PRs can tell stories and write good copy that people want to read and includes SEO links, while SEOs write copy with the primary purpose of securing links and the words don't always seem natural or sit well in an article or post.
In our spare time, some of us at Vitis PR also write personal blogs that have nothing to do with tech PR, so we are subjected to a constant stream of SEOs who contact us to provide guest posts and sponsored articles for these blogs.
Recently, I decided to explore an offer, normally I just delete this SEO spam. I was offered money to post up the article. Now I know that Google takes a dim view of paying for links, so I made sure when I posted up said guest post, it had no follow links, and I pointed to my full disclosure at the bottom of the post. I am convinced that Google will find you and shut you down (or at least penalise you) if you are dishonest about sponsorship.
Anyway, back to the point, I received a truly awful piece of copy. It was written with limited knowledge of the sector (personal finance) and some glaring errors - ie "with inflation at an all time high" - er I don't think so. In the end, for the post to go onto my blog, I had to rewrite it completely, as I felt that my readers would see the SEO written post as spam, and posting it as supplied would surely damage my blog's reputation.
I am not saying that all SEO experts are poor writers. I believe that some SEO teams employ professional copywriters, and that makes sense.
As PRs we also secure links from the articles, releases, guest posts, case studies etc that we write and place on behalf of our clients. We know how to keyword map, we know how to write SEO optimised titles and synopses, and then write good quality content to bring in more traffic to your website...and we know how to build links from media and bloggers.
At Vitis, we have a specialist who works with us, he conducts SEO audits, keyword resarch, optimises site content and then we work together to secure links.
So next time you think about hiring a pure SEO expert, maybe consider a PR agency with SEO expertise and strengthen your efforts to get more traffic.
