SEO Consulting For Big Brand Websites – 20 Tips on Dealing With Different Levels of Administrators
SEO consultation for large brand websites challenges the SEO consultants with unique situations. Dealing with the different levels of executives and managers is one of these unique problems.In reality the actual SEO techniques used for small sites and large sites do not necessarily change. However, the problems which SEO consultants have to overcome can be far apart. One factor is of course the size of the web site. Small sites may contain a few hundred pages whereas large corporate sites contain thousands of pages that continue to grow with time. The other major factor is the number of people who are involved in managing and maintaining these large websites. In a small website, it is usually the business owner who will take all the decisions, but with a large website ten persons or more could be involved in the process.The following tips will help SEO consultants survive the experience of providing SEO consulting to big brand companies:1 – The vital element in providing SEO consulting to these big sites is to start an educative training program to inform all involved levels and departments of the importance of applying sound search engine optimization techniques as well as how, when and where to apply these techniques.2 – The top administrative levels are more important to convince of the essential need for effective SEO practices. They are the decision makers and the survival of the whole SEO project depends on them.3 – The staff of different departments must be involved in the process, from the web development team to the marketing team, sales representatives and even financial officers and controllers who determine budgets. SEO is a team effort so anyone who is involved with the web site development, from designers up to the CEO must be included.4 – All levels need education and training to have a common language and realistic expectations. Based on his or her initial evaluation of the company’s website, an SEO consultant should prepare a comprehensive educational and training seminar or workshop for the staff.5 – An SEO consultant must try to arrange a weekly or monthly seminar to all staff and executives involved in the SEO project to explain to them the process and set realistic expectations to avoid failure.6 – SEO consultants must avoid any personality conflicts or issues at all costs; they may cause failure of the whole project. Many SEO companies charge more for the difficulty to work with administrators.7 – As an SEO consultant you must be able to teach and train the executives and staff. In the mean time, an SEO consultant must be capable and ready to learn and acquire new expertise from each member in the team mainly through different questions and challenges that will arise during the long process of SEO.An SEO consultant, executives and other staff members must be able to work together as a productive team, share experience and learn from each other.8 – Be realistic. Every body must know that SEO is a team work and it takes a lot of time and hard work to show results.9 – Be motivational and keep the enthusiasm of all the team high.10 – Evaluate and update knowledge and the information of the executives. A lot of their information is obtained from forums and blogs which are at most times outdated and wrong.11 – Make it clear to all the SEO team that for each hour of SEO consultant’s work, there is 6 – 8 hours needed by the company staff to implement and do the recommended changes.12 – SEO Consultants must be able to explain and justify every recommendation or change they ask for.13- Select areas where SEO will be successful or easy to show quick results first.14 – Explain to the SEO team that all recommendations must be followed, not only part of them. To get to the first page is like competing in the Olympics: every effort must be done to get the gold medal. It is very competitive out there.15 – Company executives usually ask for a Traffic estimate, so you must have a goal.To estimate the expected increase in the search engine traffic, you need to find out the monthly search volume for all the long tail keyword phrases that you are optimizing for. Usually you will get 10% of these searches if you managed to get your long tail keyword phrases to the first page of Google.In reality, SEO is not about ranking, it is about traffic. Every body must start to understand this important fact.16 – Prepare a set of tools to allow you to monitor and track different sources of traffic and every possible change in your progress.17 – Define your base line before you start, so you can evaluate your progress and measure of success. Decide where you are in ranking and traffic and what your goals are.18 – Every executive is eager to see results and success. Explain to everybody that it takes as long as it takes; it is not like PPC. We have no control on Google spiders. Traffic will reach its goal, but how long it will take is not an easy question to answer. Many factors can cause delays. Google changes its algorithm more than 400 times a year. Search engines take time to consider these links, some times up to several months and the competition is optimizing and affecting our results every day.A stable search engine ranking for a competitive keyword can take anywhere from 4-12 months, but you have to remain focused on the ranking objective over time19 -Weekly or monthly prepare reports to show continuous improvement once the SEO strategy is in place.20 – Carefully analyze and interpret the results from different tools, and publish to executives these regular reports about the progress in ranking, traffic and link popularity.By following these recommendations, SEO consultants can ensure a smooth productive relationship with different levels of executives of big brand companies and all other staff members involved in the long exhaustive process of search engine optimization.