Hours per Month Estimate for SEO

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bluhand

Joined: Eons Ago

# Posts: 18

Posted: 07/06/2005 02:44 pm

I work for a winery, and so the keyword phrases we want to be ranked well for are such terms as pinot gris, pinot noir, chardonnay, and so forth. A SEO company has quoted us approximately $800 per month to rank high for those terms as well as setting us up and monitoring paid listing accounts at Overture and Google.

For these type of keywords/keyword phrases, how many hours (approximately) do you think they would spend on our site per month? (I'm guessing around 30.) How many hours (approximately) would it take for an in-house SEO to do the same thing for the same results?

The reason I'm asking is I'm thinking of hiring someone to do our SEO in-house (I could train them how to do it because I have extensive SEO experience, but lack the time to actually do all the monitoring and site optimization involved), along with other internet/marketing projects, but before I propose this to my boss I need to have some idea whether or not it would behoove us to do so.

What are your thoughts on this? Is it always better to go in-house if possible?

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bhartzer

Administrator

Joined: Jun 08, 2000

# Posts: 7034

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Posted: 07/06/2005 03:04 pm

Without knowing specifically what the other SEO firm says that they'll do--and what their definition of "rank high" is, it's hard to critique their price. And again, it's hard to say exactly how many hours they will spend on your account.

Doing in-house SEO is usually better, because someone in-house will know your product better and will be able to dedicate more time building links, updating pages, watching stats, and creating new content on the site. At the same, time, you have to look at the time required to train someone as well as the degree of difficulty in your particular market.

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yellowwing

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Joined: May 21, 2002

# Posts: 2524

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Posted: 07/07/2005 10:44 am

In house would deliver more tailored campaigns. Especially on the PPC.

In hiring an outside firm the you will have a "This is what we will give you" versus in house "This is what we need."

You will get better reporting and better communications to make further decisions. You just have to walk over to the work station rather than send an email and hope the contractor will get around service in a timely manner.

A staffer wold be more motivated. If you have to fire a contractor, they have plenty of other clients. If you are unhappy with your staffer, they will lose a job.

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PCboy

Joined: Dec 08, 2002

# Posts: 93

Posted: 07/07/2005 01:52 pm

It depends how big your site, how hard to optimize your site, and how competitive your industry is on the search. It's hard to critique someone's works and prices before seeing their works. However, you hardly find a very good SEO compnay which charge $800/month for SEOing your website and as well as setting up and monitoring your paid listing accounts at Overture and Google.

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bluhand

Joined: Eons Ago

# Posts: 18

Posted: 07/07/2005 01:54 pm

Thank you so much for replies -- you've given me a lot to think about.

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SportsGuy

Moderator

Joined: Aug 30, 2002

# Posts: 3550

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Posted: 07/18/2005 06:30 am

I handle all SEO for our 15 websites inhouse. I cost a heck of a lot more in time than $800 per month.

Make sure they provide detailed reports BEFORE you sign up to understand if their idea of "ranking" is on the organic side of things, or on the PPC side of thngs.

Don't forget as well, that once you perform the needed tweaks to your content, etc., it's a bit of a waiting game - sometimes 4 - 6 months of waiting depending on the circumstances, phrases, competition, Google shuffles, etc.

Watch your budget like a hawk - exactly what will you be getting for the $800 per month during those times when you're waiting for organic results to rise? if all they're doing is managing PPC stuff, then I'm in the wrong line of work - $800 for about 10 minutes of my day...THAT is good money. wink

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bags16

Joined: Nov 29, 2003

# Posts: 52

Posted: 07/18/2005 09:13 am

$800/month sounds too cheap. Figure if you could hired an SEO specialist for $40,000/yr (this would be cheap), that is $800/week. Ideally moving SEO/PPC in house would be the best solution, but quite honestly there aren't enough SEO/PPC people to fill all the in-house positions. This same supply/demand for good SEO/PPC people drives their salaries way above $40,000/year. Then start to figure you need to give them benefits and pay Fed tax on them each paycheck, and you cost of one SEO/PPC specialist in house is probably $1200-$1500/week. Finally you need to figure how big an SEO project you want and how large your PPC accounts are to determine whether one person can do it all themself.

If you can afford that fixed cost, then by all means try to recruit someone in-house. Some outsource SEO companies, particular larger ones, care about your account with them once a month, and that is the day the bill goes out to you. If you decide to outsource I would suggest going with a smaller company or even a freelancer as you will get much more personalized attention, quicker response times, and lower management costs.

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