| LED Digest 2428: Managing Client Relationships |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" Data > Information > Knowledge > Wisdom www.GetWebContent.com/LED : the LED's Key Sponsor The Web's Most Experienced SEO Content Providers. www.SEOToolSet.com/training/ : the LED's Premier Sponsor Bruce Clay's Search Engine Optimization Training & Certification ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest adam, led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com .............................................. June 12, 2007 Issue no. 2428 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== When a Client Insists on Bad SEO ==-- ~ Jill Whalen "...it's pretty much your duty to wash your hands of them." ~ Chris Nielsen "...make it clear from the start the type of work you do and put it into writing..." ~ Veronica Yuill "Sounds like a 'fire the client' situation ;-)" ~ Mark J. Welch "...few SEO clients actually do much homework on their consultants..." --== Losing Rankings to Scraper Sites ==-- ~ Alicia Lane "Am I perhaps misunderstanding your reasoning?" --== Blocking Bots ==-- ~ Shaun Johnston "Here are issues involved in the quality of Web site visitors..." ======== CONTINUING =============================== From: Jill Whalen Subject: Bad SEO > What do you do when you discover mid-project that > a client who has hired you for SEO is insisting on bad > SEO practices, such as keyword stuffing on the home page? - Alicia Lane, LED Digest 2427 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/1831/55/ I guess I don't understand the concept of a client "insisting" on anything, let alone the methods used for SEO. If the client hired you to do your job and then won't let you do it, it's pretty much your duty to wash your hands of them. I understand that people don't like to walk away from a paying client, but you'll find that in the end it will cost you more if you don't. Good luck! Jill Whalen Join me for the High Rankings Seminar in Denver on June 28-29 http://www.highrankings.com/seminar Comment? -------- new post - same topic --------- From: Chris Nielsen Subject: Bad SEO > And, how do you avoid being held accountable down > the road when the site fails to bring in targeted traffic? - Alicia Lane The best thing is to make it clear from the start the type of work you do and put it into writing and have the client agree to it. This way you should avoid being put in the situation to start with. If you are working on a project where the scope changes, in this manner or any other, you should let the client know that this is beyond what the agreement for the project was. The client should expect additional charges for additional work. If the work they want done is something you recommend against, you have two choices, 1) to refuse to follow their instructions, both in their best interests and to protect your reputation. You run the risk of losing the project and the client, but sometimes you have to "fire" a client to save losing time, money, health, and your sanity. 2) Agree to do what they ask, but make it clear that you don't recommend it and will not be responsible for poor results, and get them to agree in writing. This agreement process works both ways for consultant and client. We don't use formal contracts for our projects, but we do use written agreements. This protects all parties from possible misunderstandings and faulty memories. Thank you, Chris Nielsen http://www.EbayAuctionAds.com Comment? -------- new post - same topic --------- From: Veronica Yuill Subject: Bad SEO Sounds like a "fire the client" situation ;-) Seriously, the client presumably hired you for your expertise, and now he/she is telling you how to do your job? This can't work. And as you imply, when it fails the client will forget it was their idea, and the mud will stick to you, in their eyes and those of anyone else who sees the site and finds out that you apparently did the SEO. It's not worth it, IMHO. Stick to your guns, and if the client won't listen pass them on to someone who will work the way they want. My 2 centimes :-) Veronica Yuill http://www.larecettedujour.org Comment? -------- new post - same topic --------- From: Mark J. Welch Subject: Clients Insisting on Bad SEO The "easy" answers are obvious: First, fire the client. I've done this a number of times (but now that I'm married, my wife doesn't like the income result). Or, keep working but tell the client you're going to do what they hired you to do, and not what they're asking for now. If you feel that you simply must follow the client's instructions, then prepare a letter for the client to sign ("Against consultant's advice, client has instructed consultant to [keyword stuff, etc.] and client acknowledges that consultant will not be held responsible if [potential outcomes] occurs.") It possible that when you push the client against the wall, they will appreciate your strong ethics and professional responsibility; it's much more likely that the client won't work with you any more, won't pay you, and will tell everyone they know that you are incompetent. Of course, since I'm also an attorney, this is the perfect time to ask, "what does your written contract say?" (And after you answer, I suspect I'd advice, "create a written contract" or "update your contract." As to the final question: there is nothing you can do (unless your written contract has specific terms) to avoid being held accountable for failing to please a client who won't follow your advice. I suppose the good news is that few SEO clients actually do much homework on their consultants; the bad news is that you may invested a lot of time on this client because you expected referrals or a good reference, and that's not likely. As an attorney, I sometimes was ethically required to keep working for clients who wouldn't agree to my recommended strategy. In one case, I wrote a very stern letter, explaining why I disagreed and what I thought the possible consequences were. The client stuck to their decision. Several months later, the client refused to pay my bill because he said I hadn't given him good advice or warned him of the risk! I pulled out the letter, and the client shut up and paid me. Mark J. Welch http://www.MarkWelch.com/ Comment? ============ Sponsor Message =========== We say this: We're the best bloody web copywriters on the planet. You respond thus: Prove it. We say: OK. Read these http://getwebcontent.com/copywriting-samples.php and see if you don't agree with us. You say: Where do I sign up? We say: Visit http://GetWebContent.com/LED today. ============ Sponsor Message =========== -------- new post - new topic --------- From: Alicia Lane Subject: Lost rankings > A quick look at the search results subtracting out > sites depending on anchor text indicates that Peggy's > site doesn't do a very good job of asserting relevance > through content: http://snipurl.com/1n18t [google.com/search] - Michael Martinez, LED Digest 2422 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/1826/55/ I am not sure I understand the reasoning here. The query used was: kitchen designer -inanchor:"kitchen designer" The top result for this search only uses "kitchen designer" three times and it's not even in the title. In contrast, Peggy's home page uses "kitchen designer" twice in the body text AND in the title. How do you know you aren't also eliminating other potentially content-rich sites, including Peggy's site, if they happen to have "kitchen designer" anchor text pointing to them? To test this, I did a search using this Google query: site:kitchenartworks.com inanchor:"kitchen designer" Peggy's site shows up for this search, so it appears to have been eliminated from the first search not necessarily because of poor content but because of the presence of "kitchen designer" anchor text pointing to it. Am I perhaps misunderstanding your reasoning? Regards, Alicia Lane Comment? -------- new post - new topic --------- From: Shaun Johnston Subject: Blocking bots > I'm not sure I understand why you claim traffic > references from your site are worth less than > directory traffic, but I would bet that bots aren't > the cause. - Mike Podanoffsky, LED Digest 2427 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/1831/55/ Mike, thank you for feedback. Here are issues involved in the quality ("how qualified") of Web site visitors. HOW QUALIFIED ARE VISITORS FROM DIRECTORIES Issue -- visitors from my travel directories show a page-view pattern on lodgings' web sites that indicates they are less qualified than visitors from other directories. Page-view pattern -- I select a "room-booking surrogate" page, such as room availability, or even "Contact us", a page that visitors only look at as they become more interested. When I compare the rate my visitors visit those pages with those from other directories, from analysis of logs of sites for lodgings I host, I find my visitors visit those pages less frequently. In my directory log files I find very long visits of hundreds of page views, generating up to 60 visits to lodgings' sites. These skew my data, for example average visits-to-lodgings-sites per visitor to my site, and hence what I can afford to pay for sponsored search in search engines. Also, I charge lodgings PPC for visits I send them, and these visits are obviously not driven by interest in room bookings -- they are very poorly qualified. I assumed these must be due to bots researching pricing, data that is highly valued on the Internet. If I could identify them, and stop them visiting lodgings' sites, I could increase how qualified my other visitors were, on average. I asked for help here in identifying these "bots." Will Bontrager very generously shared his expertise in identifying bots, and the conclusion was -- no bots! These are real people. To discourage them, weaken their interest in seeing more sites, and at the same get some visitor data (though they aren't typical of desired visitors, I understand), I plan to interrupt them every 12 visits to lodgings' sites with survey questions. ABANDONING WEB METRICS Because web metrics are so easily available I tend to use them and refer my clients to them. But researching afresh I find web metrics data hugely at variance with log data. Part of the reason for a difference, I had concluded, is that web metrics register many more duplicate calls. In my log analysis I eliminate adjacent duplicate calls. But my new research says, web metrics and log analysis cannot be reconciled. So I am abandoning web metrics. When I do, my directories come out as better qualified, ie more towards the average. HOW QUALIFIED ARE VISITORS FROM SEARCH ENGINES In an analysis of 5 months' log files for one of my directory customers I analyzed Google visits, dividing them between those that had the lodging's name in the search term, and the others. Those that have the search term in the lodging name are presumably from people using Google as a quick way of finding the lodgings' site. They already know about the lodging and qualify as "repeat visits." I found those visitors were three times as qualified as the others. When I eliminated those visitors, analyzing only those where Google is being used like a directory to research lodgings, Google become just another directory, third in terms of visits (below me) and below average qualified (below me). The other search engines show a similar pattern, and turn up way down among the minor directories. In terms of paying for extra visits to lodgings' web sites, directories may be a better use of time and money than search engines. Also, if I consider only visits from Google without the lodging name in the search term, the return from SEO is only one-third as much, ie three times as costly in time and money per visit delivered. JOINT ANALYSIS OF DIRECTORY AND CLIENT LOG FILES PPC encourages visit analysis. To improve how qualified my visitors are I have combined one month's log entries for all my directories and four lodgings whose sites I host, nine sites altogether. Now I can track visitors from their entry into my family of guides, through those guides, into my lodging clients' sites, to visits to booking-surrogate pages, all as sessions. I can then divide those sessions into those that are well qualified, and those who aren't. Obviously I can use that to evaluate sources of visits to my guides. But I can also use that info to see how the paths the two groups take through my guides are different, and restructure my site to favor the more qualified visitors. IS REFERER DATA BEING LOST When I pay to sponsor terms in the search engines I tag the destination URL. If I select just those visits, with tags, from Google 20% of the visits have referrer of " - ". From Yahoo and MSN, 10%. If this is true for Web traffic general, then probably between 10-20% of my visits get recorded in my clients' log files as " - ". Since I charge PPC, this is an issue. Also, since Google and Yahoo differ in how many of their visitors appear as from " - ", is that true of other directories, that the rate they appear as referer will also vary? Is there a way I can make sure my visits always show up as from me? SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION I operate in a very narrow niche, as you can see, a tight community of non-chain getaway lodgings in a very small geographic area. I pay very little attention to SEO. I believe that the search engines have reproduced the web as communities of sites, and within each community they "know" us as individual members, in a cloudy multi-factorial way, almost as we know the personalities of people in our own real-world communities. I believe I will do better in the search engines as I become a better member of my "community" of directories and lodgings offline, as I sponsor group efforts, take on volunteer work with organizations, just be friendly and responsible, offline. I think Google can read that. I must stress this is just a personal, almost mystical, belief. To me, black hat / white hat works on the web as it does in real life. Eventually you get known for who you are -- by the search engines -- and succeed to the extent people respect you. Cheers, Shaun Johnston Comment? ------------------------------------------------------- The LED Digest is sponsored by: GetWebContent.com The Web's Most Experienced SEO Content Providers. 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