere near as much revenue as they claim. The reason is simple: many businesses use inaccurate metrics to measure success.
They count sales instead of conversions. They count visitors instead of customers. They count clicks instead of leads.
So, what should you do? Well, you need to figure out which metric best represents your business. Then, you need to track that metric over time. Only after you’ve tracked this data for several months will you be able to make accurate conclusions about whether or not your SEO efforts are working.
Coming Up With Topics and Content Ideas Can Be a Challenge
If you have limited resources, coming up with new topics and content ideas can be a challenge. You may find yourself stuck trying to come up with ideas for blog posts without having enough time to write them all down.
Fortunately, there are some ways to get around this problem. First, you can look through your own company’s history to find inspiration. This can help you avoid repeating old mistakes.
Second, you can ask your employees for suggestions. Many people are willing to share their knowledge with others.
Third, you can turn to social media. Most platforms allow users to post questions and answers. These types of posts are perfect for generating new ideas.
Finally, you can take advantage of free tools such as Google Trends. These tools show you how frequently certain keywords are searched for. By looking at trends, you can quickly identify popular topics and then create content based on those topics.
There are plenty of reasons why SEO isn’t easy. However, by following the tips outlined above, you can increase your chances of succeeding when you’re the only one coming up with topics and content.
Resources Can Potentially Be Limited
When you’re the only person responsible for an entire website, you’ll likely have to rely on outside sources for information. Unfortunately, these sources can sometimes be unreliable.
For example, you may want to know how long it takes to build links from different sites. If you go directly to Google, you won’t always receive reliable results. In fact, you may even end up seeing fake results.
This is where third-party services can prove useful. Some services offer reports that include detailed statistics about how long it takes to acquire links from various sites.
You can also use these services to check the validity of your competitors’ backlink profiles. It’s important to note that these services aren’t always completely honest. However, they can provide valuable insight into how other websites are acquiring links.
You can also use these services if you’re looking for more specific information. For example, you might want to know how many pages each site has. Or maybe you’d like to see how many times a particular keyword appears in a page title.
These services can potentially be very helpful. Just remember that they may not always give you 100% accurate results. So, you’ll still need to verify any information you receive.
SEO isn’t easy. That said, it’s certainly possible to succeed. All you need is a little bit of patience and determination.
SEO Infrastructure Can Be a Challenge
Having the right infrastructure in place can make or break your search engine optimization efforts. After all, you don’t want to spend hours building out a website only to realize that it doesn’t work properly.
Luckily, most web hosts will provide you with basic features. They should include things like FTP access, email accounts, and databases.
However, for some web hosts, you shouldn’t expect everything to be included. For example, you may not be able to install WordPress or Joomla. And you might not be able to set up advanced features such as caching plugins.
Still, these limitations shouldn’t stop you from getting started. As long as you have the basics covered, you should be fine.
It’s also worth noting that you may need to pay extra for some of these features. Fortunately, most web hosting companies offer discounts for multiple years. You just need to shop around to find the best deal.
If you do decide to purchase additional features, you should consider using a managed service provider (MSP). An MSP provides you with support and maintenance. This means that you won’t have to worry about installing new software or updating outdated files.
It’s also worth mentioning that you may need to upgrade your account after a while. Most web hosts charge monthly fees for their services. So you could end up paying thousands of dollars over time.
Fortunately, there are ways to avoid this problem. Many web hosts offer annual plans. These plans typically cost less than $100 per year. Plus, you get free upgrades every year.
Of course, you may need to pay an initial fee when signing up for an annual plan. But, you can usually cancel at any time without penalty.
Despite the Challenges, Successful SEO is Still Possible (and Fun)
Despite the challenges of a small team, achieving SEO success is still quite possible and a realistic goal to achieve.
You just have to be mindful of your priorities and your tasks, along with making sure that you take care of the most important things that should be done in a successful SEO campaign.
So long as these priorities are successfully managed, you should experience success with your SEO campaigns.
When do you plan on launching your next one?
