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
-
In-depth/longform content DEFEAT backlink, DA/Trust score!
Hi all, There is a new way to defeat the big boys. Build a releated topic with minimum 4000 words and focus on in-depth content and use the target keywords more than 2,5% of each content. So its game over for linkbuilders and happy end for the copywriters? Ofcourse every factor of seo is important, but its better to focus on in-depth content. To score good with your target keywords in SERP. What are the challenges for a big webshop? Create a related deeply content? that separated from your webshop?
Link Building | | Dreamgame2016
Because it will be coatic with a lot of deeply contents on your webshop Is there more additional advice for a webshop with a big assortiment? Ps. Specifiec, the big webshops sells game/software keys.0 -
Whats the Best Link Building Strategy for News Sites
Hello, I have a news portal and l am working with 3 editors, they are writing 3-5 daily unique news articles. I would like to know if whats the best link building strategy for news sites that l need to keep getting links from? What sort of sites l should find links for best link building? Please inform me. thanks.
Link Building | | rk19800 -
Help with outreach emails for content marketing
Hello, Could I get some feedback on how to make a good outreach email? I'm using buzzstream and Rand's awesome whiteboard friday. Here's what I've put together: Hi [first name] have you seen this [our niche] article? Paragraph 1 (short paragraph) comments on what the person is involved in, and ask them how these things are going Paragraph 2 (short paragraph) talks about how I've shared and retweeted their recent important posts. Paragraph 3 (short paragraph) Asks if they would link to our article. This niche article is really useful and needed to these people. Paragraph 4 (short paragraph) I'm not sure how to reasearch and put something interesting here. [my name] co-owner [our website]
Link Building | | BobGW0 -
MSN Content ads incoming links..
We have started to show a lot on incoming links in google webmaster from this site convulsions.co.uk, and others using the same template - can these harm our seo? can we block them?
Link Building | | jj34340 -
Guest Blog Etiquette & Re-using "Expired" Content
Hi everyone, There's two parts to this Q, which is why the title's sort of split in half. We wrote a guest blog post that we were really proud of, which took a good few hours of work. It went live about a month ago, but I just happened to notice recently that it had disappeared off the person's website - I now get a 404 error and I can't find it either using a 'site:' search in Google or via the site's own search tool. I've tried getting in touch with the webmaster, but he's no longer responding to my emails. I really don't know if a) it disappeared by accident (for whatever reason), or b) they purposefully wanted to remove it and now they're avoiding me. My two Q's: Do you think it's cheeky to re-use the content, by giving it to someone else? Or would you say it goes against guest blogging etiquette? It seems a shame to waste it, for it to disappear. If I were to re-use it, would there be any implications regarding Panda, given the fact that it was content that was once live (i.e. effectively 'duplicate', once upon a time), even if the 'original' content is no longer indexed by Google? Would it even be considered a duplicate if published again now? Many thanks in advance!
Link Building | | Gmorgan0 -
Publish content on current domain for content boost or new domain for links?
I have about 1000 unique and organically generated articles. My quote compare business has had briefs submitted by clients for over two years. The content has only been accessible to registered members. I want to polish it ASAP. Is it better to publish the content on the existing website in a sub folder or set up a new website to publish the content and have every article link back to the main website? Content is around 300 words x 1000.
Link Building | | designquotes0 -
Companies Copy Content with links
One of our customers has been getting a whole bunch of really relevant links recently as many of his competitors are actually going to his site copying the text from his page and forgetting to remove the links that are within the text. Its amazing we have links from major UK providers of his products totally for free. This is where linking to the actual page itself is coming into play and we are gaining good back links. Has anyone else experienced this before ?
Link Building | | onlinemediadirect0 -
Ecommerce websites' SEO strategy
Hi, Can you please make a short list how to make ecommerce websites SEO strategy?
Link Building | | Netkreativ
I am working on ecommerce websites and I curiuos how You professional think this. Now I am: Optimizing the website Build few relavant links Regards, Misi0