When you are gauging your seo campaign you need to figure out one of two things:
- Is your hired seo actually doing the work that was promised?
- If yes to the above, are your expectations set too high?
The two reasons above are why most business owners claim to have had a bad experience in the past with seo. Either they were taken by someone who was lazy, or they thought that seo was the end-all to all marketing.
Search engine optimization is just the actual onsite work done to make your website more visable to search engines. It is done once, and then done again when the search engine algorithms change (which they do often). Search engine marketing is a completely different ballgame and is an ongoing process. SEM when done properly is meant to get your website multiple top 10 rankings for various target keyphrases. Whether or not the SEM campaign is effective is determined by your budget.
Are you spending $300 per month? Your campaign is likely to include the basics which will get you rankings.
Are you spending $600 per month? Your campaign should include some social network marketing which will help with traffic generation.
Are you spending $800-$1,000 per month? Your campaign probably includes pay-per-click management, but the ppc budget is a separate cost.
Are you spending between $2,000 to $5,000 per month? Your campaign is likely to include the ppc management AND the actual ppc costs with Google Adwords, or Yahoo Search Marketing.
Keep the above in mind when figuring out your goals in the online marketing field. Be reasonable and understand that you truly get what you pay for.