8 replies to this topic

[Mr Man]

Been thinking about marketing myself a SEO consultant, mainly doing PPC hopefully. I have a quick question i'm hoping some SEOs can answer....

Do you get out and about and meet your clients much? I work from home online already and actually getting to meet clients and have some actual human interaction and meet new people would be very welcome!

Are there any good resources, books i may want to take a look at?

Also I was thinking by starting to use direct marketing (brochures, sales letters) to local businesses to beging with, do you think i'd have much luck with this approach?

Thanks

[Jill]

If you're working with local clients, then yes, it's generally very helpful to get to meet and speak with your clients. It's the best way to truly learn about their business and their website marketing needs.

As to a good book or resource, Dan Theis's Search Engine Marketing Kit from SitePoint is a great one for someone starting an SEM business. It basically tells you how to do it.

[Randy]

If you've got any local business associations (eg Chamber of Commerce, etc) they're usually a good place to start. Not only can you network with local business owners, but if you play your cards right you can give a little presentation regarding what you do and how it can help your new friends.

[ScottSalwolke]

Also I was thinking by starting to use direct marketing (brochures, sales letters) to local businesses to beging with, do you think i'd have much luck with this approach?

Thanks

I started out doing a lot of direct marketing with local clients. One thing that was really effective was to find keyphrases that related to their business and showed them their current rankings. And tried to give them an idea an idea of how much business they were missing out on. I then used brochures to demonstrate my experience in copywriting and to play up what little experience I did have with SEO. I started a year ago this month with just two clients and I've added 25 since. And most of it was due to aggressive direct mail campaigns.

[Mr Man]

thanks for all the replys so far!

Its good to hear i'll have opportunities to "press the flesh"!

Thanks for the link Jill, I'd only be interested in the last chapter "Running a Search Engine Marketing Business", so $150 seems a bit steep. However i do like the fact it seems to come with a few forms "Client Assessment Form" etc which would cut down on the time it'll take me to get everything in place so i'm gonna keep it mind if I can't find any other resources.

Thanks randy yeah we do have a local chamber of commerce, will definatly go down that route.

Copywriter39 excellent thats just what I wanted to hear, how did you find local businesses took to you're services? were they keen? was it a hard sell? what sales process did you use? i was thinking of ringing clients up to see if they would be interested in my services and asking if I could send them some information (sales letter and brochure), follow them up a few days latter and try and arrange a face to face. What do you think? Was this similar to what you did?

[ScottSalwolke]

Copywriter39 excellent thats just what I wanted to hear, how did you find local businesses took to you're services? were they keen? was it a hard sell? what sales process did you use? i was thinking of ringing clients up to see if they would be interested in my services and asking if I could send them some information (sales letter and brochure), follow them up a few days latter and try and arrange a face to face. What do you think? Was this similar to what you did?

I first started out approaching new businesses that didn't have web sites. But what I found out was that my best business came from companies that already had sites. They were disappointed in how much business their current site brought them and were looking for a new approach. So I played up my copywriting background, and most importanly my knowledge of SEO.

[paulevison]

(Am based in the UK, so things won't necessarily be the same elsewhere...)

From my experience it's not very hard to sell search marketing services, in that most businesses/ business owners will know that it's something they should be looking at and will have a vague idea of what it involves ("number 1 on Google, right?" the naive little so and so's!).

Personally I wouldn't bother cold calling or mailing; there's a lot of jokers doing exactly the same thing... it can work of course but I think a better approach is to get into the networking groups (BNI et al) in your area and use any existing contacts you already have (tell everyone you know what you're doing, everyone works for someone (or themselves) and it's amazing how word can spread through family and friends). Providing you know what you're doing and can answer any questions, I think you'll find lots of people interested to know more / get a quote etc.

Be ready to meet a lot of people who seem interested but don't have any money to spend (i.e. to whom a few hundred £pounds is a lot of money); learn to avoid them or you'll be out of business in no time (or make a concious decision to make a loss on some clients in order to use them as a showcase for your results). For some businesses marketing money is immediatley "dead" - they don't think in terms of ROI and actually making more money from their outlay... therefore be an educator and persuade them or walk away and find someone else who's more savvy.

Also, one of the best ways to get business I found was to partner with web design/ development firms with no expertise in SEO/ PPC (i.e. most of them). They'll have clients asking them for help in this all the time and I found that my skills were a rare enough commodity to be able to do this with a lot of firms in my area. Just be careful you don't slag off their websites too much (easily done if they design sites with no thought to SEO), be diplomatic. My favourite phrase to deal with the question "why didn't [web design company x] do this for me originally?!" is "SEO and web design and different dicisplines; if you don't explicitly pay for it, you're unlikely to get it as it takes time and effort."

Hope that helps

[truedesign4u]

Like the others have said, your approach will work and it should. People like to talk with friendly people. Think of it this way, lets say your standing in line at a fast food restaurant and the person asking for your order is slumped over and sorta rude to everything you say.

Does it make you want to buy?

What if the person was HOT and stood straight and asked what can I get for you today!

Which one makes you want to buy initially and possibly return for more later on?

Take that perspective and you cant go wrong enjoy

[SEO_Gal]

I'm also considering starting my own SEO consulting business. Every post has been very helpful to me as well.

As for meeting clients in person, YES... it's very important. I was recently laid off from an SEO company that hardly ever met clients in person. Hence, they lost clients because of it. I plan on consulting locally and in person as much as possible. Good luck.