Why SEO Companies Need to be Able to Prove their Worth
The ever-changing economic climate has seen a dramatic increase in companies, both large and small, looking to cut expenditures in order to successfully make more money than they spend, with marketing often being one of the first things to be cut or reduced. Increasingly, this decision is being made without any real thought as to what the campaign is bringing them in terms of revenue and leads. In cases like this, it’s vital that we make ourselves accountable for exactly what we bring each and every client as best as we can.
To help the client identify the importance of the service you provide, you need to be able to ask the client questions which will make them consider the importance of their SEO campaign. This can be achieved by asking questions with facts attached, such as:
- We’re bringing you
X enquiries each month that can be attributed to the work we are doing – can you afford to lose those enquiries?
- Based on your average order value and conversion rate figures, we’re bringing you around £X of revenue, generating you £X profit each month. Can you afford to lose that revenue stream?
- X% of your £X revenue this month was generated as a result of someone’s first interaction being through Google’s organic search, this was as a result of our work on X keywords.
Businesses are more in tune with their revenue streams more now than ever, and because of this they are looking at different ways they can attribute sales to different revenue streams. Lauren Vaccarello went through this in a lot of detail at Distilled’s SearchLove Conference in London 2012; and she describes ways which businesses can attribute revenue values to each stream for the sales they make.
Based on this, companies have a much better idea of how to split their overall marketing budget across different mediums. This makes it clear which streams are less effective at generating revenue in relation to their cost.
With this in mind, it’s important to stress that SEO is a marketing strategy which is known for being a cost-effective means of generating revenue. And although this does depend on whether the campaign is executed well or not, it also depends and whether the SEO consultant has reported their work and whether they have done themselves justice in the information they report. So make sure you report everything to your client, and add value to it by outlining what your service is earning them in revenue.
To successfully make your client money it’s imperative that you see the bigger picture and develop a strategy which will make the most of the campaign and the revenue it generates. Not only this, but it’s important that this is put across effectively in your reporting and the conversations you have with the clients.
It’s not just about having the SEO tool belt but the tools which go in it – and of course the ability to use them when you need them! One core skill which is often mistakenly overlooked is the ability to communicate well with the client, so that they have all the facts and figures to make the right decision for the success of their company.
December 13th, 2012
This is a great article Ash. I certainly fully concur with you that business owners need to have it quantified and clearly explained to them exactly how the SEO Service benefits their bottom line in terms of lead numbers what that will mean in terms of how many clients they should get a month based on likely conversions etc.
I think this is a must in not just SEO but any type of business where you’re selling a proposition to someone, they have to be clear on what’s in it for them. I think that cure reports are not nearly as important in SEO as results and the ranking improvments the client/s is/are seeing.