With the government imposing a state of lockdown and encouraging the public to practice social distancing, internet usage has spiked as many work from home. It is the best time to capitalise and dominate the search with SEO.

Maybe you’ve had to close your physical store and you’re considering eCommerce, or maybe your goals of growth remain the same. Vine Digital sees this as a unique period of opportunity: speak to us today and find out how we can help you.

Probably, but possibly not. We’ve come across a few businesses—usually extremely niche B2B companies—that would not benefit from an SEO campaign. For example, people wanting certain extremely specialised services just won’t use Google search to find them, but rely on peer referrals instead. Nevertheless, such websites still need optimal design and UX (user experience) in order to solidify leads and induce a conversion.

If your business is B2C, it’s pretty much guaranteed that SEO will help you. It’s also likely that your competitors are already doing it, which makes the phrase “if you’re standing still, you’re going backwards” particularly pertinent in this field.

Usually after 3-6 months there will be tangible improvements. It can certainly yield results in a shorter space of time but the real benefits build up gradually. Short-term wins tend to come from websites that have technical faults built in that are quick to fix when we start the campaign. Continual high rankings take more time and effort, but can bring much more dramatic long-term benefits to your business. The results of SEO should be likened to compound interest, with benefits building on each other over time.

Have a chat with us and you’ll see. We totally understand why you would ask this though. One of Vine Digital’s core reasons for being is to break through the murky reputation that the SEO industry has unfortunately managed to build itself over the years.

But to name a few points that separate us from the field:

• All of our staff are experts in one particular aspect of SEO, PPC and design. This means your PPC is managed by a PPC expert, your content by a content expert, and so on.
• Our strategy for your business is custom designed to your needs. We get to know you and your business needs, then craft a strategy from the ground up. We don’t have pre-built automatic strategies that we try to shoehorn businesses into.
• We don’t lock you into contracts. Any one of our clients could cancel our services at any time if they were unhappy with our results. This puts the onus on us to continue providing great work and results every month—a standard that we are more than happy to meet.

Only if it doesn’t bring a return on investment.

Each strategy is bespoke to a business and we take many things into account before quoting. In short, our quotes start from around $1000 per month for SMEs and sole proprietors and there is no upper limit for multi-national corporations or hugely ambitious companies such as VC-funded startups. The quality of service is exactly the same for all clients; the amount of services determines the actual quote.

No, we don’t, and you should avoid any agency that does. We work to optimise your website to work within Google’s search algorithm and normal user behaviour, which leaves room for a wide range of business factors that are outside any agency’s control to affect results. Any agency promising results in this sort of environment is lying to you, and should be treated with strong suspicion.

With that said, we have an enviable track record of which we are very proud. We place ROI at the heart of everything we do and will work tirelessly with you to achieve just that. We will provide you with our strategy in full at the start of a campaign and throughout as the work becomes more involved, provide regular meetings and updates with us to keep you abreast of developments, and report on all results with detailed analysis every month.

Not if you don’t want us to. We prefer working with clients for at least 12 months so that our abilities can be clearly demonstrated and our achievements compared to year-on-year statistics, but we don’t do long-term contracts just to tie you into something. We have a 30-day cancellation policy that can be triggered at any point.

That’s not a question, but we understand your point. Let us part the veil a bit for you. There are three kinds of SEO approach that you might come across:

1. “Black hat” SEO:
   Using techniques that abuse Google’s algorithm, tricking it into ranking your site higher. Google is way too smart for this sort of nonsense to work these days, and all that will happen is your site will get blacklisted and never rank on Google ever again. Do not trust any agency that talks about “tricking” Google, or “abusing the algorithm”, they may do irreparable damage to your website.
2. “White hat” SEO:
   Using techniques approved by Google to optimise a website based on a number of well-established ranking factors. This is a much better approach. Look out for agencies that talk about “optimising” for Google, as this is the path to good results.
3. Bespoke SEO:
   Basing a white-hat SEO approach on your website, your business, and your needs. Applying a generic SEO template to your website might have good results, no results, or just harm your website. Customising the strategy to your particular needs will always have the best possible results, no exceptions. Look out for an agency that listens first, then starts telling you what you need, rather than the other way around.

This could be one of two problems:

1. Sharp, sudden traffic decline?
   You have most likely been hit by a penalty from Google. This is usually the result of an inexperienced (or shady) SEO agency using black-hat techniques, which has led Google to place you under penalty, removing you from its search results. This can easily be fixed, but it does take time to get Google to trust your website again. This requires some patience, but a strong strategy can certainly bring you back to an even better place than you were before.
2. Steady decline over a long period?
   The problem is simply that your site is not well optimised. This includes problems with the technical build of the site, the content on your site, the links pointing to your site, and the design of your site. To fix these problems we want to take a careful look at the state of your website and then improve on each of these facets, starting with those that need the most work. The good news is that this sort of work is our bread and butter (and a lot of fun!), so it is definitely possible to get your traffic back on the improve.

If your traffic dropped off to 0 on one date, or you have no traffic at all, it is also possible that you have a problem with your Analytics tracking. This is normally very easy to spot for an Analytics expert and can be fixed more or less instantly.