Should You Hire a Link Building Company?

Although this might at first appear to be a straightforward 'yes or no' question, the answer is actually more complex than it seems. Hiring a search engine optimization (SEO) company is certainly something you should give serious consideration if you are planning to build and maintain an effective web presence - but to hire a company whose policies begin and end with link building would prove to be a serious error.
It is important to work with an SEO agency if you are developing your online presence. One of the main reasons for doing this is because spending money on search engine optimization will increase the return on investment you gain from all other areas of your web marketing strategy. By contrast, if you choose not to invest in search engine optimization, spending on other areas of online marketing will produce an inferior return.

However, an effective SEO campaign is comprised of much more than simply link building activities, although these often represent the most significant and consistent drain on an SEO agency's resources. The other elements are important because without their inclusion in an SEO strategy, link building will have less of an impact on the ranking of a web site.

Step one in the SEO process is usually for the agency to discuss with the web site owner what their hopes and expectations for the campaign are. Although this is partly to do with budgeting the work, it is also to do with identifying the specific key terms that the web site owner wants to target. It is generally accepted that a certain web site cannot rank well for all key terms (Wikipedia seems to be the most prevalent exception to this rule), so the web site owner must be both selective and realistic when consulting with the agency to determine what key terms can be most effectively targeted.

Before even thinking about link building, a competent SEO agency should perform an evaluation of the web site in question. Broadly speaking, there are two different types of process involved in SEO: on-page and off-page. Just as you would not build a house without foundations, so you should not begin off-page search engine optimization without first ensuring a good degree of on-page optimization. When everything on the web site itself is optimized for the search engines, that site will experience the greatest possible benefits from the accompanying off-page promotion.