{"id":1739,"date":"2021-03-15T08:22:26","date_gmt":"2021-03-15T08:22:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seobuddy.com\/blog\/?p=1739"},"modified":"2023-06-21T03:03:56","modified_gmt":"2023-06-21T03:03:56","slug":"my-seo-journey-mins-savela","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seobuddy.com\/blog\/my-seo-journey-mins-savela\/","title":{"rendered":"My SEO Journey: Mins Savela from 10Adventures.com \u2013 Over 715k free organic traffic visitors in 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

My SEO Journey is a new series where entrepreneurs and Indie makers will share their honest SEO Journey filled with failure and success, and most importantly proven results. Episode #5 features Mins Savela from <\/em>10Adventures<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Mins<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

My name is Mindaugas Savela, a.k.a. Mins, and I am the digital marketing manager at 10Adventures.com.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

10Adventures is your one-stop source for everything you need to plan or book your next trip. From sharing high-quality route guides for free to offering a comprehensive adventure tour marketplace, our mission is to help you get outside, creating a memorable experience when you do.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our business is seasonal, so most users come in for summer activities, but our traffic goes down during the winter and autumn, as fewer people hit the trails.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Graph<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve reached a 76% growth on our organic traffic year-on-year, which comprises 70% of our total traffic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Organic<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

What is your experience (bad or good) working with agencies, freelancers, or building your own in-house SEO Team?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

My experience working with agencies is very limited.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is mainly because SEO is one of my own main responsibilities at 10Adventures. So I try to cover as much as I can myself. As 10Adventures is still a start-up, we\u2019re using the resources that we have in-house, and so far it seems to work pretty well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When it comes to freelancers, we do use a couple of great people to help us out with simpler tasks like web research, email checks, and administrative tasks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All of our more in-depth SEO work is carried out in-house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently, we mostly rely on our own team with a little help from freelancers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So far, it has been working great. I believe we owe a lot of our SEO-related success to our great content team and developers, who are 100% on board at making sure the website is both user and SEO-friendly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think when everyone involved has some SEO knowledge, it makes it a lot easier to achieve your goals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any tips on hiring an SEO Specialist, or outsourcing to a Virtual Assistant?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As we haven\u2019t hired any SEO specialists, I can\u2019t tell you exactly what would be the best thing to look for. I can only give general advice. Before hiring an SEO specialist, I would advise you to at least go through the SEO basics to see what it\u2019s all about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I would probably want to hire someone who would get me the full scope of where my website is and where we need to get to. And that would entitle technical SEO, on-page SEO<\/a>, outreach, link-building, content strategy, and all the other things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But really, it depends on where you are with your website and how much you need to cover. For example, if you only need help with link-building, you may just need someone who can do the outreach for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But when it comes to a virtual assistant<\/a>, I would not expect one to be fully aware of all the bits and pieces and would hope that they are following the latest updates from the SEO world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If I needed someone to help with research or emails, I would not look for a virtual assistant<\/a>, who is an SEO expert. I would look for someone who is great at doing web-research, knows their way around the web, and has a high attention to detail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019d look for someone who\u2019s got the skills to do the exact tasks I need them to do. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think this is the biggest difference. You either get someone who is a specialist, or you get someone who\u2019s good at doing some specific tasks on the to-do list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some people may think that SEO is easy and quick to learn. I believe it\u2019s not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s something you work on and update your knowledge on continually. Some things I learned 1.5 years ago no longer apply today. I mean, I still meet people who think it\u2019s just about stuffing the keyword in as many times as possible and wait for the results to come in. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What are your favorite resource, blog, and influencer, to learn new SEO Tips?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

My favourite resource is probably Ahrefs Blog<\/a> and their video tutorials on Ahrefs YouTube channel<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They cover a lot of topics from the beginner level to some really in-depth practical guides. And that practical part is something I really value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s so much theory out there, and I agree, it\u2019s important to know your stuff. But for me, it\u2019s even more important to be able to use that knowledge, and I think they do very well with their step-by-step guides. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for an influencer, I have to mention Evaldas Mockus<\/a>, who\u2019s the director of SEO at Omnisend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was the person who introduced me to SEO when I was looking for a more concrete field in digital marketing that I wanted to pursue. The 1-on-1 SEO lectures with him were really invaluable, and it was probably the best step into the SEO world that I could have taken. <\/p>\n\n\n\n