|
SEO Business – The Joys of Reselling
By Jim Hedger, StepForth News Editor, StepForth Placement
Inc. October 12 2005
» Click here for  PDF &  Word
Versions
As a facet of the Internet economy, search engine optimization is a specialized
service that shares several characteristics with other web-based businesses.
While the objects of our labours might be seen and used by millions
of unique people in millions of unique places, our workspace consists
of a 17” – 24” monitor, a miniature window on an exponentially
expanding world. A 24” portal might seem small by modern building
standards but as both Yahoo and Google will tell you, size is not the
issue, depth is. That 24 inches represents the largest window of opportunity
anyone could ever open.
One of the greatest characteristics of the online economy is that the Internet
has created a common space shared by over ¼ of the planet’s
population. This has fostered an environment in which information, which
is the only product actually created on the Internet, is transcontinentally
transportable. Information products can be created and posted to the ‘net
from anywhere in the world. A site designed in Bangor Maine is just as accessible
in Mexico City as one designed in Bangalore India. That site can also be
worked on by anyone in the world. For example, a small online search marketing
office in Victoria BC can work on the website of a major Canadian fashion
retailer as if the staff were housed in the Montreal headquarters of the
much larger firm. One of our employees has actually based himself in the
far northern regions of British Columbia, near the 60-degree line that marks
boarder to the Yukon.
For those of us working on the production side of the monitor, the Internet
is more than a marketplace; it is the primary space in which we do business.
Discussion forums are meeting halls and a corporate boardroom can take the
form of a multi-user chat environment. Over the past decade, the Web has
grown to become one of the fastest growing employer sectors, allowing virtually
anyone with skills, talent and connectivity to start their own business.
Social and professional networks that have developed over time between complimentary
service providers have spurred much of that growth. Like the world of traditional
businesses, word-of-mouth recommendation continues to be the best way for
online businesses to attract new clients.
After a decade of development, the Internet has become a far more complicated
working environment in which micro-specialization is necessary. For instance,
many web design firms turn to third-party vendors to provide customizable
shopping carts for their clients. The artistic function of a website is
far different than the commercial function of a shopping cart, requiring
entirely different skill sets to create. Both the website design firm and
the website application firm benefit from their relationship and, provided
both do right by their shared clients, can build lasting reciprocal relationships
into the future.
For search engine marketing firms, there are a lot of complimentary businesses
out there all of which are looking to add value to the services they can
offer their clients. SEO firms dedicated to organic placement and SEM firms
dedicated to the management of paid-search advertising campaigns are the
first and most obvious matches for reciprocal relationships. Unfortunately,
most SEO and SEM firms continue to try to be all things to all clients and
have not yet realized gains from the natural synergy between SEO and SEM
firms.
Aside from members of the search marketing industry, most obvious natural
relationships for SEOs are with website design firms. More often than
not made up of less than five employees, most website design firms survive
from month to month without creating long-term sustainable income sources.
They create stunning sites for their clients but those sites are often
one-time design contracts. These firms are rarely able to wrangle a multi-year
maintenance contract from their clients who are often small businesses
themselves.
Another obvious area for SEOs to find long-term referral relationships
is with mainstream advertising and public relations firms. These businesses
serve clients with a pressing need for organic search engine placements.
As noted in countless articles and surveys over the past year, most large
corporations and many smaller ones with recognizable brand names have neglected
organic optimization on their sites. As the PPC market shifts, many of these
businesses are again looking to their advertising agencies for search marketing
advice. While the established ad-agencies are expert at nearly every aspect
of marketing in the world, they have not become experts at search engine
marketing, as shown by the search placement of many of their largest clients.
A third place for SEO firms to establish relationships is with local or
regional Internet Service Providers and hosting firms. Local ISPs are often
the first place new online businesses seek advice and establish a professional
relationship with an online third-party vendor. ISPs are always looking
for ways to improve on services they offer their clients and working with
an ethical SEO firm is a good match.
There are literally dozens of other opportunities for search engine optimization
and other web-service firms to do business together. Our firm, StepForth
Placement has been working with a growing network of service-resellers for
about two years. In this time, we have developed a simple, two tier reselling
system that works well for our company and the firms we do business with.
The first tier is called Direct Sale and offers resellers a 10% commission
on all referrals that convert to contracts. In other words, a business we
have a relationship with markets our service and receives a 10% commission
on our initial service fee. Under this system, a $3000 SEO contract nets
the reseller $300. This is obviously our most popular package as it gives
the reselling firm a quick payment without them accepting responsibility
for the success of the SEO campaign or for communication with the client.
The second tier is called Value Added and allows the reseller to offer
search engine optimization and market research services. Here the reseller
charges whatever they feel their market will bear for our services. In exchange
for this, they accept all responsibility for the success of the SEO campaign
and communication with the client. This type of package is most popular
with larger advertising firms and for SEM firms that wish to also offer
SEO services via a third-party vendor. (Oftentimes a client may not even
be aware the SEO campaign is conducted by an outside firm.)
Reselling SEO services offers many advantages over trying to offer those
services in-house. While search engine optimization can be compared to common
sense website design there is a lot of common sense to be learned. Professional
SEO firms have already invested the time to learn the ethical techniques
that can place a site in the Top10 at the major search engines. Reselling
SEO services offers site design companies and advertising firms another
marketing avenue they can confidently market to their clients. It can also
provide a side stream income that can help smaller companies with their
monthly bottom lines.
Many SEO firms have some form of reseller option available to complimentary
web-service businesses. For those that don’t, offering a fee for referral
program is a relatively simple way to increase business while developing
long-term relationships with other web-professionals around the world.
For more information on StepForth Placement’s reseller program, please
visit our SEO Resellers site.
BACK to
the StepForth Search Engine News
|
