Looking for a top-notch SEO agency or an SEO professional? In these digital times, the world of search engine optimisation has become a flourishing place. Yet it’s also one riddled with a thousand choices when it comes to seeking out SEO help.

Questions arise like: How do you decide which SEO agency is going to be best for my business? Who can I trust? And how can I be sure I’ll get results?

If you’re on the hunt for a winning SEO agency, here are some traits to look out and to keep in mind once you start making inquiries.

#1. Analytical Experts
No SEO professional is going to thrive in the online world without a strong analytical side. Great SEO experts need to know what tools to use, how to use them and what changes need to be made based on your website’s statistics. Look for an SEO agency that is technically and analytically savvy; they’ll need to be able to write and edit code and continually measure your website’s SEO performance metrics.

#2. Customised Services
Because no website and no business is the same, no SEO campaign should be the same either. In short, different businesses will need a different range of SEO services.

When choosing a good SEO agency, look for one that tailors their SEO services and techniques to match what’s right for your business. If you find that they’re trying to put you into a generalised bucket or employ every SEO technique under the sun for the sake of it, look elsewhere.

#3. Open & Honest
No matter what techniques they employ, SEO agencies need to be open and honest with you about their strategies. This means informing you exactly what they’re going to be doing and how they’re going to be doing it. And they should also give you realistic insights into what to expect. If you find an SEO agency is being secretive about their techniques, they’re probably either not very good – or engaging in illegal “black hat” practices.

#4. Great Content Creators
SEO professionals need to be analytical – and they also need strong, creative flair. This is because their job involves not only examining your site, but also creating new content for it.

Writing quality content both onsite (such as web content, blogs) and offsite (like backlink articles, social media posts etc.) is key to a successful SEO campaign. If they’re not creative themselves, they either need to have a creative team on board or a creative resource at their fingertips.

#5. Deliver Results
One thing you should know about SEO is that (a) different keywords will produce different results, and (b) results do take time to happen. Depending on how new your website is and what market niche you’re in, some SEO results will appear quickly, while others can take months or even a full year to come to fruition.

Once your campaign is launched, however, you should notice an improvement in the short term, even if it’s only a small one. Your SEO agency should be able to provide you with concrete statistics on the effectiveness of your SEO campaign. If you find that nothing is really happening or that the agency isn’t being upfront with you about the stats, their techniques are probably not accurate.

#6. Great Personalities
Finally, great SEO professionals should be personable people. They should relate easily to you and your business and they should be someone who maintains regular contact with you.

For this reason, choosing a local SEO agency can be beneficial. Email communication is fine, but meeting your SEO professional face-to-face, or at least speaking to them over the phone, will allow you to form a better impression of them. They should come across as confident, trustworthy and experts in their area – if you speak to agency who exudes all three, they’re probably a good one to start with.

Amanda Johnson enjoys writing on a range of topics including online marketing, health and wellness and IT. This article has been written by her for a Sydney based company engaged in offering SEO services.