The recession is in full swing and budgets are tightening. Businesses are spending less because they have less to spend, and companies that provide services for businesses are feeling the strain. Fortunately, we live and work within a system so virtual that anything IT is still and will remain in demand. SEO is no exception.
However, SEO budgets are being tightened, too, which makes me ask the question: how should SEO adapt to the recession-pressed economy? Are there ways for a business to get more bang for their buck? What should SEO firms focus on? Below are a few ideas.
Free is Great
Fortunately for online marketing, there are just as effective free methods as there are priced methods. Not all advertising and marketing these days comes from paid advertisements or from paid search engine listings. Now, with the rise of Web 2.0 companies, the future is in free web-based communities.
Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Digg…all are free communities that boast impressive numbers of members and networks. Facebook alone has over 175 million users and Twitter will most likely get there in the future. They’ve changed the way marketing is done, transitioning from advertisements, posters and give-aways to blogs, feeds, bookmarks and comments.
Viral marketing campaigns utilize these community conversations to promote and raise awareness of products and websites, as well as post articles that link back to your site. All this is free to join and highly popular. It just takes some patience and a little know-how.
Cheap is Great
SEO has always been about optimizing websites and writing good content. Both web design and copywriting are not extremely expensive, especially if you do some searching and price comparison. Most of it you can do on your own, in-house, which can help with the budget woes. The only thing that it will cost is time, which is as expensive as you make it.
Good content goes a long way. The more that you write and add to your website or blog, the fresher your site appears. The fresher your site is, the more crawlable it is for the search engine spiders, which means you’ll have higher listings and more traffic.
Also try adding media content, like audio files, video files and sharable documents. These you can post not only on your website, but also on media sharing websites like YouTube. Both will help boost your visibility, build links and increase traffic.
Ultimately, the more you spend the better results you will have, but this doesn’t mean you have to spend a fortune. Times don’t call for that right now. A little investment can surprise you with a greater ROI (return on investment) through SEO. There is still hope for a recession-pressed budget.
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RT @level343 Recession-pressed SEO Please RT thanks http://ow.ly/TiM
RT @level343 Recession-pressed SEO Please RT thanks http://ow.ly/TiM
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