I was speaking with a prospect who had been referred to me and he told me how much he trusted his IT guy. He went on to assure me that his IT guy would know how to build his website, develop his pages, and do his SEO … oh, and the IT guy had numerous other duties in the store. I wondered, “Why did this guy bother to call me?”

I’m amazed at how often I still hear “I trust my IT guy, he knows SEO.” And then I do a search for the main keywords of the business paired with his city and his business doesn’t show up at all in the search results. Zip. Nada.

One prospect told me he was coming up #1. Well, yes, if I typed in his “business name” he came up #1 … but then that’s nothing to write home about. What if someone needing your product doesn’t know your company name?

Or maybe my prospect is coming up #1 for a keyword because he hasn’t turned off the personalization on his browser, thus yielding false positives. Sigh.

I often notice that the web content IT guys manage for their pages is pretty dreadful. Copy and images “float” randomly on the pages and they often are “piled-on” resulting in cluttered pages. The visitor doesn’t know where to focus.

I know it’s hard for retailers and other businesses strapped for cash these days, but please, remember, most IT guys are tech guys. They know how to keep your computers and networks humming. For that purpose, they are gold.

But 99% are not marketers. Nor do they have the time to keep up with the ins and outs of search engine optimization.

Easy Web Tip #143: Please don’t rely on your IT expert to understand SEO and web marketing. They have enough to worry about.