Ori Zilbershtein returns to the SEO Rant Podcast to share his experience with an SEO agency -from what went wrong to what SEO agencies can learn from this series of unfortunate events:
The importance of offering SEO clients a consistent agency experience
How SEO agencies can correct course when things go wrong with clients
How agencies can handle project failures the right way
When SEO Agencies Fail - Lessons to Learn: Episode Synopsis
When an SEO agency is on its game - it's great. Agencies can be a powerful ally to help you grow your business and improve your site's experience for users. When an SEO agency is not on its game it can be a downright nightmare.
This nightmare, at least for Ori, started out with serious inconsistency from the agency. The onboarding process for an SEO project can be great. The agency sets up a call with its brightest stars and everything can feel like it's headed in the right direction. However, where agencies sometimes make a mistake is when they pass the work off from a senior employee to a junior.
Instead of the top-level person who did the onboarding taking on the project SEO agencies often pass off the project to a junior team member. The problem is not just lack of experience but that you end up with a case of broken telephone. As the project gets passed along there is often a communication breakdown to the point that the actual people working on it have an entirely warped outlook on what the expectations are. For a client, this is obviously really frustrating!
Problems like miscommunication are only compounded by a lack of accountability. There will be problems - there might even be an "SEO crisis" or two. The worst thing an SEO agency can do is go silent. The second worse thing an agency can do is deny the problem exists. When problems arise leans toward over-communicating and owning up to mistakes.
Forget mistakes, projects can actually outright fail. Like all other SEOs, agencies might not always be able to deliver results in every instance. What you need to think about is what that client says to others in such a situation. That client might not want to pursue a new project with your agency. You might not be able to avoid that. However, that very same client could recommend you to someone else. They might feel that in their situation your agency didn't work for them but it might work for someone else. You want to handle a project failure the right way for the sake of what the client will say to others!
Resources:
For more of the SEO Rant Podcast check out our previous episode on doing user-first SEO.