Why is SEO a long and costly process?
Through our SEO Agency Optimize 360
on the theme : Price of an SEO service
Le Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) has become one of the key levers for success in the world of digital marketing. It allows you to optimise the visibility of a website and improve its position on search engines such as Google.
However, achieving satisfactory SEO results generally takes time and requires a substantial financial investment. In this article, we'll look at why SEO is a long and costly process.
The time it takes to develop an effective SEO strategy
First and foremost, it is important to understand that SEO does not produce instant results. It's a long-term investment that requires sustained effort and strategic thinking. Several factors come into play in the duration of an SEO campaign:
- Market research and competitive analysis It's essential to take a close look at your business sector, identify the major players and study their SEO practices. This stage can take several weeks.
- Technical and semantic audit of the website : To draw up an action plan tailored to your company, you need to measure the current state of its SEO performance. This concerns both the technical aspects (loading speedmobile adaptability, etc.) as well as the targeted content and keywords.
- Strategic planning Once the site's strengths and weaknesses have been identified, it's time to draw up a list of objectives for the next few months and the resources needed to achieve them. This stage often involves several people working together (web copywriter, developer, graphic designer, etc.).
It all requires a considerable investment of time in order to develop a coherent and appropriate SEO strategy to the context of your business.
Tasks that make SEO expensive
In addition to the skills required to develop an effective SEO strategy, a number of other factors contribute to its complexity and high cost:
- Drafting of optimised content The introduction of a blog or enriching existing content to improve its relevance are essential elements in boosting natural referencing. This requires time and expertise in web copywritingand therefore represents an additional cost.
- Technical optimisation of the website : Making a website compatible with the quality criteria of search engines can require considerable modifications and highly specialised technical work, both in terms of design and technical development. maintenance.
- Netlinking and partnerships The backlinksin other words external links pointing to your site, are a key factor in increasing awareness of your site. However, this strategy requires you to forge partnerships with other web players and allocate resources to managing these relationships.
These different tasks therefore require specific skills and a significant budget allocation. If you are not in a position to carry them out in-house, using a specialist SEO agency or independent service providers can be a suitable, but potentially expensive, solution.
The constant evolution of search engine algorithms
The need to adapt to Google updates
To complicate matters further, it is essential to understand that SEO is a constantly evolving field. Google, which has more than 90% of the world's search engine market share, regularly updates its algorithm to improve search engine ranking.user experience and to thwart fraudulent practices (spam, abusive referencing, etc.).
So, to stay competitive and meet Google's new requirements, a company must not only invest time and money in optimising its website, but also keep a close eye on new SEO developments and adapt its strategy accordingly. Quite often, this means reviewing certain parts of the site and making corrections to content, or even rethinking the SEO strategy as a whole.
The importance of measuring SEO effectiveness
Finally, it is crucial to regularly monitor key performance indicators (KPIs) in order to assess the effectiveness of your SEO strategy and adjust your actions if necessary. These KPIs include :
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- Organic traffic: the number of visitors coming from search engines
- The rate of conversion The proportion of visitors who carry out a desired action on your site (online purchase, request for a quote, sign up for a newsletter, etc.).
- Keyword positioning: your website's position in search results for the terms you are targeting
This constant vigilance and performance monitoring are additional factors that make SEO costly in terms of time and money.
In short, although essential to your company's visibility and success on the web, SEO is a complex lever that requires time and a substantial financial investment.
To develop an effective strategy, it is essential to think carefully about your situation, taking into account the constant changes in the industry and the expectations of search engines.
