SEO is one of those key phrases that many content creators and website designers refer to. However, it’s not always fully understood for many. One of the key ideas that’s commonly misunderstood about SEO is that it’s not just something that you can tick off at the inception stage of a website. Instead, it’s a continual process that must be returned to on a regular basis to ensure that good SEO is maintained at all times.
In this article, we’ll answer the question, “How often should SEO be done?”. In doing so, we examine what exactly SEO is and why SEO is so critically important to a website. We also explore if it’s beneficial to carry out SEO even more regularly than a competitor.
What Is SEO?
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. In practice it means creating, writing, and constructing a website and its content so that it can be found by search engines. Search engines will look for the keywords or phrases that a person asks by crawling through the web for sites that answer that person’s query.
For example, if a person types “what is SEO?” into Google, Google will search the web for all the websites that answer this question. It will then rank those answers according to the relevance and usefulness that it believes those websites to be in. As a result, the better the SEO, the better the ranking.
Why Is SEO Important?
Ranking is just one of the reasons why SEO is so important for a website and its success. The higher up the rankings a website is in a search engine query, the more likely it is to be clicked on by a user. This then has a knock-on effect to its rankings as the more clicks it receives and the longer the user spends on a page, the more relevant and useful a search engine believes that website to be. It will therefore be more likely to return that website as an answer to that query and move it up the rankings if it’s further down the results page.
Crucially, SEO is simply a vital way for a website to be found at all. If it’s not found by a search engine, the traffic a site will receive will be lower than it needs to be. In fact, the only traffic it will receive is the traffic from a user who has been sent a link directly. If you think of your website as your digital shop window, you want that shop window to be seen as much as possible. Good SEO practices is one of the ways that you get more people walking by your shop window and hopefully walking into your shop to purchase goods or services from you.
How Often Should SEO Be Done?
SEO is not something that you can do once at the set up of your website and forgotten about. To stay relevant and useful in terms of Google and other search engines, it needs to be carried out once a month to ensure that the right keywords and phrases are still used on your website and its pages. If you do not do it once a month per page, you will be fully susceptible to your page no longer hitting the right target in terms of keyword content. Your website and its pages will likely slip down the rankings, which then becomes a self-perpetuating cycle that is difficult to escape from. The lower down the rankings you are, the less likely your website will be clicked through to, which then means it gets put further down the rankings.
Should I Do SEO More?
It can be tempting to do SEO more than once a month to ensure that it’s the very best it can be at all times. However, doing it too often will take away your time and energy from running other key parts of your business. Doing SEO once a month is striking the right balance between ensuring your website is as good as it can be, while giving you time to direct your attention to running your company. It’s also important to keep in mind that you will not see immediate SEO results, which means that constantly changing content and keywords won’t give your website time to see better results. Sometimes with SEO, less can be more.
SEO Frequency – Key Takeaways
Carrying out SEO audits regularly is key to ensuring your website is always high up in search engine queries and rankings. Set time aside each month to go through each page of your website to make sure that all content has the very best SEO as well as making sure that all links work and all URLs are correct with excellent SEO as well.
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FAQs
This means that SEO should be done at least once a month to ensure your website is optimized for the best performance. It's also important to monitor your progress and make adjustments as needed. This could mean changing keywords, updating content, or optimizing images for better visibility.
Does SEO need to be done monthly? ›
Without monthly SEO maintenance, you will have trouble staying ahead of the competition, particularly if the competition has an effective maintenance strategy.
How often should I do SEO for my website? ›
SEO is a long-term commitment
Likewise, if the site is small, 1 to 2 times in 3 months and 3-4 times in 6 months are recommended.
Does SEO need to be constantly updated? ›
SEO changes constantly. It's important to stay ahead of the search engines and revisit and update your strategy regularly. The Google search algorithm changes 500 to 600 times a year. These tweaks vary from the barely noticeable to unannounced overhauls of how Google chooses what users see.
How long should you spend on SEO? ›
The larger your team the more specialized you will be, so on specialized marketing teams you my be dedicated fully to content creation, link building, keyword research, or analytics. So for a full-time marketer, you could easily spend anywhere from 10-30 hours per week on SEO-related activities.
Is paid SEO worth it? ›
But is it worth the investment? Absolutely! In fact, as discussed above, SEO attracts more traffic and builds more trust than paid ads, which are generally far more expensive in terms of cost per click.
How much should SEO cost per month? ›
Most businesses paying a monthly retainer for SEO will pay between $500 to $1,500 per month. For those paying by the hour, $75 to $100 is the most popular hourly rate. For one-off SEO projects, $2,501 to $5,000 per-project is most common.
How much does ongoing SEO cost? ›
Comprehensive Local SEO services can be as much as $3,000-$5,000 per month. Most businesses have budgets that range from $500/month to $10,000/month. Average hourly SEO services cost $100-$300 per hour. For small businesses, spend at least $500 per month on SEO to see results (Search Engine Journal).
How many hours does SEO take? ›
By investing the recommended 4-15 hours of work per week into SEO, on average, results should start showing up in months 6-12. As Lee Grant, CEO of Wrangu, puts it: “Six to twelve months should be enough time for SEO to start showing results. It's a long-term investment that demands regular upkeep and attention.”
How much is SEO on average? ›
On average, SEO costs $1000 – $5000 per project (51.92% of respondents), though some businesses pay upwards of $10,000. How much your SEO project costs will depend on the project's scope, timeline, and requirements. For the most accurate SEO pricing for a project, request a custom quote.
Is SEO dead? In short, no. People are still using search engines to find information, research products, and learn new things — but the way Google organizes and delivers search results has changed.
What happens if you don't do SEO? ›
If you stop doing SEO, you'll eventually start seeing lower rankings in search results. Over time, this will lead to less organic traffic to your site and less visibility online.
Is SEO obsolete? ›
When individuals say SEO is "outdated," they mean keyword stuffing, overwhelming the internet with low-quality content, and replicating popular content. Really, those procedures were never current. Search engines are now better at catching those methods.
How much should you budget for SEO? ›
While there is no set cost for SEO services, most businesses should expect to budget between $500 and $5,000 per month for SEO.
Do I need to run Google ads instead of SEO? ›
Most marketers recommend using a blend of both SEO and Google Ads in your marketing campaign to help increase exposure and leads to your site. Both methods enhance your visibility in SERPs, so using them in your digital marketing strategy will maximize your brand's online potential.
Why is SEO a monthly thing? ›
Monthly SEO tasks will help you track your SEO performance and improvements to make to keep your site competitive. They further help assess how your website performs in natural search and pinpoint areas to better your rankings. The shrewd implementation of these SEO tasks will bring fruitful and positive results.
How many months does SEO take? ›
SEO takes between three and six months to start showing results. In some cases, it can take up to a year to see consistent improvement from SEO. SEO is not an immediate fix — it requires time and effort to see improvements in rankings and traffic.
