In the 21st century, nothing is more important for your business than content creation. It is an essential business activity that can increase your revenue, boost customer retention, and help you develop your brand’s voice. However, bad content can ruin your reputation or even mess up with the Google algorithm and make your brand become blacklisted.
You have to find the best way to use SEO practices to work to your advantage. As in any other aspect of the business, you need to determine cost-effective methods that can bring a good quality level.
While you might have some vague idea about how SEO works, you might not have time and enough expertise to create the best SEO practices. This is why it is best to reach for professional help. A company that offers SEO content writing services is a great choice.
As with everything, using a company that offers SEO content writing services has its pros and cons. Keep reading to make a decision that is going to be the best for your business.
What Is SEO and Why Do You Need It for Your Business?
If you are not interested in online marketing, you might not know what SEO is. Simply put, search engine optimization is a way to make your website friendly for search engines. This way, you can perform well in an organic search. What does it mean for your business? Your website is going to appear high in page rankings, so your potential clients can find you on the internet.
To make your content more SEO-friendly, you need to create valuable content that is also going to include keywords: specific words that your potential clients search for on the internet.
As a brand owner, you should prepare a plan on how to get new clients and promote your business. One of the best ways to do it is by investing in good SEO.
According to a survey performed by Hubspot, 91% of businesses that use professional SEO strategies were able to notice an increase in ROI (return on investment). Moreover, creating engaging blog posts is one of the best ways to increase traffic on your website. Of course, posts have to be optimized for the search. Thanks to this, your blog can be found and drive more traffic.
While SEO is the best way to find potential customers, it is not a very easy thing to do. Google’s SEO ranking algorithm often changes, so something that was increasing your visibility a while ago might no longer work. There are some basic SEO good practices that you can follow. However, that might not be enough.
The best way to increase your organic traffic is by hiring an SEO content writing professional. You can get an in-home writer, a freelancer, or outsource writer from writing services agencies.
Hiring SEO Content Writer: Insourcing or Outsourcing?
Good quality content can help you increase traffic, make your clients more engaged and generate profit. In the modern world, the business has to have a content marketing strategy.
To get a good outcome for your effort, you have to publish content that is original, adds value, and is engaging. You have to do it on a consistent basis, at least a few times a week. This might not seem like an easy task and indeed it is not, especially when you do not cooperate with digital marketing experts.
If you are planning on investing in SEO content writing, you have two options to choose from:
Insourcing
Insourcing means that you can hire an in-house writer who is going to be responsible for SEO content creation. You can also delegate one or more of your current employees to realize content-related tasks.
Outsourcing
You get your content from outside of your company. You can hire freelance writers, companies specialized in blogging, SEO content writing agencies, etc. They are going to create content on your behalf and send it to you when it is ready.
Why Do I Need a Professional?
Before going to the pros and cons part of using agencies’ services, let’s have a look at a few basic reasons why it’s worth hiring professionals.
To create engaging and SEO-friendly content, you need to know how to add keywords and search words to your content. Professionals have tools that can make this process easier and more effective.
You need to create quality content. Bad content is worse than no content at all. When you are busy with managing your brand, leave content creation for those who know how to create a blog post that is going to be remembered.
To increase your visibility in search engines, other blogs have to link to your page. SEO experts know how to effectively create backlinks and make people connect with your website.
Google has to constantly rank you and it does it based on the content you have. If you don’t have new content, there is nothing to rank, so your website drops down in the internet search.
Pros of Using SEO Content Writing Services
Save on Extras
If you are torn between hiring an in-house writer and reaching for a web content agency, you should consider pricing. At first glance, it might seem that outsourcing is more expensive. Pricing varies from one agency to another, but on average, you can expect to pay $25-$150 per blog article.
When you need a lot of content, this number can add up to hundreds or even thousands of dollars per month. Let’s then look at your alternative.
An in-house copywriter, on average, earns around $50,000 per year. If you hire a person to work for you, you need to offer all types of benefits. When you have to pay for sick leave, insurance, etc., you need to additionally add around $21,500 per year. Moreover, you have to cover the cost of buying equipment (about $3,000), and payroll taxes of around $4,000. When you sum up this number, you notice that an in-house writer can cost over $80,000 per year.
That means that if you order high-end content for $150 per blog post, every day, you still pay much less than for an in-house writer.
Balance Your Needs Through Outsourcing
In-house copywriters can create, on average, 87 blog posts of 500 words each in a month. Your brand might not need that amount of content. For small businesses, the recommended number of blog posts is no more than 30. As a small business, you might not have the budget, but also the need to hire a full-time copywriter.
If you are a company that needs a lot of writing content, for example, a large business, e-commerce, or even an SEO agency, one writer is not enough. Yet, it would be too expensive to hire a few of them on a daily basis.
Change Perspective
When you can pick from tens or even hundreds of writers, you can be sure that your SEO content is going to be good. You might pick one favorite writer, or reach for various, to show a different perspective and make your content more exciting.
As a company, you might need many blog posts that concentrate on the same topic. While having various writers, you can get a unique angle to similar themes. Diversity can take your blog to another level. Different perspectives help to increase the added value of your content and be better rated by the Google algorithm. Moreover, your blog can be interesting for various clients.
Of course, you have to have a consistent brand voice, but it doesn’t mean you to have to be boring or repeat the same topic all over again. Make your readers feel that each article is worth their time and can inform them about something new.
One writer can quickly get stuck with ideas if the topic is repeated over and over again. Agencies provide you with various writers that approach a new topic with enthusiasm. An in-house writer can be influenced by your ideas and the work environment, which is not bad but can lock out some new concepts and thoughts. An outsourced writer can go more in-depth on the topics that you haven’t yet noticed.
Get Specific with SEO Content Writing Services
While creating content for your business, you want it to be diverse, but also follow a consistent voice that allows your brand to be quickly recognized. An SEO content writing agency can offer you samples of various writers. Based on them, you can pick those creators whose voice can align with your company.
A good SEO content writing services company can also apply your particular guidelines to their work. If you want to talk to your readers in the first-person, with wit, but you want your content to be funny and friendly, share it with writers. They should be adjusted to it and help you to create content that is going to be your unique voice.
Save Some Time
The other reason why it is worth hiring professionals is time. As a business manager, you might not have time to create content. While hiring an in-house SEO writer, you would need time to search for the right candidate and train them. That doesn’t give you the security that you are going to get a great outcome.
If you don’t have time, energy, or money for the whole hiring process, and don’t want to commit to someone that you are not sure is going to feel your needs fully, reach for SEO content writing companies.
Writers who work as SEO content creators are trained and qualified to do the job. When you contact an agency, you know you are going to get what you pay for without extra fuss, training, etc. Thanks to this you can focus on other things that your business needs. You also get the work done immediately and don’t have to wait for anyone or anything. This means you can implement and benefit from SEO strategies right away.
Get What You Need
One of the best perks of using SEO writing services agencies is their scalability and flexibility. As they have access to at least several writers, they can turn around as much content as you need. They can also help you grow in the future. Imagine that you start as a small company and then rapidly grow. Instead of hiring more in-house writers (you already know it is not really economical), you can ask an SEO company to provide you with more content.
It works the same when you have a limited budget. You can negotiate prices in bulk, and when your business grows and has a bigger revenue, you can ask for extra content. You can be sure that the agency is going to keep up with your needs. In case your business is slow, you can simply back up for a while, without the need of firing an in-house writer.
Moreover, SEO content writing companies work with such varied writers that you can pick from different content types and topics. That can be blog articles, websites, product descriptions, E-books, recipes, and much more. One writer can write perfect recipes but have no idea how to create an E-book. With an agency, you don’t have to worry about that.
Publish Regularly
It’s highly probable that your clients regularly check social media, blogs, etc. As a brand, you should deliver good content regularly. That is a key for a good marketing strategy. Research shows that a lack of consistent strategies can confuse visitors and make your brand’s value drop by 20%.
Brands that post regularly on their blogs and social media are considered more trustworthy and credible. People also believe that those brands are able to provide them with a great customer experience.
If you work with an in-house writer, the regularity of publishing is uncertain. Some things that can influence their work are meetings, vacation days, sick leave, or even writer’s block.
SEO content writing services work with numerous writers, so even if one cannot create a post for you, they can easily replace them and deliver the content on time. Thanks to this, you live with peace of mind, and don’t need to worry that you are going to leave your clients without great content.
Cons of Using SEO Content Writing Services
While there are a lot of advantages of using SEO content writing companies, there are some cons that you should remember. Fortunately, some of them can be easily eliminated if you spend a bit of time doing your research before deciding on which company to use.
Low Pay Might Equal Low Quality
As you might know, lower payment often equals low quality. The same rule applies to content creation. As a business, you need to be wise when it comes to expenses, but you shouldn’t be greedy when it comes to content creation. You can accept as a fact that good writers are not cheap. If you notice that a freelancer or a company offers a rate that seems too low, they probably offer work that is not-so-good.
If you see an offer of $5 per article, you better be careful. Most probably, you are going to receive hard-to-read, grammatically incorrect content.
The truth is that many SEO content writing agencies outsource in countries like Philippines, India, etc., as people are more likely to work for a very low rate. While you can find great content creators there, most people who work for such a low rate don’t deliver good work.
Lack of Expertise
While getting writers from the agency can make your content more diverse, it can also lower expertise. Clients are very smart and consider many factors before purchasing. This is why you don’t want any “fluff” filled piece. As a brand, you should be seen as an expert in what you do, and your texts should show that about you.
If you work in specialized fields such as finances, technology, health care, software, you should consider cooperating with a person who has a background in those fields. Customers of the mentioned industries have some knowledge of it, and they want content that adds value and helps them to immerse deeper into a topic that interests them. In this case, only experts can deliver content that is going to be detailed and accurate.
Even the best writers are not able to fool clients by pretending to be an expert. Moreover, as a brand, you should never try to do it. When your clients notice that you are not honest, you can lose your reputation.
Another thing that might be an obstacle while hiring SEO content writers from outside your company is a lack of knowledge about your brand. You can provide style guidelines and some information about your business, but that might be not enough.
Lose Time
When you find a good agency, you can save tons of time, but before that happens, you might also lose a lot of it. Very often, companies suffer when trying to find reliable and good quality agencies. You have to pick an SEO agency that can be consistent and deliver valuable content, otherwise, your marketing efforts are not going to bring any effect.
If you are not lucky enough, you might spend more time searching for a good agency than you would on training an in-house writer.
In case you decide on freelance writers, you might need some extra time to manage them. You have to check their productivity, send them payments and tax forms, provide them with all necessary information, etc. If you decide on a freelance writer, you might need some extra managing skills.
Late Turnaround
Well-known SEO content writing agencies have ways to always deliver work on time, no matter the workload. However, younger companies may accept more projects than the outsourced writers can handle. This is an aspect that you cannot control, so you want to be sure that a writing services company doesn’t have a history of delayed work.
You need to know that the company is determined to keep the promised deadlines. When they are late with delivery, you postpone your publishing process and question your credibility in the eyes of your clients.
While searching for the best company, check how long they have worked in the field. Have a look into a portfolio and verify customer reviews. If you notice that a company that has been around for two years only has five reviews and a small portfolio, most probably they only have a few writers. In case the agency is on the market for years, has a great portfolio, and a client roster with known brands, you might treat it as a green light.
Of course, you shouldn’t exclude younger agencies right away. Perhaps they are more motivated to deliver great content for you. However, if you need large amounts of content that you need to publish daily, you would do better by contacting an agent with a good name in the SEO world.
Difficulties with Finding a Reliable Agency
When you start your search for a perfect agency, you’re probably going to notice that companies are very different. Be careful with the agencies that prioritize profit over quality. Those agencies are commonly known as “content mills”. They are “famous” for poor customer service, late turnaround, and poor-quality content.
You might be unlucky and pick one or two of these types of agencies. Remember to not give up in your search and be persistent. Once you find a good SEO content writing agency, you are going to be amazed.
Conclusions
SEO writing is a great tool to boost your company’s revenue. By creating a blog and appearing on social media, you can get new clients and keep loyal customers close to you. However, with constantly changing digital marketing, you might need the help of a professional.
After checking the pros and cons of getting a writer from an agency, you should know what is best for you. Remember that there is no universal solution. Think about your company and its needs. Summarize your goals and consider this option that can help you reach them faster.
Once you invest in a good SEO content creator, you are going to notice that it was worth it.
