Hire an SEO Expert

“Google it” now seems to be the answer to just about everything, including the question of where to buy a service or good.

Let’s face it, when most people turn to a search engine to find products or services, they’re not going to click through pages and pages of results (in fact, 67% of clicks go to the first five results). That’s why your company’s site needs to be on the first page of search results.

An SEO Consultant (or Specialist) is someone who uses digital marketing strategies to make sure your website is as close to the top of the list as possible on search engines like Google.

Here’s how and where to hire an SEO Consultant to help increase your organic search presence.

Read our guide on the best freelance websites for marketing to find and hire talent to grow your business.

Best Websites to Hire an SEO Consultant

1. Mayple

Best for the top digital marketing experts

Mayple is a premier freelance website where businesses can get connected with digital marketing freelancers of all varieties, including search engine optimization experts.

Mayple vets all of the freelancers that sign up and, once allowed a profile listing on their site, provides ratings for each freelancer’s skills. By only featuring talented digital marketers, they give businesses the peace of mind that they can find professional SEO services through their platform.

Every company has different end goals, especially when it comes to SEO. To make sure that your business is matched with the right SEO contractor, they get a feel for what you’re specifically looking for by providing an onboarding questionnaire. With this, they can make sure the SEO Consultant you are matched with is right for your unique needs.

• Read our Mayple review

2. GrowTal

Runner up for finding and hiring top marketing experts

GrowTal is a company that places its focus on creating a relationship between a business and its freelancers that is mutually beneficial.

In order to match businesses to qualified freelancers, GrowTal will meet with you directly and get a feel for what your company’s SEO goals are. They will then contact a few of their vetted freelance SEO specialists, providing them with information that you have given about your company’s voice and goals.

GrowTal will then take the three to five SEO freelancers that have expressed interest in your project and provide you with their information within two business days so that you can then interview them and make the final call on which individual you want to work with.

This company is a great option for companies that need a vetted, talented SEO Consultant who can get to work quickly.

• Read our GrowTal review

3. MarketerHire

With one of the most rigorous screening processes on the freelancing market, MarketerHire only accepts less than 5% of the top SEO Experts that apply to their site.

This is because the talent team behind MarketerHire is always at work recruiting (not just looking through and vetting applications) only the most advanced and skilled digital marketers out there.

Similar to GrowTal and Mayple, MarketerHire will also hand-match you to an SEO Consultant that fits the scope of your project and budget in 48 hours. Most of the projects that their freelancers take on get started within a week, making this a great option if you need to get an SEO strategy up and running ASAP.

If your company is new to the concept of SEO, or if you just aren’t sure how long you’ll need an SEO Expert, you don’t have to sign a long-term contract and instead opt for shorter-term agreements.

• Read our MarketerHire review

4. Upwork

Best overall freelance website for finding marketing talent

One of the most popular freelancing sites out there today is Upwork, and it remains a great place to find a professional that can provide a wide range of SEO services.

On this site, unlike the others previously mentioned, you have to do the job posting and vetting yourself.

You start by posting a job looking to hire an SEO Expert with all of your desired specifications in the description. SEO Consultants can see this job posting and apply, giving you a short message about why they feel they’re a good fit and including their resume and portfolio, and you get to hire the one you like best.

Many companies like this site because they get to list their budget and requirements and let SEO Consultants come to them, but it is important to know what to look for since the vetting process is minimal.

• Read our Upwork Review

5. Fiverr

Fiverr is one of the largest freelancing job boards on the web, which means that there are thousands of SEO Experts to choose from on the site.

The process here is sort of the inverse of what it’s like on Upwork. On Fiverr, companies look through profiles of SEO Consultants (the top-rated ones are at the top of the list) and reach out to them directly. They can filter freelancers based on their price range, body of work, reviews and ratings from past clients, more.

Once a company finds an SEO Expert that’s a good match, the parties create a contract listing the terms for a project. After the contract has been finalized, clients pay the marketer upfront.

You have about three days to read over the finished product and decide whether to accept a project submission or reject it to get a refund.

• Read our Fiverr review

What is an SEO Expert?

An SEO Expert is a digital marketing expert who uses their knowledge of search engine optimization techniques to create and execute a strategy that will boost your site’s visibility on search engines like Google.

They use key phrases strategically to cause your site to list higher on search results and earn natural search engine traffic, ultimately leading to more revenue for your business.

What does an SEO Consultant do?

An SEO Consultant will research and analyze keywords and phrases that get a high number of “hits” on related searches in different search engines.

They then incorporate these keywords and keyword synonyms strategically into each page of your site. They organize relevant topics and use knowledge of on-page SEO mechanics like H-tags, formatting, text structure, and more, to maximize conversion rates.

An SEO Consultant will stay updated on any changes in Google’s algorithm to see if anything needs to be tweaked to better optimize SEO on your site and will adjust accordingly.

How much does it cost to hire an SEO Consultant?

Some SEO Experts charge per project or hour, and some are paid on a salary, so it depends on what the scope of the project you are hiring them for is.

On most popular sites, SEO Experts charge between $10-$150 per hour with the average rate being $48 per hour (this number was generated based on data scraping popular SEO consultant profiles across multiple platforms and locations).

How to hire an SEO Expert

Here’s a good step-by-step process that’s useful in hiring an SEO Consultant:

1. Identify your needs – Do you need someone to do a quick revamp of your site to include more SEO key phrases? Do you want to hire an SEO Consultant for continued testing and upkeep?
2. Create goals – Set quantifiable goals that you want to reach within a certain timeframe. Things like increasing organic traffic by a certain percentage, optimizing your page speed, or maximizing the amount of time visitors spend on your page are all good examples of SEO-related goals.
3. Define your budget – Analyze what your finances can handle and have an exact amount allotted to pay your SEO consultant (this will also change depending on the duration of your relationship with them).
4. Explore best websites for SEO experts – Check out reviews on Upwork and Fiverr to see how much success other clients have had before choosing an SEO expert or take a more holistic approach by using an agency that will check all of the boxes.
5. Create test or pilot projects to see if they’re a good fit for your culture – Test their understanding and abilities by having them do SEO for a video or showing you how they approach a keyword search.