Will Panda kill the freelance SEO star?

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Posted 26 July 2012 13:15pm by Ben Potter with 5 comments

Before going on, I want to make one thing clear. I am not setting out to be intentionally provocative with this article. It goes without saying that there are some excellent freelance search experts able to offer their clients first class advice in how to plan and execute an SEO strategy.

Instead, I am driven by helping those buying digital marketing services, SEO in particular, to make more informed decisions when sourcing external partners and agencies.

I am passionate about SEO, and digital marketing more generally, but I also understand it has its pitfalls, the main one being the complex, crowded and confusing market for SEO services.

As such, my purpose is not to antagonise the world of freelance SEO but to simply encourage buyers to question whether it is realistic for a freelancer to deliver every aspect of a highly effective SEO strategy on their own.

The well-publicised Panda and Penguin updates have had a significant (and in my view, positive) impact on the discipline of SEO. Whilst there remains a technical aspect to SEO, these updates (along with other fundamental changes to how Google ranks and displays its search results), have significantly changed the skillset and attributes required of todays SEO practitioners.

Lets take a look at four of these areas in a bit more detail to explain my argument:

Fundamentally, SEO is a marketing discipline, not a technical one meaning that an understanding of basic marketing principles is essential. Nothing is more important to a successful marketing strategy than a strong understanding of the audience you are looking to attract.

Todays SEO strategies need to be underpinned by genuinely useful and engaging content (more on this later). But creating this content can only be achieved with an understanding of your customers, namely their problems, needs and motivations in purchasing a product and transacting with your business.

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Will Panda kill the freelance SEO star?