How to Sell SEO Services
If you are receiving leads that are interested in your SEO services, you have to know how to identify effective SEO strategies that are both cost effective and ROI friendly. Further, since most prospects shop around for quotes, it is important to go the extra mile and discover strategies and existing SEO issues that your competitors have missed. This extra effort will make your proposal stand out and position you as the expert in your field. Plus, in addition to having the most comprehensive proposal, you will also have a solid strategy in place when you close the deal and are ready to start implementing.
1. Evaluate the Client Niche
Whether I get a lead from our website or a phone call, the first thing I try to do is to get a sense of the size of the company. What are they selling? Are they interesting in a local, a national or an international campaign? Would it be geo-specific? Have they already worked with another SEO agency? If so, why are they switching? How many visitors are they currently getting to their site? Are they running a PPC campaign? How much are they currently spending on PPC?
Gathering all this information not only creates a dialogue between you and the potential client, it also provides you with relevant information, letting you know what kind of budget they are expecting to see.
2. Keyword Search Volume Analysis
Start by running a keyword analysis to find out which keywords are relevant and how competitive those keywords are. I recommend using either Google’s Keyword Tool or Done! SEO’s geo-specific Keyword Research Tool. Once you have run the analysis, export the results into an Excel spreadsheet, deleting non-relevant keywords as you go. For example, I usually ignore keywords that have less than 1k monthly search traffic on Google or keywords that are not niche specific or are too broad. Don’t worry if your list ends up containing 100 + keywords, even after weeding out non-relevant terms. Those extra keywords will help you later on when you need to up-sell your services as a part of your SEO campaign’s second phase.
3. Keyword Ranking Analysis
Run a preliminary keyword ranking analysis using the list of keywords from the last step. I often use SEO Book’s Rank Checker for this task as it is very fast. From this analysis look to see which keywords are already receiving good rankings (if any) and which are not. It is also important to note which keywords are closest to first page rankings, as that will let you know how much work it will require to get your prospective client onto the first page.
Along with your proposal send your client the keyword search volume report as well. This lets them see how much potential traffic is available for any given keyword. Now, understandably your prospect won’t be receiving 100% of all available traffic, no matter your SEO skills, but it will bring measurable results. Have a look at this article on Google First Page Ranking and CTR to get more info on how much traffic you can expect from a first page ranking.
4. Analyze Traffic Data
If possible, ask the client if they can add you to their Google Analytics statistics. This will not only give you relevant information as to how far along their site has come, in terms of traffic, but it will also help you further develop the relationship with the client, as you will be evaluating their Google stats for free. With this access, find out where their traffic is coming from, if they set up their site’s “goals,” if the site is converting, and how high their bounce rate is. All this information will give you further insight into what their site’s status quo is. It will also help you identify missed opportunities, which you can then address in your proposal.
5. Check Search Engine Indexing
Sometimes you will have a site that has really good PR rankings and a good inbound link count, but horrible on-page SEO. If so, this suggests the site could make huge forward movements with only some minor (and inexpensive) changes to the site. Check to see if and how the site is indexed by using the following search string on Google: “site:www.YourProspect.com”. Furthermore, if you know the site has about 40 pages, but only two are indexed, you know there is a problem with the indexing of the site. Dig a bit further and check to see if there is a site map. You might also ask for access to their Google Webmaster Tools data as that would provide you with even more interesting and valuable information, including existing SEO issues Google already knows about. And again, you are demonstrating that you will go the extra mile for a client.
6. Evaluate On-Page Content:
Does the site have keyword-rich content? If not, you will want to include content development into your proposal as well.
7. Identify On-Page SEO Issues
Before putting together a proposal you will need to evaluate how much work is required to clean up already existing SEO issues. Check for the following:
• Flash Sites: Is the site built using flash? If so, you will have a really hard time finding SEO results. Ask the client if they are interested in a site redesign, if that is something your company offers.
• Database: Is the site database driven with non-SEO friendly URLs, poor site navigation and duplicate content? Ask if they have an IT team familiar with the site that can implement your SEO recommendations. If not, you have to think hard about whether you are willing to make those foundational changes yourself, or if you are even capable of doing so.
• On page coding: Look for the following tags on relevant pages and make sure they are unique to each page: Title Tag, Meta Tag, H1 tag, external CSS/JS, and SEO-friendly navigation.
8. Evaluate The Competition
Run a search for one of the geo-specific keywords your prospect should rank for. Have a look at the sites ranking on the first page and see how strong they are. I primarily look at the amount and quality of inbound links from these sites since link building is often the most time consuming and costly component of any SEO campaign.
9. Google Local Business Listings:
Check to see if the site is listed on Google’s local business listings. Since the local business listings ranks above the organic search results, adding a site to Google’s local business listing can be huge for a client.
10. Business Profiles
Propose to add your potential client’s website to relevant business profile sites, such as Hotfrog or Yelp for example. These listings can rank on the first page of Google alongside their company site, providing them the potential for multiple first page listings. Furthermore, some of these sites, like Yelp, have popular iPhone apps that can drive further traffic and business to your client’s site. Make sure, though, that they understand that user-generated sites like these offer the potential for negative feedback.
11. Putting It All Together
At this point you should now have sufficient information to put together a comprehensive proposal for any prospective client. You will now want to formulate and list your findings within the proposal, letting the client see all the work involved in optimizing their site and ranking relevant keywords. Don’t worry about giving away your information for free. In my experience this approach pays back over and over again. After you have sent your proposal, wait a few days before contacting them again to address any questions or concerns they might have.
Should they have budget restraints, see if there are any components in your proposal that could be handled by the client instead. For example, if their budget is small, you might want to take on an advisory role and have them implement the SEO recommendations themselves. Or, you might reduce the amount of content you are planning to develop for their site. Wherever you decide to cut, though, be sure to then communicate to the client how that will affect their campaign.