Search engines have been around for over 20 years, and to this day, the majority (53.3%) of all website traffic comes from organic search. In fact, 60% of all online generated leads are organic, with a whopping 14.6% close rate. But in an era of tech innovation, AI, and sophisticated marketing strategies, how does one play the SEO game? The answer for most – SEO outsourcing.
Search engine optimizations (SEO) outsourcing is the practice of hiring a third-party agency or professional to improve the performance of your website on search engines, and enhance your digital presence. Below we’ll discuss the benefits and drawbacks of SEO outsourcing services, as well as why you should consider outsourcing it to the Philippines and which roles you can outsource.
Pros of SEO Outsourcing
In 2023, around 37% of all services outsourced to the Philippines are related to design & marketing. Of these services, one of the most in demand is search engine optimization or SEO outsourcing as it is a long-term strategy that requires careful research, consistent execution, and analytics.
Though some companies choose to invest in internal SEO teams, many opt to outsource SEO instead for the reasons listed below!
Cost Effectiveness
59% of companies outsource to reduce spending.
In 2024, the average cost of hiring an SEO specialist is $20.88/hr and the cost of tools and software go as high as $5,000 a year. That’s easily ~$4,000/month, significantly higher than outsourcing to developing countries like the Philippines, where the average cost of outsourcing one SEO full-time-equivalent (FTE) typically costs less than $2,500.
Not to mention, building an entire SEO team means more than hiring an SEO specialist; you would need content writers, link building specialists, and more. On the other hand, SEO outsourcing services are available on multiple engagement models, giving you the flexibility to work with dedicated professionals, or outsource SEO projects. It also allows you to access SEO software and tools that are otherwise very costly to maintain.
No Learning Curve
Optimizing SEO for a particular brand and industry takes time and experience that most individuals don’t have. Hiring someone in-house requires a learning curve that can take anywhere from a couple of weeks to a couple of months.
When you hire a SEO outsourcing company, they have the combined expertise of multiple specialists and have experience working with multiple brands and industries. These allow them to more easily find what works best for your brand and what doesn’t, making it quicker to see results.
Enhanced Marketing Strategy
Outsourcing agencies that specialize in SEO have years of experience using SEO best practices and sophisticated tools and software to improve website performance and SERP rankings. This knowledge comes in handy when designing a marketing strategy that will help you reach your SEO goals.
They can create actionable plans and help you set expectations about your SEO strategy. Better yet, they can give you regular updates based on analytics that will otherwise be confusing to navigate and make sense of.
Having someone else who is experienced in SEO step in and give you a clear marketing strategy also helps put your mind at ease and makes it easier to project ROI.
Faster Results
When you skip the learning curve, not only do you get enhanced marketing strategy, but you also skip the waiting part and move on to results much faster. SEO outsourcing companies are experienced with optimizing websites and content to help you not only rank on search engine results pages (SERPs), but also target the right audience so you can get qualified leads.
On average, it takes an agency at least three months to see traction on SEO, whereas in-house teams with trial and error take six months or more. And even then, to actually convert engaged users into qualified leads may take even longer.
Any business strategy aims to generate ROI. By outsourcing, you get a clearer picture of when you can achieve ROI, rather than playing the waiting game and hoping for the best.
Scalability
A business that performs well scales its operations. If you plan to grow your business, you should also prepare for when you should scale your operations. While preparing your recruitment team to hire more SEO specialists helps, this can be a problem if you’re uncertain of how much you’ll be ramping up your SEO operations.
If you’re in the retail sector where demand spikes seasonally, then having a SEO team who can increase their capacity a couple of times a year is the perfect set up. Outsourcing makes this possible by adding more staff to your outsourced team whenever needed, while reducing it to status quo the rest of the time.
This eliminates the worry of having to hire and lay people off – your outsourcing partner has the people to reallocate, so you pay only for the outsourced SEO services you need.
Access to Innovative Tools & Analytics
While Google Analytics and Google Search console are free SEO tools, sophisticated ones that offer more in-depth analysis to help you optimize and implement your SEO strategy cost money and paying for multiple tools monthly can quickly add up.
For example, plans from Ahrefs and Moz start at $99/month, while one from SEMrush starts at $119.95/month. These, along with other tools like SpyFu, Screaming Frog, SurferSEO, and Majestic require money to help fine-tune your SEO strategy further.
SEO outsourcing companies have access to all of these as they already provide SEO services to other clients. When you work with them, you get to use all of these too, without having to pay heftily on subscription fees.
Cons of SEO Outsourcing
As much as we love to boast the benefits of SEO outsourcing, it’s not a be-all-end-all solution that comes with no strings attached. It has its drawbacks, and if you’re considering SEO outsourcing, you should learn about them and mitigate them before you outsource your SEO.
Lack of Control
Outsourcing SEO services to a third-party agency means you give control over your SEO to your service provider. Depending on how you communicate with your outsourcing partner, they may or may not employ strategies that align with your overall marketing goals, which may lead to inconsistencies in your messaging.
At the same time, you may experience delays in implementation of SEO changes because of communication gaps between your inhouse team and outsourced team.
A solution to these is to find a white label SEO outsourcing company who collaborates well with your organization. This allows you to seamlessly collaborate with your outsourced team, so you can make sure they’re aligned with your goals, and that they’re working together with your inhouse team.
Miscommunication
Having an outsourced team, especially offshore, can mean cultural and time zone differences, which may pose a challenge in terms of smooth communication. There are important cultural nuances that can be missed by simply communicating in the same language; this may impact relationships with your outsourcing partners, and can affect the quality of service provided.
Meanwhile, having your outsourced team in a different time zone can cause delays in responses, which may in turn, delay project updates and completion.
To bridge the cultural gap with an offshore team that speaks your language, build relationships outside of work. Some ways to do this include virtual team building activities such as game nights or town halls.
As for the time zone difference, many outsourcing partners have shifting schedules, so finding one that will work your hours should help solve the problem.
Poor Quality Control
Outsourced teams may not have as clear an understanding of your brand and objectives. This may lead to irrelevant content, which, though may help you rank on SERP, will not target the right audience nor reflect your brand voice. This leads to poor conversions which are going to hurt your overall marketing strategy.
At the same time, you may work with SEO outsourcing companies that lack SEO expertise; they may employ black hat techniques that can lead to penalties from search engines, thereby damaging your site’s reputation.
The easiest way to avoid these problems is finding an outsourcing partner with a proven track record of elevating branding and boosting SEO using white hat techniques. When choosing who to work with, ask for case studies to help you evaluate the company’s SEO capabilities.
Risk of Dependency
Relying on an outsourcing partner helps reduce the burden on your in-house team, but at the same time, it also increases your dependence on an external team, subsequently increasing your vulnerability.
If you outsource all your SEO, your in-house team will lack SEO knowledge. Should your service provider choose to terminate the contract or make organizational changes that impact their service quality, your SEO strategies and operations are going to take a hit.
The best way to avoid this is by retaining key staff who are experts at SEO. Have them serve as a liaison between your in-house and outsourced teams, and use them as point persons for transitioning SEO processes internally in the future.
Cybersecurity Issues
When outsourcing SEO services, it’s inevitable to share data with your service provider. This, however, increases the risk of data breaches and unauthorized access to your website and analytics data.
A great way to avoid this is by working with a SEO outsourcing company with robust cybersecurity measures that are up to par with industry standards.
Why Outsource SEO Services to the Philippines
Companies outsource their SEO to save on costs, produce reliable and faster results, as well as scale their operations. However, with thousands of SEO outsourcing agencies claiming to provide outsourced SEO services, where should you outsource?
10-15% of the global outsourcing market comes from the Philippines, making it the BPO capital of the world. While there are plenty of other great outsourcing destinations like India, China, and Malaysia – the Philippines remains a top choice for SEO and marketing services primarily because of its excellent English proficiency.
Filipino writers and marketers have a reputation for producing high-quality and high-converting content that not only rank on SERP, but are also relevant to the target audience. Because the Philippines has such a high English proficiency, it’s also easier to find writers who speak native English, and at a fraction of the cost of hiring someone similar in the US, Europe, or Australia.
Excellent English doesn’t only translate into high-quality and engaging content, it also means smoother communication and easier collaboration between your inhouse team and your offshore Filipino team. This means reduced delays, faster turnaround times, and quicker results!
SEO Functions You Can Outsource
SEO, as a whole, involves quite a number of moving pieces, any of which can be outsourced. Below is a list of the most commonly outsourced SEO processes.
Keyword Research
Involves identifying relevant and high-traffic keywords that will help your website rank higher on search engines. It requires the use of specialized tools and expertise to incorporate selected keywords into an SEO strategy.
Content Creation
The practice of writing SEO-optimized content for blogs, articles, and web pages. This is typically outsourced to professional writers, and sometimes agencies with professional writers, who can produce high-quality and engaging content that also ranks well on SERP.
Link Building
Acquiring high-quality backlinks from reputable websites, which helps improve your website’s domain authority or score, which is the basis of your search engine rankings. Many businesses outsource this to help them build networks and strategies that obtain relevant backlinks to their websites.
On-page Optimization
Involves the use of titles, headers, meta tags, URLs, and internal link building to optimize user experience and SEO, ultimately, to rank on search engines.
Technical SEO
Addressing technical aspects of SEO, such as site speed, mobile-friendliness, crawlability, and indexability to improve a site’s performance. This process involves identifying and addressing issues and errors that hamper site performance and user experience.
Local SEO
Optimization of a business’ online presence in order to attract more local customers. This typically includes managing Google My Business profiles and local citations. It’s particularly important for businesses that have physical locations.
Analytics and Reporting
Setting up and monitoring of site performance using tools such as Google Analytics and Google Search Console. The objective is to track user behavior and other SEO metrics to gain actionable insights for ongoing web improvements.
Competitor Analysis
Analyzing competitor websites’ strategies, weaknesses, and opportunities by looking at their backlinks, keywords, and content, with the goal of adapting best practices to improve your own website performance.
Outsource Your SEO to the Philippines
Reduce the learning curve, stretch your budget, and maximize your ROI on SEO when you outsource your SEO to the Philippines. By working with offshore Filipino marketers who specialize in white label SEO outsourcing and who speak native English, you’ll see faster results and hit your marketing targets.
At KDCI Outsourcing, we have a large pool of marketing professionals ready to help you with your marketing strategies. By building your offshore marketing team with us, you can expect seamless onboarding, clear and regular communication, as well as KPI monitoring and analytics reporting – all to ensure your operations are running smoothly and helping you get to your marketing goals.
Learn more about SEO outsourcing. Contact us today!
