When I was a young SEOer, small-time, freelancing my way through life - charging a set fee for one or two sessions with the client to do what I could optimize their sites in as little as time possible - things were great. They were happy, I was happy - life was grand. They would come back to me a few months down the road and ask for more help… good times. Then things changed when I took on a full time job with an agency.
All our clients pay monthly for SEO X amount of hours per month with no real set end date - of course the process is set to continue forever - and this isn’t bad because link building never technically ends and you always have to make small changes to the site to optimize as time goes on - to keep up with trends and new algorithms etc.
What happens though, every client eventually thinks they don’t need the SEO or that they can’t rationalize paying monthly for it. They either cut hours back or decide to leave and do SEO in-house completely.
This is especially true because my company believes in educating the client so what we do becomes less magical as time goes on. This is fine. Clients like us for it because we do good work and teach them how SEO works.
It just makes me sad every time… But I suppose it’s just the great circle of SEO life.
October 25th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
SEO isn’t really magical any more than PPC is - they are both time-consuming practices where experience is the most valuable commodity.
Clients rarely if ever realize what it is that you do to any depth. If they did, they would not volunteer to take on the task themselves.
The main reason for any client/consultant break-up is poor communications because neither side generally understands the other.
Like everyone else in our lives, clients come and go. Often they come back. I personally believe that the more you educate them the more they will comprehend and the LESS likely they are to leave. If they do, they are also more likely to come back.