Client Content Strategy (or lack of)
-
Hey everyone,
I just finished pitching a client for some SEO work. He said he does not want to write any type of content. He also said his industry is so unique that he does not want anyone else writing content for him either. His site has about 25 pages of total content now.
I am going to get all of his onpage seo good to go but what would you do? Just build links?
I really prefer to have some sort of content strategy in place but find it can be challenging with clients.
-
If he answers those questions once on his website via an FAQ, then he doesn't have to go back and answer them time and time again in email and phone!
-
I would do some analytics (after your new SEO matures) and show him how each page of the site is pulling in visitors. Then explain if he gets pages up for new content each of them will pull in more visitors. That should make "chaching" in his brain and might motivate him into new content. Maybe you can suggest some topics in his industry where he does not have search presence?
I really enjoy hearing about people who don't want to write content. It allows me to take their money!
-
If it's a matter of not wanting to "write" any type of content, is he interested in any sort of content? The fact is that SEO and search is concerned with delivering content to searchers looking for it, so without content you won't have much to go on (25 pages can still work, though, it all depends on the quality of that content and the depth of the searcher's intent: do those 25 pages answer their query and satisfy their search, or will they bounce to a competitor's site?)...
I look at your question this way:
If your client is simply averse to writing, what sort of content is he more comfortable in delivering?
If your client is satisfied with his 25 pages, can you find keywords and examples where competitors are eating his lunch? Showing lost opportunity can help change his mind.
But at the end of the day, you need to ask your client what his goals are, and if this roadblock in content opinion is going to hinder your progress in helping meet the goals...if content is going to remain at 25 pages, you have to weigh that against the stated goal and deliver the reality check.
Other than that, it's hard to say what I'd do in your shoes apart from seeing the site and knowing the niche: knowing the opportunities at hand and knowing how deep you want to on this project is really up to you to determine. (That is, you have to know if you're actually able to even do your job given these limitations, and if not then you need to tell your client you can only deliver so much in terms of ROI and move accordingly.)
Another way to look at it is that you've just been given a defined boundary: making your job potentially much easier than it would be otherwise had there been more content to rank.
[I see a bit too late that there were 2 other responses above mine - whoops! I'm too lazy to edit other than making the observation.]
-
Good idea! This is actually what I have done in the past. The client was reluctant but is now writing his weekly content.
-
Thanks for the response! Yes, that does make sense. He said he does not want to spend time on things that do not directly make him money. He said he doesn't want to answer questions, be involved, etc. He just wants to do his craft. He said he tried it in the past and he was spending more time answering questions than actually making money.
-
Always tricky....
I'd set the client expectations first - let them know that in your professional opinion there needs to be a content strategy and without one they won't reach their desired goals - and then just let it be (for now). Move on to implementing the rest of your SEO strategy. During reporting time where rankings are slow or making no improvements you can just mention that it's due to lack of content and suggest a content strategy again but this time just trial one or two pages and track progress (rankings, conversions, bounce-rates perhaps....etc). After 2-3 months of the content (working alongside your link build and on-page optimization) the results should speak for themselves.
Good luck!
-
Perhaps one way to re-open the content discussion is to show him that content, aka "conversations" are taking place online about his topics/products. Those conversations are going to take place whether he writes content or not. Does he want those conversations to be able to define his business, without his participation? Or would he prefer to be part of the conversation? I think it might just be a matter of showing him that conversations are going to take place regardless of what he does or doesn't do, and that ultimately it would be much better for him to participate. Hope that makes sense!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Link building strategies
Hello, I read lots of blogs and websites. None of them clearly tell that where and how to build links. How to get back links quickly to boost the website rank. Would you help me to build quality links? give me specific answer where to build links like 1. Press release 2. Directory submission 3. Web 2 submissions etc
Link Building | | NancyThomass0 -
Duplicate content on site->citations? How important is it to change it?
Hi there, I recently realised that the citations and directories i was building used the same content than the one on my website. I know this is not best practice. I will for sure make sure it doesn't happen in the future, but I am affraid of the ones i built in the past. How much do you think this would affect my rankings, and do you think this is a priority to go through my citations and directories to modify it?
Link Building | | H.M.N.0 -
Backlinks from translated content
Hello, We have quite a few articles "out there" that give us backlinks. We were thinking of also translating the content and submitting it to local content websites, so it can provide us with more backlinks. The main questions here, will this content be recognized as the same content as the English version? Also, being in another language, some of the anchor text might not hit the English keyword. Not sure how Google sees it. Any advise on the matter? thx!!
Link Building | | PangeaLangs0 -
Does spinning content work any longer?
A few years ago, I used Free Traffic System, and spun a bunch of content to get links. I still have tens of thousands of these links showing up in stats. They were probably not good quality links. Will I get penalized if I pick up the spinning game again?
Link Building | | manintights280 -
How do you put together a link building strategy?
I know after all the Google changes link building is different than it used to be. How do I put a link building strategy together that I can understand and follow? I have fixed most of the crawl errors and my site is still low on the search for most of my targeted keywords. Is link building the answer? Or are there other options I'm missing?
Link Building | | JHSpecialty0 -
Backlink's using duplicate content in article directories
I've had a link build report of all the links an SEO company have got us but a simple search for some of the content in Google with phrase match brings up about 3 pages of the same content posted to different article sites. I think it is doing something but will it just be penalised over time?
Link Building | | acs1110 -
Your opinion of link building strategy
Hi all, I just started working on the optimization of highly competitive keywords on one website. I already started posting articles in reputable directories, but as you know, more quality links are needed. To do that I created the following strategy: (see the uploaded image or http://i.imgur.com/9HCiM.png) The idea is to buy new domain and build page rank to this domain by other 3,4 domains that I will buy with PR3. Those 3 domains will contain low quality text generated by spinner just to keep that PR. Then those 3 domains will give PR to the newly created website which will contain only professionally written information and sometimes will give links to me. At the end I will get high quality links. I know it's hard work, but posting PR articles will not be enough. I will continue to spy the competition via SEOMoz OSE but for now that is the idea that I have for quality links. Share your opinion 🙂 9HCiM.png
Link Building | | VasilTasev0 -
What Linking Strategies Are Meant To Get Traffic or To Build Trust and Authorty ?
What Linking Strategies Are Meant To Get Traffic and Which Ones To Build Trust and Authorty ? I do wish to implement a backlink strategy to get me some quick traffic -- tell me if you agree with what I have in mind below as far as getting me immediate traffic or am I off the mark or close meaning it will get me traffic but may have to wait till one of my articles get selected as a interesting article worth mentioning to their their friends and family ? Link Building For Traffic identify high traffic relevant blogs who want guest posts Submit articles to digg and stumbleupon Submit to top and other articles directories for syndication oppty Submit 1 video to youtube weekly
Link Building | | helpwanted0