SEO in the UK

eConsultancy, an online publisher of internet marketing research and reports, has just released information about their recent SEO roundtable briefing. The monthly group discussions, which cover various topics in online marketing, include some major companies and employees within the UK SEO market. It makes very interesting reading and I would recommend anyone interested in the UK SEO market to go and download a copy.

Some key facts…

• :: The UK SEM market was worth an estimated £1.41 billion in 2006
• :: The UK SEO market was estimated to be worth about £98 million
• :: Spend on SEO services represents 10% of the overall market for Search

It’s a good time to be a UK SEO. There is a lack of expertise in this area and currently demand is outweighing the supply. This is certainly going to benefit a lot of the seasoned pros, as more and more set up internships and conferences in order to increase the UK offering.

SEO is now widely recognised as an essential requirement for any web project and more and more marketers now understand what it is, and how important it is. I remember a time when client meetings involved educating those in the room about how the search engines work and why you cannot simply build a site and expect people to find it. Those meetings are now far more progressive; a client will often ask “have you seen this new development?” “Would this work on our site” “I notice a title tag changed the other day” etc. This is obviously a far more positive way of working, the more that is known about SEO, the better the project progresses and overall goals are achieved.

The main reason a clients interest and excitement increases in SEO is obviously down to the measurable ROI. Often when a project is 6-10 months in and the ROI is being measured, clients will often see that due to keyword inflations and click fraud concerns, that SEO is much stronger than PPC. More emphasis is then placed on the organic optimisation and interest grows in what results can be achieved.

The future also looks bright for the UK SEO market with social media optimisation, personalisation, localisation, content, vertical search and mobile search all playing a major role in the future of the engines. As more and more spam is found and removed from the SERP’s, the power of ethical white hat SEO increases. This is great for the white hats out there and can only be a good thing for the consumer as the SERP’s become cleaner and clearer.

My only concern for the future is with the amount of cowboy, fly by night companies that keep popping up who claim to be SEO experts. As the demand increases, more and more “so called” SEO experts suddenly appear offering “Number 1” placements. I just hope this doesn’t effect the reputation of the rest of us.

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