First of all there is no doubt that a company who does this for a living everyday has it's place in the world of internet marketing. Understanding search engines and how they affect a business is hard to do.

It requires more than most webmasters have the time for. So if you are getting beat on the keywords you want to rank highly for understand that a good SEO person may be just what you are looking for.

Secondly discussion forums are a terrific source of information for many different things online. Join a few internet marketing forums and look for areas where search engines are discussed. A little self education never hurt, but this is where you can find out who other people have used or recommend. You can also find out who to avoid.

Next take the names that you come up with and start contacting them. Ask to see some of their work. Pick up the phone and call them if they can be reached by phone. You are in a sorting phase here and it is worth it in the long run to do your due diligence before making your choice.

One thing that is important is finding a SEO company you are comfortable with. This means do they understand your business or the niche your business is in. Part of this comes back on you and your being able to clearly define to them what it is you are trying to achieve.

If you are trying to dominate your niche your strategy may be different then if you just want to get on page one of Google for a few select words.

Lastly know what you are paying for. You should be getting a thorough analysis of your website before and after they make their recommendations and perform their work.

You are probably looking at making changes to the way your pages are laid out, who you are linking to, your meta tags, and other things that they will address. Be sure to compare apples to apples when you are comparing bids from more than one SEO company.

These are several things to keep in mind when choosing and SEO company. Hopefully this article has helped.