5 Concrete Ways SEO Experts Deliver Value in the SGE Era

Lots of veteran SEOs have been asked to take over accounts after a brand tries (and fails) to use SEO newcomers to drive growth in their organic campaigns.

Since it’s a pretty common topic of discussion, we’ll save you some time by laying out what actual, experienced SEO experts can do for brands as AI and SGE (Search Generative Experience) continue to make their presence known in the SERPs.

5 Benefits of using SEO experts:

Benefit 1: Real-world analysis

There’s SEO theory, and then there’s real-world analysis. Speaking plainly, SEO beginners don’t have the experience of tracking data to assess the impact of updates; analyzing year-over-year, month-over-month, or week-over-week results; or incorporating that knowledge into their strategy for continuous optimization.

Benefit 2: Context and perspective

First-hand experience of the evolution of SEO is important. Beginners have (hopefully) done enough background work to understand things like past algorithm updates and their impact on the search landscape. Even so, reading something is different than having had your hands on it.

Real-world context is also important, and it’s much sharper with experience. Things like matching keywords to user intent and understanding UX and how to reflect it in your SEO and content – those are all things you need to practice to get good at. 

Years ago, you could have gotten some improvement in clicks (although probably not any metrics further down the funnel) using keyword stuffing and gray-hat antics that weren’t valuable to the user. Today, it’s more important than ever for SEOs to be able to put themselves in the user’s shoes.

Benefit 3: Versatility

Something that sets JDM’s SEO team apart from in-house teams and other SEO agencies is our clientele. We work with all sizes of clients, from seed-stage startup to enterprise.

Being able to adapt strategies to what a business needs, which means being able to prioritize your efforts and understand what will drive the kind of growth most important to the client, is critical.

Benefit 4: Brand development

Obviously non-brand traffic is vital, but you can’t forget about branded traffic and brand development. Companies with good brand equity can, with the help of good SEOs, parlay that into backlinks and effective digital PR. Off-site SEO practices, for instance organic social media and earned content placements, can help build brand awareness as well.

For SEOs, authoritative content and thought leadership is a major driver for brand development. We stress to our clients that we want to make them into the leader for their respective industries. This means writing content that’s incredibly relevant to your target audience – how you’ve helped people like them grow, what goes into solving their challenges, examples of your work. Essentially, you need to answer the question of why people should choose you through your content.

Note that your website’s UX – including its look and feel – plays into your brand development as well.

A great SEO brand strategy puts your company front and center for all searches that include your brand name, throughout the entire customer journey.

Benefit 5: Distribution

“Distribution” is still an undervalued concept in SEO, and it refers to distribution of both information and content.

Distribution of information can happen through blogs, longer-form content, well-organized flow of information on your owned properties, and links to valuable resources both on and off site.

Distribution of content (remember: if you build it, they won’t necessarily come) requires some creative thought. What can we do next with the piece – repurpose it in other forms of media? Distribute it? Use it for outreach? Share it with paid as a lead gen lever? Can it expand into a series based on related keywords?

Think of your best content as an asset, not just words on a page, and be resourceful in how to get it some attention.

If you’re mulling over whether the time is right to bring SEO experts into the fold to grow your brand, ask yourself honestly whether you trust your current resources to deliver what is outlined above. If the answer is no, and you’re ready to put more emphasis on your organic growth efforts, let’s start a conversation.