All to often here we see people worrying about their rankings on an almost daily basis, in my mind the more focus the client applies to concern over the serps detracts from them thinking about how to expand the site and make it an effective online resource with captivating content and ultimately bring in those sales.
In doing a number of SEO reports in the last week certain similarities have been occurring with websites that were constructed some time ago, perhaps without the search engines in mind.
At a pretty basic level sites lacked relevant content, whilst they were littered with keywords there were not really any calls to action on the pages. It was unclear what the websites were about, what product the person wanted to promote and indeed how easy it was to place an order.
I guess sometimes when you are so close up to a site you don’t really see the simple changes that need to be made.
The other thing I find when constructing an SEO report is that you could go on generating literally hundreds of pages of advice, what to do what not to do etc. The key requirement when writing reports seems to be the ability to focus on areas that require immediate action and indeed the thing that I struggle with most which is consolidating advice down to steps that the client can follow in a concise fashion.
How are your report consolidation skills???
Dan Horton SEO
14 Comments
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- 2
Bring on the gimp
Hat tips to gimpy.. - 3
Dan, stop reporting the news, give us the insider tips..:)
Looks like DaveN should be working in financial services, he called GOOG to tank, which is what it is doing now!
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The biggest problem I have with SEO reports is that people tend to want to report on things that are interesting, but can’t be acted on. This is especially true when dealing with web analytics data. There’s often a belief that flipping through 50 pages of web traffic stats will reveal the secret to success. I shouldn’t complain too much though since it does pay the bills!
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The biggest problem seems to be in getting people to see that the problems listed for the site, really are problems, and updating the site will improve ratings, rankings, traffic, earnings, etc.
Even with specific examples, and comparisions with other such sites, some people just cannot see that these problems really are hindering rankings, conversions, sales, whatever.
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we often try and boil it down to a number of “quick wins” — the easiest actions that can be taken for the most gain.
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I find a thorough prioritized to-do list seems to work just fine.
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I think most clients get lost when you give them and SEO report. I break it down now to quick fixes the client can do and things that I will need to do. My list is normally the biggest as most clients can not even write a good description never mind anything else.
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I also run into the same issue with advice. Like should I point out that your comments link is mystery meat navigation (http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/mysterymeatnavigation.html) or rather that proper grammar is generally a good idea (at Dave
). BTW, Dave, I loved the videos with SEOmoz – best Whiteboard Friday ever! And I liked how you used “yeah?” the way we Canadians use “eh” hehe… - 10
And while we’re on the topic of advice, Web Pages That Suck has mystery meat nav as one of the top 5 sucky design points: http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/worst-web-sites-of-2007.html
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Most of my clients just want to see how much traffic they are getting and where it is coming from. They just want me to justify what I am doing, so I keep my reports simple.
- 12
It seems like most SEO reports should focus on back links building first, content second and structure/targeting third. A full time back link building program can do amazing things for any site.
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The hardest thing I find in writing reports is explaining things in a way that a client, often unfamiliar even with html basics, can have any idea of what I’m actually telling them.
BB
- 14
you are right! you could write about everitihing and goin in thousands of pagess…but the first considerations should always start form the Stats.. basic things like bounce rate, visitor’s sources…anceh check if some basic onpage seo is missing…
Pretty good I think
You have seen mine I would hope. But it is difficult to not have to explain why certain thing need doing. But some clients need that, it is picking the right style for the right job.
Cheers
Rich