The Real Cost of SEO: It�s not Budget, It�s Believers!
Some familiar ground covered re the problems in converting others to the benefits of organic search optimisation....The Real Cost of SEO: It�s not Budget, It�s Believers!:
"If organic optimization is so effective, why isn't it a more common strategy?" Great question. Unfortunately, the answer isn't an easy one.
Requirements:
One: Corporate Understanding
The problem with organic optimization is that it can't be owned by any one department in a larger organization. While a sponsored campaign can be launched by a single department, or individual for that matter, with no impact on any other department, organic optimization needs buy in throughout an organization...we generally see the best optimization on sites where C-level executives are close to the front lines, believers in optimization, and can give a single go ahead that will open the required doors for organic optimization to happen. The bigger the organization, the more unlikely it is that this will happen.
Two: A Friendly IT Department
Three: No Sacred Cows
Four: Champions with Perseverance and Thick Skins
If you still need convincing re the payoff from organic SEO he states the following:
- What's good for a search engine is good for humans. The changes that make your site easier to index are almost always changes your visitors will appreciate as well. More content, less unnecessary Flash, standard navigation options and cleaner code will bring you in line with long standing usability guidelines.
- Organic traffic is not dependant on budget. This traffic base goes on, day after day, whether you're topping up your AdWords account or not.
- Organic optimization gets less painful the longer you go. Once you make the commitment, the painful part can be over relatively soon, but you'll be reaping the benefits for years to come.
- You'll reach a whole new market segment. People tend to look at organic listings when they're in the research phase, higher in the buying funnel. This gives you the chance to intercept them earlier and build a relationship that can last a long time.
Ends with "a painful real world example to prove my point. We had the CEO of a company bring us on to help with organic optimization. But rather than pave the way for success, he threw us to the lions and quickly exited the scene. We identified the issues keeping them from higher visibility on the search engines, outlined our recommendations and handed them over to the IT team for implementation. And there they sat, and sat, and sat. Meanwhile, the IT team pursued their own agenda, spinning their wheels on minutia while ignoring the fundamental issues that had already been identified. Our frustration level rose, as did the CEO's, who was wondering why he wasn't going anywhere. Guess who the internal IT team pointed the finger at? Eventually, we and the client parted ways. We couldn't win, and the client was getting no value from recommendations that no one would follow.
We usually monitor activity for a period of time following the termination of a contract. Eventually, this client did get around to doing one or two of the things we recommended. These were relatively easy fixes, but the results were dramatic. The result: a 448% increase in visibility in the organic listings. Of course, at this point, no one will remember who made the original recommendation. All they'll remember is that they only saw improvement after they got rid of their SEO company."
posted by Jen @ 8:46 AM
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