Business owners attempting to compete in this highly competitive market frequently face difficulty with their digital marketing strategy, particularly in determining which specific technology to utilize and focus on. There are several sources of internet traffic accessible, and many people are unsure which one would perform best for their type of business and deliver them the best results.
The Commission claims that despite working with the industry to cut the number of charging cords Many business owners, particularly those who run small and medium-sized organizations, lack the marketing and promotion expertise of giant multinational corporations and will automatically choose the least expensive option. That is why many people go for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) assuming it comes with a “free” price tag. Is SEO, however, truly beneficial to your company? Is it worthwhile to commit your time and resources?
We’ve all heard about the benefits of SEO and why you should use it. Here are certain downsides that you should be aware of.
- SEO Outcomes Will Take Time
The most visible disadvantage of employing SEO for the company is the long time it takes to see real results from all of your work. The key to success in digital marketing is not just having a website, but also having a strong presence in search engines. Getting your information indexed by search engines might take several hours, days, or even weeks. If you desire or want rapid results from your campaign, SEO may not be the best option for you.
- For a competitive niche, SEO will necessitate a significant investment.
SEO is not a completely “free” digital marketing tool until you do everything in your SEO strategy, such as getting backlinks and creating content. If you truly want to achieve significant results from all of your marketing efforts, you will most likely wind up seeking and employing external aid to develop all organic links and other SEO marketing tasks. This is especially true if you operate and market in a highly competitive area.
3. SEO will take a long time to produce a return on investment.
If it takes a long time to see significant results from your SEO efforts, it will also take a long time to see a strong Return on Investment (ROI) from all of your efforts. This may not be advantageous for small enterprises that require significant income in the immediate term, which they would utilize as a revolving fund to finance their ongoing operations.
- There is no assurance of success with SEO (especially 1st-page ranking)
One of the most significant goals you should set for your SEO is to rank top on search engine results pages. Because 75 percent of search users would most likely never go past the first page and discard the rest, getting on the first page is actually what matters in search results. SEO does not ensure that you will appear on the top pages of search results for the keywords you are targeting.
- SEO Doesn’t Give You Complete Control
Nobody truly understands the inner workings of Google’s algorithms. What you believe counts in search rankings (and what so-called specialists say) may produce outcomes that are diametrically opposed to what you expect. Only Google is aware, and so only Google has complete control. You have no control over how much traffic you will create or the sort of visitors you will receive as a result of your SEO efforts. It is not like paid marketing, where you will get returns proportional to what you spent.
- The possibility of being punished
The figure below shows a glimpse of previous improvements to Google’s search algorithms over the years. These improvements were given fancy names like Panda, Penguin, and Hummingbird, and many digital marketers’ efforts poured into their SEO campaigns over the years crumbled virtually overnight due to being punished for what these new adjustments required. As a digital marketer, watching everything you’ve worked so hard for wiped away may be a very unpleasant experience, forcing you to rebuild from the ground up in order to reclaim your SEO pedestal.
SEO is still the most important source of traffic for many websites and should be a component of your overall digital marketing strategy. However, the drawbacks mentioned here will provide you with a far greater understanding of how you might utilize SEO in a more appropriate context. This will give you the option of increasing your efforts in this channel or maintaining a better balance of SEO and other digital marketing techniques – all aimed at accomplishing your overall company goals.