SEO is not an exact science since nobody knows 100% what search engines value to position a website. Still, the agency you work with must have a clear methodology that allows you to see how you try to improve the positioning of your website and that it is also measurable (to see if what has been done generates results).

That they assure you that they do not use “black hat” techniques

There are different fraudulent techniques to improve the SEO of a website, which are often called “black hat” within our sector. Perhaps they can be tricks that can give you some quick results, but we assure you that it will be very detrimental to your website in the long run.

Google and the rest of the search engines pursue all kinds of fraudulent techniques to improve positions and punish them. We recommend that you work with agencies with proven reliability or at least assure you that they will not use these techniques.

That they confirm how they will work with the keywords

Some agencies work based on only positioning a few specific keywords, which may be important for the business. In contrast, other agencies carry out a more global task, trying to improve the entire positioning of the website.

You decide to see which option interests you the most, but they must specify well how they will work with you so that there are no misunderstandings later.

That they notify you of actions that may entail an internal cost

When we hire a supplier, there is often a belief that we are paying them to solve our problem. In some situations, it can be like that, but when we talk about SEO, the provider will often need his client to be able to improve the situation.

Whether due to direct costs, such as the need to change the website, or generate more pages, for example, or internal costs such as the need to generate more content by the client, or a good number of meetings between the supplier and the customer to clarify concepts and learn more about the product.

When a direct cost is generated, it is easy to see and analyze, but sometimes we neglect the internal cost that carrying out some actions may entail. For this reason, your provider must try to help you anticipate the internal cost that the optimization work that it is going to carry out may entail.

That they explain to you how they will report on the results

As we mentioned at the beginning, in addition to the methodology, it will be important to see that the actions to be carried out will be measurable to check whether they are reporting satisfactory results or not.

For this reason, we recommend that you talk to your provider from the beginning about how they will inform you about the improvements (what indicators they will use, how often they will report to you, etc.).