SEO Client Management: How to Communicate with Clients Effectively and Gain Their Trust — Serpstat Blog

What Client Management Means in SEO

Client management is the proper organization of communications with clients throughout the entire period of cooperation, from the first meeting to the completion of the last project — and any follow ups past this point. It usually involves using a certain system for the organization and quick search for data (CRM), distributing roles in the team (personal managers or representatives), and setting goals and milestones in working with specific customers. 

When communicating with SEO customers, it’s important to understand the unique aspects of customer management. Establishing contact involves specific tasks. When you establish contact with a customer, you perform the following tasks:

The Value of Personalized Communication

To make your communication as productive as possible, you should prove to the customer that you understand their goals, needs, and business methods. Therefore, in managing relationships with customers, it is important to consider not only what you say but also who you are talking to. 

Communication methods will depend on the position, responsibilities, and authority of the contact person:

• Communication with developers, site administrators, designers, and content managers is often limited to a ticketing system and working documentation.
  
• For marketers, regular reporting will be the most important, as it will provide them with data for making ongoing management decisions.
  
• The most effective method of discussing SEO with project managers and team leads will be via email, phone calls, and video conferencing, which allows for solving problems in real time.
  
• Communications with the company’s top management are usually represented by monthly, quarterly, and annual reports that reflect the fulfillment of strategic goals. 
  



Pay attention to the purpose of communications. When you manage an SEO project, you can address the client in the following cases:

1.To get permission to take a certain action, such as making changes to plans or launching the next phase of the SEO strategy. 


2.To confirm the successful completion of the task and demonstrate the results, confirming your expertise. 


3.To sell the idea and get additional resources to engage other tools, communication channels, and target audiences.  




The customer relationship management best practice in SEO is to present information as a case study or story. But this doesn’t mean you should go too far or present an overly complicated picture, filling it with small details — the customer is unlikely to appreciate your verbosity. No, the case study should be simple, even schematic. However, it should clearly describe the current needs of the client’s business, the tools that will help meet them, and the results that will be achieved. 

To convey to the client all the benefits of working with you, explain the reasons behind all your recommendations. If you are unsure how to explain SEO to a client, do not rely solely on your expertise — briefly describe the mechanisms of these processes. Support your explanations with clear documentation — plans, reports, structure descriptions, instructions, etc. The client should have access to such materials, even if you discuss their content during each video conference — words are easily forgotten, while documents are available at any time. You can generate personalized reports in Serpstat, choosing the necessary data and visualization. 

Another important SEO management rule is to limit the use of technical slang and jargon. Adding a couple of professional terms lets you draw attention to your expertise. However, you should not rely on them too much. Most likely, the client will simply not understand all the details of your offer and will turn to a competitor. Try to explain everything as simply and clearly as possible, focusing on complicated issues if necessary. 

SEO Testing to Support Strategies with Data

A great way to demonstrate the effectiveness of SEO for clients is to conduct a series of tests. It will help you test certain hypotheses and obtain the necessary data. You can test any change, from an alternative button color on a landing page to changing the amount of content or better optimization of a certain page.

Testing is one of the SEO standard operating procedures, although many SEOs fail to use this key asset. It allows you to get the data you need to predict the results of larger projects and get buy-in for future updates. It is often used to convince the most demanding clients concerned about the impact of any changes on their brand and the perception of their business by the target audience.

The following changes are most often tested in SEO management:

• Content updates; 
  
• Selection of new meta tags;
  
• Optimization of internal linking; 
  
• Adding videos, quotes, and structured data; 
  
• Design changes; 
  
• Improving the text structure;
  
• Image optimization, etc. 
  

Content Rewrite Test

When explaining SEO testing to clients, you should also emphasize that it simplifies the work for other process participants, including developers and designers. By testing the changes on one page, you can solve the main problems, identify additional needs, and create templates for quick optimization of other site sections. You can control each testing stage using Serpstat’s team management tool and quickly get data on its results. 

Another Serpstat advantage is a wide range of research tools:

• for keyword optimization;
  
• for technical audit;
  
• for backlinks analysis;
  
• for content improvement.
  

Using SEO tools for managing client projects, you can make arguments supported by data. It is unlikely that a customer will be able to refuse you if you demonstrate that your changes will increase organic traffic, improve click-through rates, and increase conversion rates. To make these arguments even more convincing, use visualizations like Google Data Studio. 

In general, testing provides the following benefits for client management:

• Uncovers potent tactics, setting the stage for scaling implementation.
  
• Helps to avoid costly mistakes and optimize budget use. 
  
• Helps find new directions for SEO strategy and ways to increase the company’s competitiveness.
  
• Increases work efficiency by allowing you to make decisions based on data rather than hypotheses.
  
• Illuminates the project’s impact, garnering the essential backing it merits.
  

Managing Risk in SEO

Remember that your customers and partners don’t like surprises when building business relationship strategies. Anything beyond the usual workflow, be it a sudden drop in website rankings or global structural changes, causes an adverse reaction. 

You can use the following methods to reduce risks in managing relationships with customers:

• Prepare for changes and innovations in advance. Review documents and materials gained from industry leaders, Google themselves, search engine conferences, or through internal experimentation. Plan your work, taking into account promising algorithms. If you constantly explain that there is a drop in traffic and lagging behind the planned indicators, the client may lose trust in the process.
  
• Be as honest and transparent as possible. To build the perfect client relationship, discuss all probable risks and describe different scenarios — from pessimistic to optimistic. If you make a mistake or fail to complete a task on time, be honest about it instead of trying to catch up in the future. There may be blockers caused by the client that has led to this, that they need to be aware of.
  
• Maintain communication with responsible persons. These can be client managers in marketing, PR, or web development departments and direct performers. Constant communication helps to avoid delays and mistakes. It reduces the risk of distortion of information used to make management decisions. 
  

The highest risks arise when making changes. To correctly manage SEO client ranking and not lose positions in search results, you should introduce different levels of testing — during development, implementation, and when applied across the entire site. Each should have different result analysis methods, benchmarks, and reporting.

Source: Digital Information World

Positioning as an SEO Expert

Referring back to client management meaning, we recall that this process starts with the first contact. You must “sell” yourself at this stage by demonstrating your expertise. To strengthen your positioning as an SEO expert, use the following business relationship management tips:

• Remember that you will only have one chance to make a good impression. Even if mistakes don’t prevent you from getting the project, they can haunt you throughout the entire workflow. So, any presentation of your expertise should be carefully prepared.
  
• Think in advance about how to explain SEO methods to the client. Find out about their role in the company, responsibilities, and level of expertise. Use this information to provide detailed but simple information.
  
• Always answer with confidence. Avoid vague phrases indicating a lack of knowledge or experience in a particular topic. Try to avoid using phrases like “I think” — you must show that you have specific solutions for each client’s need.
  
• Show passion and compassion. A client manager is a person who recognizes emotions. Demonstrating a sincere passion for the topic will emphasize your status as an expert. And understanding the company’s problems will prove that you are also interested in improving its current position.
  
• Set realistic expectations, and don’t be afraid to say “no.” Explain the true capabilities of SEO for clients and be honest that certain results may be unrealistic on a limited budget or within the current timeframe of the project.    
  

To position yourself as an expert, you must be known, liked, and trusted by your target audience. You will be the one they think of when it is time to buy your products once you gain their trust.

Source: Marshallpr 

In managing relationships with customers, it’s also very important to remember that most people don’t pay attention to your job title or the events you’ve participated in. They will be interested in proof of your expertise. Such evidence can be represented by brand reputation (corporate or personal), testimonials, and real cases with similar tasks. 

Effective SEO Reporting

Reporting is one of the most important parts of a client management program. It can both strengthen and destroy the relationship between the client and the contractor. The client should know how to manage SEO and get the desired results, so you must provide them with detailed information. To make the reporting clear, stick to the following rules:

Key Takeaways

One of the key conditions for high-quality client relationship management will be the personalization of all communications, from phone calls and presentations to reporting and business documents. You must understand who you are communicating to, what level of expertise your interlocutor has, and what authority they have in the company. 

Be sure to use SEO testing to test hypotheses and make data-driven decisions. By managing client relations this way, you can build trust and get strong arguments for your proposals. 

To build a reputation as an expert, don’t just talk about your qualifications — demonstrate them. Show your actual achievements rather than titles and participation in various events. To manage SEO communications, you’ll also need an effective reporting system. It will show your achievements and convince the client to provide all the necessary support for the project. 

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