Forge Search Marketing » Company Insight

Client Education is Essential to Conducting Good Business

Matt Mehlhope — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 13:15:55 +0000

While myths are apparent in any industry, SEO is inundated with bad information and as a result a lot of our clients are initially skeptical or have had bad experiences with previous consultants or agencies. So, in the early stages of meeting with a new or potential client we have a very definitive approach to earning their trust that revolves around client education and transparency.

Initially, we establish how much knowledge the client has about the work they are asking us to perform and then immediately clear up any misconceptions they have with sound documentation. A wonderful recent example of this is how a client did not understand how Quality Score for Google Adwords worked and was skeptical when we suggested adding a few pages of valuable content to his website.

We explained that one of the factors Google looks at for Quality Score is where the pay-per-click advertisement links to and what content that page has. Thus, by adding a few pages to his site that detailed individual services, not only would the Quality Score of specific advertisements go up, yielding lower cost-per-click values, but the pages could also be used for organic rankings. To help prove our claims, we provided the client with some Quality Score documentation straight from Google. The result? A client that was not only better educated about the service he was getting, but visibly excited for newfound possibilities.

With myths debunked and trust established, we maintain an open line of communication with our clients and explain in detail the process that we are going to take to garner results. Within the conversations about our work, we often find that our educated clients ask more informed questions and are able to assist us in making the best decisions for their business, yielding a very healthy working relationship.

Our goal as a company is not simply to provide a service, but to provide knowledge. Not only do our clients get the results they deserve with a substantial ROI, but they learn how to be – excuse our French – bullshit detectors for SEO and out web related services. Thus, we are fervent believers that client education is essential to conducting good business.

Best Tools For SEO Companies – Guest Post on MakeItRank.com

Matt Mehlhope — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:40:59 +0000

Our good friend Kevin Spence over at MakeItRank.com invited us to guest post on his SEO blog and to share some more of our experiences in working with clients. As a result, we compiled a list of some of the best tools for seo companies to use to interact with their clients. The article is highly comprehensive that discusses how the tools mentioned allow for high levels of communication and transparency, ultimately resulting in client trust and loyalty. We hope you enjoy the article as much as we enjoyed writing it!

You can view the article here.

Local Organic Rankings Review: October 2009 – January 2010

Matt Mehlhope — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 20:45:19 +0000

Our website launched just a few months ago and as any SEO practitioner knows, organic rankings take time, strategy and a great deal of effort to achieve the ideal results. In comparison to some websites out there, ours is in its infancy and because of such it is necessary for us to reflect upon our own organic SEO endeavors to see how we are performing. Generally, organic SEO performance reviews include a wide variety of KPIs, but for the sake of this article, we’re simply going to show you some key local organic rankings we’ve achieved. It’s always good to show our readers and potential clients that we aren’t all talk and that we do garner some rather impressive results, so below we’ve compiled some examples of our progress.

Local Organic Ranking Domination

One of our initial key goals that we not only set for some of our clients, but ourselves, was that we wanted to establish local dominance on a city and state level. Even though our services are international, it’s particularly nice to have a “home base” where you are the known figure for a certain product or service where you can meet you clients face to face. Thus, since we are based in Lexington, KY we initiated a strategy that would yield top results.

Local Keyword Rankings *

SEO Company KY – #1 Organic Ranking
SEO Company Kentucky – #2 Organic Ranking
SEO Company Lexington – #2 Organic Ranking
SEO Company Lexington, KY – #3 Organic Ranking
Search Marketing Lexington – #3 Organic Ranking
Search Marketing Lexington, KY – #2 Organic Ranking
Search Marketing Kentucky – #2 Organic Ranking


Considering the sizable amount of competition for these terms (over 5,000,000 results combined), we are very happy to see these results so quickly and to know that we are establishing ourselves in the community. In addition, because this is highly targeted traffic it often yields conversions, which results in more happy search marketing clients. In the coming weeks we will be putting up some impressive case studies for some of our recent clients that we have helped garner impressive results - some of which came from the very searches listed above!
* Keep in mind that search results are not static and they may fluctuate a bit from computer to computer.



What’s It Like To Work With Forge?
Matt Mehlhope — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 19:13:49 +0000
Our focus as a company has always been to provide highly professional, transparent SEO services to our clients and communication is a critical part of that. In conversations with our clients we get to learn about the reasons why they picked Forge to be their SEO company, why (or if) they were apprehensive before signing on, and all the juicy morsels of feedback and criticism that we can handle. In this article, we aim to shed a little light on how we go about our day to day activities and how we interact with our clients.



Getting Started

Whether our conversation has been started from you filling out our contact form, being referred by a past client, or introduced by a mutual friend, we are always thinking about the long term goals of you and your business. SEO is a long term solution for a long term issue and the best part about working at an SEO company is that every single client is unique: the website, the business model, the problems and the potential solutions for those problems. We will ask you multitude questions and it isn’t because we’re being intrusive, it’s because we know that the only way to really give you the results you deserve is by knowing all relevant details about your brand. We strive to shape your web presence in a way that is in line with your vision.
Work

As we begin to do research and analysis based on the initial discussions we’ve had with you, we like to keep you informed every step of the way because communication is critical to our transparency. It isn’t uncommon for us to send you several documents for review in the early stages of research while we further our understanding of your brand. The best part about the initial research and analysis phase is that you will often learn more about how your customers and clients find you than you have ever known. “Who knew that ‘flash drive’ was 8x more likely to be searched for than ‘thumb drive’?!” or, “‘Best Buy gift card’ is 25x more popular than ‘Best Buy rewards card’?”. The little bits of knowledge that are gained at this stage of cooperation with Forge are not only enlightening, but it allows us to start shaping your web presence for the better.

After reviewing and refining the initial SEO stategy, we meet with you on several occasions to establish the exact techniques that will be used to meet your goals. Whether our methods include on-page optimization to make your website search engine friendly, the establishment of a pay per click campaign, or a social media marketing strategy, we will always set obtainable goals to measure progress. You aren’t going to get on the front page of Google in 48 hours (and anyone that tells you this is bold-faced lying to you), but you will definitely see significant increases in website traffic and conversions in a realistic time frame – that’s why you hired us, isn’t it?
Presentation and Interaction

SEO has never been known for being a simple or easy to understand methodology as a means to increase a website’s performance, but that doesn’t mean that our clients are ever left in the dark. While working with you and explaining our plans for action, we provide information in a very clear, easy to understand manner. Our favorite way to interact with clients is by conducting webinars with tools such as GoTo Meeting.

Nothing is quite as satisfying as walking a client through their analytics and having them understand all the metrics they are seeing. We don’t simply aim to present, we aim to educate. We want our clients to become more knowledgeable about how SEO works so that they can better understand the web and the ranking reports we send them. Furthermore, we are able to address questions, concerns, and often make changes right in front of our clients’ eyes, giving them the satisfaction that their feedback is being heard and acted upon.
Robert Devito of First American Capital and Trading Corp had this to say:

“Forge’s webinars were concise, educational and comprehensive; enabling them to deliver valuable information to a captive audience translating into real-time results for my company.”

Additionally, we are able to be contacted via a plethora of mediums so we are always available. You can contact us through traditional mediums such as the phone, email or our website, or can you could schedule a meeting with us through Twitter or even Facebook. No matter where you are or what you’re doing, we’re here when you need us.
Conclusion

We hope this article has helped you to better understand how we interact with our clients on a day to day basis and will make you more comfortable with choosing us for your SEO needs. We would love to hear any comments or questions you have, so please either leave us a comment, or contact us in one of the many ways we listed above!