Is SEO (search visibility) for everyone?

A website is now an almost obligatory part of every business. It is the company calling card that potential clients and business partners land on. That is why there are more and more services around website search visibility. But does everyone need to use them?

After reading this article you will know:

1. Whether SEO can help you win clients in your industry.
2. How search visibility compares with other ways of winning clients online.

What does website search visibility actually involve?

Polish companies often split this kind of work into two parts: SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and “pozycjonowanie”. So how is SEO different from pozycjonowanie?

In simple terms, SEO services refer to work done on the website itself, for example optimising the site code or the content on its pages. These are so-called on-site actions.

Website pozycjonowanie is a broader term. In short, it is work done outside the site (off-site), such as earning links from other websites.

Importantly, that split exists only on the Polish market. In the US, where SEO comes from, the term covers all actions that improve a website’s position in Google.

You should know, though, that these are not the only ways to increase a site’s visibility online.

Website SEO versus Google ad campaigns

Besides SEO and off-site work you can also run ad campaigns in Google Search in parallel. The goals of all those actions are (in a simplification) the same: improve the website’s visibility, lift it as high as possible in Google results and, as a result, significantly increase the number of people visiting the site.

In the details, though, the two methods are completely different. The infographic below shows the differences between SEO work and Google Ads campaigns:

You now know the methods for improving visibility online. So should every website use SEO or search-visibility services?

Should every website get SEO work?

Although it may surprise you, the answer is no. Why, if this is one of the best ways to win clients?

The answer is time. The website SEO process is long and depends, among other things, on the industry, the reach (local, national or global) and the type of site. That is why, before you decide on this service, you need to think about whether it makes sense in a given case.

When is it worth investing in website SEO?

An SEO contract is most often signed for 12 months. That shows how long you have to wait to properly check and assess the impact of the work.

That is why it is worth investing in SEO on long-term, multi-year projects, for example when you are starting a business or running an online shop.

I will give you my own example. More than 5 years ago I started SEO work on www.studiobrothers.pl. The domain had already been online for about a year (which also matters here). Reaching the local TOP 3 in Gdańsk for phrases such as “strony internetowe” and “strony WWW” took me 6 months.

Importantly, after 6 months I paused the SEO work, and those keywords have stayed in the top Google positions to this day.

The conclusion is that a website SEO service only works if you can wait at least 6–12 months for visible results. In return you gain valuable organic traffic that brings long-term benefits. You also do not have to run that work without a break.

When is it not worth ranking a site?

You can probably already guess that SEO is not worth it when, for example, you want to organise and promote an event that will happen in 3 months. That is too short for SEO work to bring visible benefits. In that situation a Google Ads campaign is key, because it brings short-lived but immediate results.

Are there alternatives to SEO and Google Ads?

So the best time to start SEO was… a year ago. 🙂 If you do not want to invest in a Google Ads campaign, there are still other ways to promote your business quickly.

I mean, among other things, promotion on social media and on specialist portals. That is where most people potentially interested in your services gather.

Social media has downsides too, though. The biggest is complete dependence on another platform. Brand24 showed that well. When the brand was banned on Facebook in 2019, it recorded large financial losses for six months and also lost the image of a reliable company. The effects of those problems still follow it today.

The conclusions are that the priority should be a well-designed website. It makes you independent and constantly available to your clients. Create a long-term plan, then decide: is it better to invest in long-term SEO work and valuable content, or in a fast, short-term Google ad campaign?