In today’s competitive market, most savvy business owners understand that achieving online search visibility is vital to the survival of their business. The difficulty comes in how to choose the right company to help you achieve this goal. Unfortunately, choosing between the many companies out there is quite a challenging task. Even if you conduct serious research, the right choice in SEO companies isn’t quite as obvious.

Most people approach the task of finding an SEO company by typing “SEO Company” into a search engine. They then accumulate a list of potential companies to work with and start to call them up. As they start to contact these potential providers they become flabbergasted when they find that they all say the same things over and over again like a broken record. Industry-wide consensus can actually make it even harder to make a choice, as each knowledgeable consultant seems to corroborate the other’s claims.

Here are some tips on how to hire the right SEO firm.

1. Trust the companies that have been around for five years or more. Generally speaking, the older a company is, the more they understand the inner workings of the industry. More established SEO companies such as BlueHat Marketing are also more capable of catering to specific client needs.

2. Stay away from SEO companies that promise you immediate results. Less-than-honest SEO companies make it seem that simply by hiring them, a company will magically achieve the highest ranking and visibility.

3. The internet marketing world continues to change drastically and rapidly. Make sure the company is always up to date with knowledge and information. The company you hire should be always up to date with what is going on.

4. Visit their social media profiles and their blog. How actively do they post and interact with their followers? Look at the quality of their posts and relevance of their content. If they aren’t investing in their own profiles, what makes you think they will invest in yours?

5. Sometimes you have to learn before you do. Approach searching for an SEO company with the same mentality. Read about SEO strategies – this will allow you the ability to ask questions and judge service offerings.

6. Here are samples of some questions you could ask the representatives who you will speak to over the phone:

· What have you been doing since the Panda and Penguin algorithm updates?
· What kind of report analytics do you use?
· What type of reporting is available to help quantify linking, coding, positioning, etc.?
· What kind of backlinks will you be providing?
· Can you provide me with sample work? Client testimonials?
· How familiar are you with my industry?

7. A serious company will offer data analysis and intricate explanations of their goals and achievements. Analytics is the most important piece of code to have in your website as it gives you the most accurate figures.

The outlined tips above should help any individual or business compare, evaluate, and hire the right company for the job. Just remember that SEO takes time and requires a sustained effort.