seojealous

as promised, part deux!

establish clear conversion benchmarks up front
before contracts are signed and work begins, sit down with clients and listen attentively as they discuss their goals. if their expectations are unrealistic, this is the time for damage control - not six months down the road. 

if the site will be used as a lead-generation tool, direct contacts may be your primary conversion goal. be prepared to measure all contacts generated by the site, including email, intake form submissions, and phone calls. if the website will also support client communication and retention, establish a set of secondary conversion benchmarks related to these goals. secondary conversions could include online coupon downloads, newsletter subscriptions, contest entries, etc.

when specific goals aren’t established up front, how do clients determine the ’success’ or ‘failure’ of their site? they usually latch on to the only visible signal they have: rank. when a client is obsessed with their position, any fluctuation is bound to give them conniptions. and since rankings are fluid and relative (more so now than ever before), conniptions are almost inevitable. even if you get great exposure for your most prized keywords, those rankings are worthless if you don’t convert visitors and generate revenue. you may drive a flood of traffic to a website, but if you fail to establish clear conversion goals, it’s going to be hard to declare success.

choose an appropriate analytics tool
different tools have very different levels of user-friendliness, ranging from girl-next-door to no-chance-of-parole. if you’re doing all the dirty work yourself and preparing neat, tidy summaries to clients on a regular basis, by all means use whatever you like best. but if you have a hands-on client who wants access to their data in real time, choose a program with a user-friendly interface. avoid analytics rage at all costs - no matter how good those results are, they’ll never adequately impress if your client is in a frustrated state of mind every time he or she checks in.

if you do opt to give clients access to their analytics, don’t just send their login information and back away. have a training session. teach them what they’re looking at, and focus on the metrics that show important performance trends. without baseline training, too much information is a dangerous thing.

track all phone leads
this is an absolutely critical step. even if you have an intake form on your site, many users will find it simpler pick up the phone and call. people searching for service providers often seek an immediate response, and depending on your client’s vertical, an email volley may be out of the question (e.g. referring keyword: twin cities plumber emergency 24 hrs).

the most effective phone tracking method is to dedicate a single phone number exclusively to your web traffic. consider obtaining a unique toll-free number, post it on the website, and never list it in any other marketing materials. if your client prefers to use a local number (and this may be a good idea if you’re relying heavily on local search), dedicate a separate cell phone number to the website (you may also want to use this number for IYP submissions & local search engine profiles). when the phone bill comes, all incoming calls generated by site are listed right there.

granted, you could also give the receptionist a stack of post-its and pencil to keep tally, but this is hardly science. 

expectations gone awry
here’s a case study: a local seo signed on to do some extensive contract work for a financial services company. the owners assured this unsuspecting seo that once they got people on the phone or in the office, they could close the deal with 1/3 of their prospects. they just needed him to get the leads, and offered unsuspecting seo a hefty bonus based on the number of accounts opened.

a few months into the project, unsuspecting seo discovered he had generated approximately 500 promising leads that had never been contacted by the financial firm. no phone calls, no emails, no appointments scheduled. so despite the highly effective generation of qualified leads, unsuspecting seo had no chance of seeing that promised bonus money.

earlier this year, the number of clients asking questions about local search started to skyrocket. that funny little map kept showing up in search results, and new blog posts and articles sprang up everywhere. this baseline awareness is a start, but so much confusion still surrounds local search optimization and how it functions as a marketing tool. to people absorbed in the search sphere, most local search concepts and techniques seem fairly straightforward. but after numerous conversations with non-search humans, i can confirm that they must be tricky enough. a few pesky client misconceptions:

1. there are only three local results. obsession with the one-box runs rampant! many people are blown away when you demonstrate that google maps, yahoo local, and live search local can actually produce whole pages full of local business results. it’s no wonder google has pushed so hard to integrate local results into their traditional serps. so many typical search users don’t realize they have a choice.

2. google is sending me junk mail. the post card verification requirement gets them every time. stop throwing that away!

3. faking client testimonials on 3rd-party review sites is a great idea. people, don’t fake it (i’m sure numerous articles in back-issues of cosmo would back me up). gaming user-generated content may be tempting, but readers have a knack for sniffing out insincerity, and they don’t have a high-tolerance for thinly-veiled attempts at manipulation. positive reviews in citysearch, insider pages and other sources can be great conversion tools; don’t turn them into big turnoffs. try encouraging real, live customers to spread some goodwill if they’ve had a good experience.

it’s always an adventure.