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Working Well With Your SEO Firm
by Jim Hedger, SEO Manager
March 19th, 2003.
The SEO industry is growing out of its adolescence into the realm of mainstream
credibility. After surviving the infancy and adolescence of the industry,
search engine optimization and placement is just being recognized as the
essential element that can make or break an online business’ bottom
line. A successful SEO enriched marketing campaign will require a few simple
but crucial elements: timing, organization and commitment. There are several
search engine placement strategies to choose from. This SEO plan focuses
on achieving traditional search engine placements and does not address pay-per-click
advertising.
Timing
It happens every November. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) firms start getting
phone calls from online retailers desperate for traditional Top10 placement
before the Christmas shopping season moves into full swing, two weeks later.
Before considering the actual work and turn-around time involved in achieving
search engine placements, potential clients put their service providers in
uncomfortable positions by expecting SEO’s to provide results within
impossible time frames. In many cases, some SEO providers take these jobs
without letting the client know what to realistically expect in the hopes
the placements will magically appear before the rush begins. In our case,
we are forced to explain the realities of the situation.
A successful SEO promotion requires time, the amount
of which is dependant upon the competitiveness of keywords your company
has chosen to target, (“cars” vs. “Pintos in Iceland”),
and the existing popularity of your web site. For example, if you represent
a freshly designed car sales web site that has not been previously promoted
(no existing online popularity) and your aim is to achieve Top10 placements
under the word keyword “BMW” within 2 or even 3 months then
you had better rethink your timeline.
Generally speaking a highly searched keyword with extreme competition will
require between 3 and 12 months of aggressive SEO promotion to obtain desirable
listings. Where your company falls into within the 3 and 12 month target
will depend on just how well promoted your web site currently is. If your
site is already well promoted and found under other competitive keywords
then you have some power that a SEO company can leverage towards reaching
newer and more competitive keyword targets and may put your placement goals
within a 3-6 month range.
Companies without existing online popularity that wish to compete under
highly competitive phrases will need to start from square-one. This will
mean targeting less intensive search phrases to begin with as well as acquiring
textual links from relevant websites. These initial tactics will serve to
enhance the perceived popularity of your web site and build the leverage
required to obtain your ultimate keyword goals.
Organization
The act of optimization a web site varies in complexity depending upon the
technologies employed within your web site’s design and the decision
making structure of your company. As a result, organization plays a major
role in maintaining crucial optimization and submission timelines and for
achieving ultimate success.
For example, there are many web sites that are database driven and require
special optimization techniques so that search engines can actually spider
content. These techniques may require access to specific portions of a web
site and/or authorization from specific employees of a company who are ‘out
of the loop’; without ensuring proper organization beforehand can
causes delays and can wreak havoc with SEO timelines.
With organizations that have constantly updating web sites, there are many
hurdles that may be faced by an SEO campaign.
Firstly, if whole pages are added and removed daily on a web site, then
a plan may be implemented to at least basically optimize content before
addition. This could mean the alteration of META tags, titles, and heading
tags which, although only basic alterations, can play a key role in enhancing
web site popularity. This type of Communication becomes a key issue in such
cases as this and will play a major role in creating the desired environment
for success.
Secondly, many online businesses require website changes made on a seasonal
basis. As changes to an optimized website may put the success of the promotion
in jeopardy, the company webmaster should make updating the SEO firm an
important part of the process.
Thirdly, constant site updates may present a version control problem in
which the site that is on the SEO’s hard drive may be radically different
from the modified version of the site. Again, webmasters should let the
SEO provider know when a change has been made so the provider would know
to download the fresh version of the website. If a webmaster is unable to
contact the SEO provider, that provider should automatically download a
fresh version of the site each time they prepare to work on it.
Commitment
Although this seems the simplest element to explain, there cannot be enough
said here to highlight its importance.
Firstly, SEO promotions inherently take time! Initial results are not always
instantaneous and will often take 1-3 months. Do not panic and change the
optimization of your web site! Day-to-day tweaking has long been a thing
of the past (since 1997/98 when Infoseek indexed every few hours) and such
alterations could harm your search engine standings.
Secondly, should the search engines change the rules without warning (this
has and can happen); your SEO representatives may need to reevaluate the
current status of your promotions. At this time it is more important than
ever to be calm and listen to the experienced advice that your SEO Company
provides. The reality of the Internet and the major search engines is that
they are ever-changing and all that an SEO can do in this situation is to
provide advice and re-optimize content if necessary.
Thirdly, as a veteran SEO I have often be faced with situations where,
despite our initial warnings on expectations, a client has placed all his/her
eggs in one basket. It is extremely important that Search Engine Optimization
is not the only advertising medium being used to promote your business!
There is no question that traditional search engine promotions are a proven
and effective form of promotion; to a degree, however, they are still governed
by chance and Murphy’s Law. This degree of chance is inevitably dependant
upon the competency of the SEO Company that you have chosen in combination
with the current stability of the search engines.
Finally, keep the lines of communication between your SEO’s, your
Webmaster, and your Marketing Staff clean and clear. This requires a commitment
of at least one meeting per month where each party can ask questions or
inform one another of their current status. This will serve to maintain
clarity throughout the promotion and allow your SEO’s to raise any
concerns regarding inefficiencies in communication or to note any upcoming
changes in the search engine world. It is important to note that SEO promotions
require continual maintenance and if your SEO Company smells some winds
of change in the major search engines then it would be a wise idea to weigh
their recommendations before dismissing them.
In Summary
Planning for an effective SEO campaign should be a part of a broader marketing
strategy. While top search engine placements will improve the visibility
of your website, it does not translate in to instant sales. We often tell
clients that we can bring customers to their door but we can’t make
them buy. Even in the Internet environment, brand recognition and loyalty
often help consumers choose which product to purchase. It helps if they not
only see your website but if they know your products as well. The easiest
way to sum it all up is in a series of two-word keyword phrases. Use Timing,
Good Organization, Commit Yourself, Be Patient, and Get Noticed.
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