As little as just a few years ago, SEO referred to the service of making sure your website code was up to standard and that all of the necessary page elements were in place so your website could effectively communicate with the search engines. Back then, a Search Engine Optimisation consultant optimised your site and submitted it to the search engines and you were off to the races. Today, however, SEO firms are now full blown marketing agencies covering everything from the on page coding to advanced keyword research, social media marketing, article marketing and link popularity.

Search engines have become so complex and the algorithms, formulas search engines use for determining search placement results, are kept in such secrecy,  that it has become more of a challenge to successfully promote a website. This has forced the SEO expert to become an authority on reaching markets through any available means. You no longer can get away with just optimising your on page code and expect the same results you got a few years ago. Today, you need to have a complete plan in place to cover all of your bases in order to put your small business site on the map.

Can a small business do it on their own? Of course they can, but in order to do that you must be prepared to log a lot of hours learning and then implementing what you have learned. You will need to learn some technical skills and you will need to purchase software. You may be able to become passable at SEO on your own, but at some point you will need to decide if spending all of that time becoming an SEO expert is as important to you as running your own business.

There is an old saying “Jack of all trades and master of none”. You are very good at what you do and you enjoy doing it. Why then would you want to dilute your business value by trying to do everything yourself?

The new SEO role of being a full marketing service now demands that every expert be proficient in:

Keyword research. You must know the numbers and know, without doubt, that certain keyword phrases will generate enough organic search engine traffic to make your business profitable.
Search marketing. Your business will depend on being as up-to-date as possible on all of the big search engine news. When a search engine makes even a small change in their algorithms it can have an impact on your business. An SEO expert is always in the know.
Social media marketing. Sometimes it seems like you must be everywhere at one time in the social media world to make the biggest impact. To effectively market a business. Your presence must be seen in all of the major social communities and networks on the web.
Link popularity. Although it isn’t possible to fully know how a search engine works, because they aren’t telling, one thing we do know for certain is that link popularity matters. A good marketing strategy will have a significant amount of link building in the plan.

No longer is an SEO service just about coding. As you can see, there is much, much more involved today and the Search Engine Optimisation team is indeed a full on internet marketing service.