The best SEO results come from not just hiring an agency, but working with them execute on their SEO strategy with the intent of targeting better search visibility. If you want to play an important role in ensuring the success of your SEO campaigns, here are some ways you can work alongside your agency to get better results, faster.
Disclose Other Services You Are Thinking Of Using
Your agency is working to implement an SEO strategy focused on getting results for your company. They are also working to keep your website safe from Google algorithm changes (like Panda and Penguin) and penalties. If you are tempted to try new things in the SEO world, such as signing up for that 500 link package offer you saw in a forum, you will want to discuss it with your agency first. Let them offer you that expert opinion in which you are investing. They should be able to save you from doing something that could damage your website in the long run.
Share Content Ideas
You know your industry better than anyone because you live and breathe it on a daily basis. Even if you don’t have the time or desire to create content, you likely have some great content ideas that pop up during the day-to-day operations. Each time you have a good content idea, send it over to your campaign manager. Or better yet, create a shared Google Spreadsheet that you can use to share ideas with others.
This approach will help your agency get to know your company and industry better, and ultimately allow them to create more effective content for your customer acquisition and retention. You don’t even need to think about how to use the content – give your agency the idea, and they can run with it.
Share Media & Assets that Augment the SEO Strategy
If your company is already creating media (videos, presentations, podcasts, webinars, etc.), then be sure to share them with your agency. Content can be repurposed in a variety of ways. Your videos, for example, could be transcribed and converted into blog posts, guest posts, ebooks, and another text-based piece of content.
Each piece of repurposed content can be utilized for SEO purposes. Let your campaign manager know when you have new content on the horizon so they can figure out the best way to get the most out of it.
Also, don’t forget your print content. New brochures, booklets, magazine ads, and other materials can be converted into online content, and then utilized for SEO purposes.
Discuss Website Changes First
On-site optimization plays a vital role in your website’s search visibility. What might seem like just a design change could affect the structure of your website. It could be something as simple as deleting or removing a page, adding your address and phone number in an image, or losing your site’s meta tags.
While these may not seem like big issues to you (or your web designer), they can have a major impact on your search. That one page on your website may have had a lot of links built to it. Removing it could mean the loss of traffic and domain authority. Putting local information into images could hurt your local rankings. SEO title and meta description tags may take a long time to re-write. Therefore, any website changes you plan to make need to be discussed in advance.
Backup & Secure Your Website
Regardless of whether you have an active SEO strategy in progress, it’s important to make sure you or your hosting company backs up your website‘s files on a regular basis. In addition, see if they offer virus and malware checking, or if you need to get this on your own.
Why are these things important? When your website is down, all the search visibility in the world doesn’t matter because no one can access your website when they click on your link. And when your website has been compromised by hackers and malware, Google is going to mark it as infected in search results. Both of these go against everything your agency has been working towards.
Be Open to New Strategies
The online world is always changing. Google is no different – in fact, they change the rules of the game so often that an SEO strategy that works today might not work tomorrow. Having an open mind to new strategies allows your agency to find the best avenue to your campaigns search marketing success.
Offer Access to Analytics, Google or Otherwise
If you want your agency to get results, then you need to give them a way to measure those results. Your agency can help your company set up your analytics to track conversion goals, and then use those goals to demonstrate the ROI of your SEO strategy. Conversion tracking is vital for both organic and paid search marketing campaigns.
Give Them the Heads Up
When something major happens with your company or your competitors, your agency needs to know as soon as possible. Here are just a few examples of situations that your agency can utilize.
Examples:
- Your company has an exciting announcement. Something exciting and new opens the door to press releases, media inquiries, blog posts, videos, podcasts interview requests, and similar, all of which can have a positive impact on search visibility.
- You receive a message in Google Webmaster Tools. If your agency doesn’t have access to it, they will need to know.
- Your competitor goes out of business. Let your agency know so that they can start acquiring your former competitor’s links. The agency will do this by asking websites to “update” links to your former competitor and suggest your company’s website as a suitable replacement.
- Your company suffers a reputation management crisis. The sooner your agency knows that something negative has surfaced about your company online, the sooner they can start employing tactics to ensure you keep as much of your brand’s first-page search results positive.
- Your boss wants to cut the online marketing budget. Letting your agency know this is in advance will allow them to put together documentation that you can use to demonstrate the value of your SEO campaign so far and forecast future results.
Educate Yourself on SEO Best Practices
Finally, educate yourself in SEO practices. If you stay up to date on the latest SEO techniques and strategies, you’ll be able to think of more ways to aid your agency in creating the best campaigns possible. You’ll also be able to streamline the conversations between you and your agency more because you will both speak the same language.
While your agency can execute a solid SEO strategy without your help, they can go above and beyond with your help. Be sure to ask your agency how you can help with SEO today!
