The Ultimate Guide for Justifying SEO Strategy

Most customers have some knowledge of SEO, but they don’t know how to fully take advantage of its potential. During your SEO sales presentations, you should teach your clients about the best ways to use SEO.

This is part of your client management.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a field that has many subfields. The challenge with justifying SEO strategy comes from explaining all the different ways to improve SEO in a way that clients will understand.

Your customers will have a better understanding of SEO when you tell them about its importance in modern digital marketing strategies without getting too technical. 

Here are some actionable tips that you can use to justify your SEO strategy.

Share a Brief History of SEO With Them

Seasoned online marketers know the value of SEO because they have witnessed its growth firsthand. The new algorithm updates make sense to these kinds of people, and they recognize the value of some SEO strategies over others. Understanding the why and the how of SEO can be more challenging for someone without this background knowledge.

Let Them Know That SEO is About Humans, Not Robots

It’s understandable if a newcomer to SEO is put off by discussions of “search bots” and “algorithms,” and they may even wonder why such things are prioritized over marketing to actual humans.

However, SEO is designed with people in mind.

To compete in a world where Google uses bots and algorithms to help people find the content most relevant to them, we need to focus on creating unique and engaging content that addresses the specific needs of humans. 

Inform your client that one of the benefits of implementing SEO strategies is improving the customer experience. 

Give Some Easy-To-Understand Examples of SEO Techniques

As a seasoned online marketer, you may know the meaning of metadata, semantic search, keywords, on-page and off-page ranking factors, search engine algorithms, and link profiles. However, all these sound like gibberish to a newbie. Avoid bombarding your client with jargon. Instead, focus on the basics such as the examples shown below: 

“Google values inbound links because they show that other sites find the content you provide useful.”

“To understand what your website is all about, Google looks at the content actual words on the web page and also considers information that can’t be seen by users.” 

“Keywords are the words or phrases that people enter into search engines like Google to find specific information.” 

Focus on breaking complex concepts into simple ones that anyone can understand. As your clients’ knowledge of SEO grows, it will be easier for you to explain more advanced ideas to them. 

Show Them Why SEO is Necessary for Their Business 

When trying to justify an SEO strategy to new clients, keep these three things in mind: 

• Describe SEO in a language that they are used to.
• Show them that SEO is still relevant.
• Explain SEO’s value in the simplest way possible.

When you’re meeting a new client for the first time, use the fact that they’re interested in SEO as a springboard into a deeper discussion about how to prove the value of SEO.

Clients who are slow to adopt SEO and who don’t realize that “online is the new offline” are missing out. Today, you can find almost any business on the web, and most people are used to buying things and doing other things entirely online. 

The benefits of search engine optimization are debatable. Customers should prioritize SEO because almost everyone uses the internet to learn more about a topic. Most visitors will find your site through an organic search, so your Google page rank is crucial to your online presence. You might look up Italian restaurants in your area on Google Maps, peruse their menus, and read customer reviews online before deciding where to eat 

Things to Note While Justifying SEO Strategy

Assess SEO Knowledge

While the majority of customers have some understanding of SEO, they are often less conversant with other terms used in the industry. Try to gauge their SEO level as soon as possible so that you can help them close any gaps in their understanding.

To gauge your clients’ knowledge of SEO, always maintain eye contact with them during conversations.

Through this, you will know if you need to explain some of the technical terms or if you can offer a simple definition and move on.

Help Your Clients Understand SEO

While you do your best to teach your clients during your in-person meetings, you should also focus on providing blogs on your site that cover various facets of search engine optimization as additional resources for those who want to dig deeper into a specific topic.

The idea is that they will return to your site for updated SEO information over time, which is a fantastic way to keep reusing your content. 

You can also help your clients know more about SEO by explaining the following points to them:

• Most of the people that visit a website did so because they found it through an organic search.
• SEO optimization increases consumer confidence in your products and services.
• SEO makes it easier for customers to choose your business by putting it in places where potential customers spend time.

Clarify Goals

To ensure that an SEO report corresponds with monthly deliverables, ensure you clarify the goals and the workflow. These are the kinds of behind-the-scenes efforts that will win you accolades from your customers.

Share Reports With Your Clients

Clients will learn that a lot more time is required than they initially anticipated during the planning process for improving SEO results. To help them understand this, show them reports that comprise the lists below:

• Emails
• Calls
• Custom KPI reports

Understand and Use a Learning Style That is Suitable for Your Client

There are three primary approaches to learning: verbal, physical, and visual. The use of one or more of these techniques is useful for emphasizing specific points. 

In-person and telephone consultations with some of your clients can prove fruitful. For some customers, a diagram, sketch, or chart is what you need to justify an SEO strategy. They can’t understand the concept unless you physically show them how it works. The most effective method of doing this is by using an analogy or providing a digital illustration.

Wrapping Up

Offering SEO services is not just limited to getting results (although that is important). People are now more comfortable with and adept at using modern technologies than ever before. Hence, it is important to give customers credit for what they know and also educate them about the things that affect SEO “behind the scenes.” 

Customers will be more convinced of the value of SEO after you have helped them understand the concept behind it. SEO professionals can boost their reputations if they can explain and show how valuable they are.

Elena Zelencova

Elena is an SEO and Keyword Research professional who contributes to the blog section and manages the chat system at 1stpageKWs. She is passionate about helping clients rank higher and drive more traffic with effective SEO strategies. She also loves spending her precious time with her family.

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