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St0n3y
Joined: May 01, 2002
# Posts: 1620
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Posted: 09/02/2004 04:08 pm
We've begun a discussion internally within our office about what constitutes a genuine level of search engine ranking success. For the purpose of the conversation here lets leave aside click-thru's and increased sales (obviously an important factor) and discuss rankings alone.
With the new Yahoo and upcoming MSN we have more than one dominant search engine, each with its own algorithm. Lets consider the top 5 (Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOL, Ask/Teoma). How difficult do you find it to achieve top rankings on all top 5 search engines? Certainly it CAN be done, but what is the liklihood that it will on more competitive phrases?
Do top rankings on Google/Aol overshadow rankings on the other three to the point that you don't need them? If a top ranking is achieved on Yahoo, MSN and Ask, is that enough to compare to a top ranking on Google? At what point can you tell the client "we have succeeded" (assuming that you even have to tell the client this)? Or is a top ranking on all 5 engines the only genuine level of excellence?
I'm interested in hearing what everybody uses as a success metric in this regard.
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huebdoo
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 68
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Posted: 09/03/2004 02:35 pm
Yes Google is important but its not the only girl at the dance... I would more conserned with Conversion rather than direct traffic... If you are getting loads of traffic but no conversions ... that is worse than having no traffic at all.
I think the most important factor(s)would be:
a) ROI
b) Conversion Ratio
c) Unique Visitors
d) Repeat Visitors
e) Search Engine Position
f) Sales Leads from Web Site
Position is important... but not nessisarily the ONLY thing... I would rather have 10 smaller traffic keywords in First place than 1 big keyword in first place
JMO....
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greenleaves
Joined: Mar 21, 2002
# Posts: 720
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Posted: 09/04/2004 07:16 am
A sucess measure, is based on ROI.
For me, a success is where I get a good ROI. I personally only look at google rankings. As far as good rankings (in google), that depends on the budget. The larger the budget, the bigger the expectations.
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St0n3y
Joined: May 01, 2002
# Posts: 1620
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Posted: 09/09/2004 12:10 pm
ROI is clearly important but not every SEO has direct control over ROI. If thats the case and SEO can achieve great rankings that produces poor roi for measures they have nothing to do with. So, putting ROI aside, is there a measurment that anybody uses to determine account A is successful so now I can focus more energies on account B?
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huebdoo
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 68
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Posted: 09/09/2004 04:29 pm
Good Point ROI isnt totally under every SEO persons control... but it should be mentioned when doing the job for the client. Without giving a clear understanding to a client on the actual conversion rates for say "Ad Banners" or a "CPC campaign" will burn you in the end...
Clients dont like it when you are a money pit with no explination or justification for spending. That is why I believe if I address the possible ROI, then we are at a clear understanding of Profit/loss
I believe clients prefer honest answers, but you are correct StOn3y... ROI isnt always under our control... but we should address it as part of our service.
Too many SEO agents do half the job, and give us all a bad rap.
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Rezac
Joined: Jan 25, 2004
# Posts: 817
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Posted: 09/10/2004 05:52 am
Yes Google is important but its not the only girl at the dance
She's the only one I want.
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greenleaves
Joined: Mar 21, 2002
# Posts: 720
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Posted: 09/10/2004 07:41 am
Couldn't agree more hubdoo.
The way I measure success is:
$X divided by the amount of resulting traffic.
X=budget.
The cheaper the visitor and the better it converts, the more succesfull. That is obviously very over-simplified. But I believe most people over value good rankings on highly competitive keywords. Sure it is nice to rank for a one word keyword, but if the traffic converts badly (which usually happens with one word keywords) it may be better to rank well for many 2 word keywords, get the same or little less amount of traffic, with a lot less effort.
I also believe traffic is over valued. And when it is not over valued, it is vastly under valued. If site A gets real quality traffic, it can have a 20% conversion. If site B gets not as targeted traffic, it can have as low as a 0.5% conversion. This means each visitor in site A is 10 times more valuable than a site B visitor.
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St0n3y
Joined: May 01, 2002
# Posts: 1620
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Posted: 09/10/2004 10:54 am
We don't track sales for our clients so we have no REAL mechanism in place to track ROI, however it is a very important factor in how we present ourselfs and our goals for the client. This is evident in our conversations, keyword selection process and overall reporting features. Since ROI obviously matters most to the client we do everything we can to help track ROI short of knowing their sales, etc.
But aside from ROI, looking at rankings alone, can there be a difinitive measure of success? something such as "you have top 10 rankings here, here, and here, and even though not here or here, this is a measurable achievement."?
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Rezac
Joined: Jan 25, 2004
# Posts: 817
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Posted: 09/10/2004 03:39 pm
I've found that if you rank well for the "goodies", you pick up the other less used keywords automatically, providing you know what those 'off' search phrases are. (and most time nobody else is targeting them, so they're gimmies)
Takes time to understand the mind of the searcher, when you're talking quality prospects. That sort of naturalness comes with time, at the least.
>>> If site A gets real quality traffic, it can have a 20% conversion. If site B gets not as targeted traffic, it can have as low as a 0.5% conversion<<<
Then it becomes a matter of getting the right numbers. If site A only has 50 uniques a day, and site B has 5000, it's obvious.
Its not like you have to pick..do I want the quality traffic, or do I want lots of general traffic. You can easily have both, and both have their own conversion rate.
Before you know it, your drowning in money! J/K
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dcaff03
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 142
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Posted: 09/13/2004 08:57 pm
The first thing you face in this discussion...does your potential or existing client actually know their "money phrases"..? if so then you know what your task it...get those "money phrases" in front of the target audience so that your client can realize their revenue...nothing else really matters..if you can keep those "money phrases" in front of the audience with consistently high rankings then your clients will be satisfied
...but in some cases they will also become greedy...and you need to always educate them on what to expect from the respective search engines as they continually change their algos and affect the SERPs..(and this can mean that one day you wake up and blam...your client's listings are gone...this can be quite the shock as client's get what can be significant revenue flows into their comfort zones....the comfort zone needs to be disrupted with the truth...
If the discussion is about what constitutes a reasonable level of SEO success then you are not thinking about your clients...but rather how to frame your business offerings...and then justify maybe getting second level or third level listings that may drive in "some" traffic...
Managing your potential or existing clients expectations is one of the most critical things you can do....
When I deal with my clients I always work to educate them on what is happening with the search engines....I want them to have as much notice as possible if something really radical changes...case in point..last November 16, 2003 when Google nuked the SERPs with the infamous "florida" update...one of my clients took a tough hit..had been ranking top 3 in Google for all their primary and secondary money phrases (where most of the traffic was originating)...we were able to meet our base revenue goals with a focused PPC campaign until I could reset the site(s) to the then new "word stemming" algo....it was stressful but manageable...
Now I have this same client in the top 3 for all the majors Google, Yahoo and MSN for their primary money phrases (one site doing this)...not bragging here...but it is possible...and I know as well as anyone it could change tomorrow...(7+ years of doing this has taught me this one valuable lesson...except the good old days with Hotbot where you could sit number 1 for 60 days because of the 2 month SERPs update cycles)..
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St0n3y
Joined: May 01, 2002
# Posts: 1620
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Posted: 09/14/2004 02:59 pm
If the discussion is about what constitutes a reasonable level of SEO success then you are not thinking about your clients...but rather how to frame your business offerings...and then justify maybe getting second level or third level listings that may drive in "some" traffic...
I disagree, or don't think you understand the premise of my posts. I fully agree with just about everythign else you stated. SEO has so many variables there is literally no "end" to any campaign. But there does have to be a success metric of some sort. Ultimately there are an indefinite number of success metrics, but narrowing that field down to one, for the purpose of discussion, what would that be?
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dcaff03
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 142
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Posted: 09/15/2004 11:58 am
Success Metrics:
Is your seo strategy and implementation for your respective client(s) delivering an increase in revenue, leads, subscriptions, downloads...whatever the "client" wants to achieve so that they are
growing their business...
This, of course, means targeting the right phrases (on page and off page)...as one works their way up through the great hierarchical keyword tree from niche to broad (A-Z) that represents everything we see on the web...the success metric still holds true..only the processes to achieve the metric becomes far more challenging as spam and aggressive tactics tend to reside in the broader, more competitive sectors...there are plenty of niche sectors where one can apply good clean tactics and achieve measurable success (clients are happy and growing their business)
Just my humble opinion...
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huebdoo
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 68
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Posted: 09/15/2004 04:15 pm
"What constitutes a genuine level of search engine ranking success?”
Honestly I still believe that ROI is the most vital factor in success... If the client didn’t make money on the project ... It was a failure.
However branding is another thing:
Branding initiatives in it self are something different where you blatantly spend like a fiend to promote a company with no real attention to ROI. In that case I would have to say the genuine level for success would be just meat and potatoes traffic... be it junk or focused users … just get them in the door and look around.
I guess it really depends on what you (or your client) want to achieve … I have to admit it would be nice to bag a white whale that just wants to spend money like a crack-head but I believe that most clients when given an educated glance would take the ROI initiative over a Branding initiative….
Go ask Boo.com or Pets.com what kind of SEO initiative they would have done if given the chance?
JMO - Huebdoo
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