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Why your business might NOT need SEO

by WarriorForum.com Administrator
19 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Everyone here in Warrior's like "oh you need to improve your SEO" or "here are 5 methods to increase your search rankings".

Well guess what? SEO isn't for everyone. It might not even be the best fit for your business at all. Here's why.

1. You need fast results.
2. You have very limited budget.
3. Your product or service has low demand.
4. Outranking your competitors don't concern you at all.
5. Your market doesn't use search engines.

What do you think?
#business #seo
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  • Profile picture of the author Philip Carpenter
    Well. I prefer long-termerm effectiveness, and I'm ready to bit the bullet when it comes to paying for SEO services.
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    • Profile picture of the author George Wikham
      Seo Works as an booster to get more clients to your site. Onpage and offpage both works hand in hand to give a owner a fruitful results with great revenue.
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  • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
    #2 on the list doesn't really apply, assuming you take the time and provide the effort to do search engine optimization, yourself. In fact, a very limited budget may be the very reason that you DO need to optimize for search engines, since you really cannot afford to advertise.
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  • Profile picture of the author Stella Warren
    Absolutely, You have highlighted valid points but it also depends on one's business needs and aligning with their strategies.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jayson76
    I don't really like SEO myself. It causes you to have to police everything and owning a forum, that's impossible and not desirable even if possible. Anyway, getting a social media following gives you more freedom cause, as noted, you don't have to watch everything written as much.
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  • Profile picture of the author deltahost
    I've been making money using SEO for more than 10 years, and I see only 2 options why you may not need SEO:
    - you don't want to invest money because you're not sure;
    - you have created a very unique project that will be successful even without external and internal optimization
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    • Profile picture of the author GordonJ
      Originally Posted by deltahost View Post

      I've been making money using SEO for more than 10 years, and I see only 2 options why you may not need SEO:
      - you don't want to invest money because you're not sure;

      - you have created a very unique project that will be successful even without external and internal optimization
      It is a thought that most never even consider. Correct me if I am wrong, my thoughts on SEO are...you need traffic. You want people to search for you, find you, and have a high listing on the search engines. Is this the goal of SEO?

      My opinion now, after 35+ years online...is, SEO is like copywriting, only necessary if you need people to find you, and once they do, you need to convince them to buy what you offer.

      So when do you not need traffic? When you have a project (I don't think it needs to be unique, but I'm sure that helps) that is easily offered to known lists of buyers, groups with demand for your offer, or you have built a list over time organically that has an almost automatic response to your newest offers. Or an active social media presence in a niche or big market.

      Needing SEO and the need for copywriting, hamstrings a new business from the start. Take time to think what you want, and maybe come up with an alternative.

      GordonJ
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      • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
        Originally Posted by GordonJ View Post

        It is a thought that most never even consider. Correct me if I am wrong, my thoughts on SEO are...you need traffic. You want people to search for you, find you, and have a high listing on the search engines. Is this the goal of SEO?

        My opinion now, after 35+ years online...is, SEO is like copywriting, only necessary if you need people to find you, and once they do, you need to convince them to buy what you offer.

        So when do you not need traffic? When you have a project (I don't think it needs to be unique, but I'm sure that helps) that is easily offered to known lists of buyers, groups with demand for your offer, or you have built a list over time organically that has an almost automatic response to your newest offers. Or an active social media presence in a niche or big market.

        Needing SEO and the need for copywriting, hamstrings a new business from the start. Take time to think what you want, and maybe come up with an alternative.

        GordonJ
        I suppose this makes sense to lazy people who are absolutely fine with whatever methods they already have in place for generating traffic. Most businesses, however, want as much traffic and as many sales as they can possibly get.

        For businesses who are operating just fine without SEO, great, good for you, but how much are you losing in additional profits because you are content to rest on your laurels and not explore every possible means of increasing business? What happens when your current methods stop working so well?

        New customers from any source whatsoever also usually result in new referrals from those satisfied customers. By not caring at all about SEO, you could potentially be cutting off not only new sales, but new referrals.

        Besides, well-done SEO typically is fairly permanent. Once you rise to one of the top positions through legitimate white hat SEO, you remain at/near the top FOREVER (again, assuming you have not stupidly employed black hat methods to get there).
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      • Profile picture of the author Elizabeth Robinson
        A better way of doing seo helps to get more clients and traffic to our business. yup it takes time to grow with seo but it gives fruitful results
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  • Profile picture of the author evilclown
    Mostly true, but even basic SEO elements like titles, descriptions, good clean code, and loading speed should be standard for any designer or developer. It's good web practice in general.
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  • Profile picture of the author kevingoodson
    SEO is not suited for those who need results fast. SEO needs patience while you do any project. Yes if people need results fast they prefer to go for paid ads.
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  • Profile picture of the author savidge4
    "SEO" i think is a dated term - to an extent... I prefer PEO ( Platform Engine Optimization ) and here is why.. Google is a "Platform", Bing is a "Platform", Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, X, LinkedIn, name a platform any platform.. and guess what? what drives any and ALL of them? they are search engines - DUH

    Here is a kick in the nuts for ya... Ad platforms... like Google and Bing, and all the others listed and then some... kids... optimizing the terms used to show up in search... uh even at the pay to have a listing level, it requires an amount of understanding in terms of SEO / PEO.

    And the whole discussion of SEO takes time... no it doesnt... in some cases less time than it takes to optimize an ad - and some people never get that far, so SEO at a snails pace is still faster.
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  • Profile picture of the author LilyJone
    I partially agree with your sayings. Few extra ordinary businesses don't need SEO at the initial level but when you want to expand your business and enter the market between really tough competitors then surely you need SEO. If you have budget constraints then try it by yourself.
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  • Profile picture of the author seodatabase
    you always need optimize your product, if you wont fallow the rules - u miss the leads
    even in ur market Google is not popular- there is always alternative what have own algorithms and u need to optimize
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  • Profile picture of the author LaKenya Kopf
    I think on-page SEO is essential but I do agree with what you are saying in terms of off-page SEO. I have no desire to pay out the nose for backlinks or dive in full force to improve my domain authority, page rank, etc.
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  • Profile picture of the author Gaus
    That's right, I agree with you in some way, but I still prefer seo because for me it speeds up the result
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  • Profile picture of the author imran123490
    If you have an online business that is listed on any search engine then you must need SEO to grow online without SEO you can't compete with your competitors
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  • Profile picture of the author feronenab
    If your business needs immediate results, PPC or social media ads might be a better fit. A limited budget can make it hard to see significant gains with SEO since it's a long-term strategy. And if your product has low demand or you're not focused on search engines, it might not be worth the investment.
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    • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
      Originally Posted by feronenab View Post

      If your business needs immediate results, PPC or social media ads might be a better fit. A limited budget can make it hard to see significant gains with SEO since it's a long-term strategy. And if your product has low demand or you're not focused on search engines, it might not be worth the investment.
      I agree with pretty much everything except the part about a limited budget making it hard to see gains in SEO.

      Actually, a limited budget makes it next to impossible to see gains with advertising, since you may not be able to afford the ads. SEO, on the other hand, costs absolutely nothing if you do it yourself and know what you are doing.

      If your product has low demand, I don't imagine whether you use paid ads or SEO matters a whole lot, unless it is extremely profitable when you do get the rare sale (think $500+ per sale). If there is that much profit on a low demand product, for sure, paid advertising is the way to go. You won't spend much (low searches/demand means low volume of clicks and low competition/ad cost with PPC).
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