Pittsburgh SEO Company Says "No" to Offshore Outsourcing

Feb. 22, 2012 - PRLog -- Offshore outsourcing is one way that many US based companies try to cut the cost of SEO, internet marketing and website development.
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania based SEO and internet marketing company, Ker Communications, does not outsource SEO or anything else. Not because of some false sense of patriotism or self-preservation. "It is just that we have never found an overseas provider we could trust with our reputation, or who could match the quality of service we offer. That, and we don't use 'paint by numbers' methods that can be outsourced to just about anyone with a computer", says company founder and SEO specialist, Nick Ker.

Search engine optimization or SEO, is the practice of fine tuning the code of a website and the text and other content of the site, and the online promotion of the site with the goal of making the website appear higher in the results when users search for specific search terms on search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo.  Until recent years, this was simply a matter of making sure the proper key words were used on the website in the right places, and getting other websites to place a link to the client's site.  Once the initial research and analysis to determine the keywords was complete, it was just a matter of changing some HTML code and getting those links.  This time consuming task could often be outsourced to countries with lower standards of living in order to save money.

Google and the other search engines are constantly trying to improve their service and provide internet users with the most relevant answers to their search queries.  Google in particular has made several major changes, including the well known Panda update which was designed to weed out low quality websites and those that use questionable promotion practices.  Ker says, "Within the last year, I would estimate that at least seventy percent of our new SEO clients have already tried to work with companies in India or elsewhere before coming to us.  In all of those cases, the site was not ranking any better, the page titles and some of the text was worded as if it was written by a Dr. Seuss character on a large amount of pain killers. It made no sense at all.  Not for people to read, and it didn't help the website do any better in the search engines."
In some cases, the websites ranked even lower for their preferred key words.  "Dirt cheap SEO services, whether they are in India or here in Pittsburgh will make lots of mistakes.  One of the worst is overusing the key search terms when they go out and spam for links. If they use the same words over and over, like if a realtor wanted to rank for "Pittsburgh real estate" searches, Google's algorithms will eventually notice that artificial looking pattern and limit how high the site can rank for that phrase. So the customer has hired someone to help them get more visitors who are searching for a specific term and ends up not ranking at all because the SEO provider is either inept or doesn't care. If the site owner was hoping to save a few bucks, the bad news is now a good SEO provider is going to have to work a little harder to make up for those mistakes."

Modern SEO - a New Approach That Can Not Be Outsourced
Ker Communications handles SEO a little differently from most traditional internet marketing agencies.  In addition to optimizing the website's code and structure, they work with clients to help them understand how it all works.  "Site owners often come to us with these crazy ideas about some magic keywords they can use that will unlock the mysteries of the universe, or Google, anyway.  Or they think we know how to trick Google into putting them on the top of the list.  They seem to get so caught up in all the [expletive deleted] about SEO that they lose sight of what it is all about, what ALL marketing is about - getting the message in front of the right people.  On the internet, it is just done a little differently. In search engines, social media, video sites like YouTube, blogs.  The only 'trick' is making all of those things work together for your business. And I'm sure something will be launched tomorrow that will need to be added to the mix."   SEO 2.0 or inbound marketing as Ker and others have been calling it, is about getting that mix just right and getting businesses actively involved in whatever online communities make the most sense for them.  It is just good old fashioned "word of mouth" on a much larger scale.

And it is also about making sure you are interesting. "We make a big deal about being cool", Nick continues. "When the web first started and there were no search engines, we found new websites by following links. Those links were not placed there by SEO consultants. They were put up by site owners to show their users what they thought was cool. We try to help our clients show the world how cool they are on their website, social media properties or other ways, and then the links come the old fashioned way: naturally. You aren't likely to get that with some outfit in India that has kids typing up directory listings all day long.  If you are doing something like affiliate marketing or just trying to make a fast buck overnight and don't care if your site isn't still ranking high in a few months, then yes, go ahead and outsource. But if you are in business for the long haul, this is not where you want to be penny wise and pound foolish."

Be Cool: http://kercommunications.com/seo/how-to-get-more-links-be...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iS4fR_I91Fs



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Ker Communications http://kercommunications.com/ in Pittsburgh, PA, specializes in internet marketing strategies to improve your business web presence and brand awareness with social media, quality website design, video, public relations consulting, print media, or even street level guerilla marketing.