This week I talked to two different organizations whose top managers have a serious difference of opinion. On one side, some of the managers cannot believe their colleagues would allow an outdated, un-optimized-for-search-engines website represent the organization to prospects and customers! The other side doesn’t believe they will ever get qualified leads online and just don’t see any need whatsoever to update the website, let alone optimize it for the search engines.

Here are the top five reasons management should consider keeping their site updated with a fresh look and feel, accurate content, and current technology. (Note: some of these stats are from the Earnest blog.)

1. 9 of 10 buyers say that when they’re ready to buy, they’ll find you. (Source: DemandGen Report) Let’s face it – in today’s marketing world, buyers are in control. They don’t want to be sold to until they have a genuine need. And, when they have the need, most are gonna start by searching online (see next reason).
ANY CHARACTER HERE
2. 62% of executives over 50 and 81% under 50  use online search daily for business intelligence. (Source: Forbes Insight -  The Rise of the Digital C-Suite) As younger generations move up in the workforce, the executives who make the decisions are the ones who grew up in the information world. They like to get information themselves and use Internet searches to do so.
ANY CHARACTER HERE
3. 96% of journalists use corporate websites when conducting online research. (Cision & The George Washington University) If your prospects aren’t searching online, the media certainly is. One of the big benefits of getting found online is getting called by journalists who need your expertise and can quote you in the press.
ANY CHARACTER HERE
4. Outdated content and “look and feel” of your website IS noticed by customers and prospects. Do you still use your brochure from 1985 with outdated colors, content, font, photos and style? (Please say, “No!”) When a prospect is deciding between different providers, your materials create a perception. Do you want your website to be old and outdated or new and fresh?
ANY CHARACTER HERE
5. The cost of developing websites has come down dramatically  in the last five years. If you spent thousands (or even tens of thousands) years ago for your website, you will spend only a fraction of the original cost to update it now. Also, if you leased your website through a proprietary service that developed it and hosted it, you can probably save thousands a year by paying an independent developer to create a new site that you own and host with a cost-effective third party service. Use of open source programming code, templated web pages, and cascading style sheets (CSS) instead of table-driven coding make website development much more efficient.

If your website was created five or more years ago, it’s time to update it. Out with the old and in with the new. Make sure your online presence is appealing to all generations and that it shines over your competitors! With the falling cost of web development, you almost can’t afford not to update your website.

Flickr photo – Some rights reserved by micah.d

I got an inkling that all was not right in the web development and SEO world in 2008. I went out to bid for a client of mine – a manufacturer of green industrial lubricants – and got bids for a new, optimized web site that ranged from $2,000 to $20,000. Hmmm – that’s too big a range! That’s a red flag of a fragmented industry – or innocent business owners being ripped off on their Internet marketing!

Then again in January 2010, I requested bids for a client that needed a web site update and ongoing SEO. I got bids for $4,000, then $7,000 for the update alone. Hmmm. I called my web dev/SEO guru  and asked, “Mark, if I’m not mistaken, to update this site we need to do steps 1, 2, 3 and 4, test everything and then flip the switch, correct?” He said, “Yes!” I said, “How much would that cost?” He said, “$400.” Eeeesh! A 10 x markup from the other guy? Are you kidding me?

I started directed successful web site and SEO in 1998 (among other marketing), when I first worked on a client’s web site. At that time, there were very few SEO experts out there. I rolled up my sleeves, learned SEO,  instructed the web developers involved with my clients, and we got fantastic results. From this experience and in part because I spent 14 years in the software industry prior to founding New Incite, I understand SEO and web development technology!

In 2005 I placed more emphasis on positioning and marketing my B2B CMO for Hire services. I said, “Now there are more good SEO companies out there, I can partner with them and focus on  strategic marketing, marketing planning, execution/project management and results tracking!”

But now in 2010 I am seeing SEO and web development practices that aren’t right, and I’m going to continue to blog about them and consult with my clients to protect them and save them money. There are too many new web development and SEO companies who got into the business because they saw the need, but:

• They see web dev and SEO as a money-making business only – not a win-win for both their company and their clients.
• They learned SEO when they got in but they haven’t kept up with best practices and they’re still proposing old tactics – I kid you not!
• They’re specialists in something else (graphic design, IT services, publishing) and have added or moved to web development and SEO as a cash cow that they pay lip service to but are not experts in!

So, share your war stories – have you or your clients ever been ripped off on web development or SEO?

Photo on Flickr – Some rights reserved by superk8nyc

In my last blog entry,Trust: Get It, Measure It, Grow It Online or Offline, I wrote about what I learned in reading the books Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith and The Trusted Advisor by David Maister et al.  The exercise made me think of an issue I’ve seen on a lot of web sites: the position of the About Us page.

I take note when an About Us page is the first one on a web site menu. To me, putting an About Us page first tells me at a glance that the site creators either don’t get basic marketing principles or just have an “it’s all about us” attitude. They are not putting the needs of visitors who come to their site first.
As an example, let’s say a visitor comes to a site about a manufactured product. What is first and foremost on their mind? Do they want to read about the history of the company or the bios of the people who work there first? No. They are asking in the short time they have to decide if they are in the right place, “Is this product what I need?” and “Does it have new features that offer me benefits I haven’t even thought about?” They might also ask, “How is this product different than that of the competitors?”

When you design your web site (or your presentation or your brochure or any other marketing materials), put yourselves in the shoes of your target audience(s). What pain do they have that you solve? How can you make a difference? Providing answers first for the needs of your potential customers increases trust, gives them the feeling that you care, and grabs the attention of your prospect. It increases your trust quotient by decreasing the selfishness factor in the trust equation mentioned in the book Trust Agents and originated in the book The Trusted Advisor:

Trust = (Credibility + Reliability + Intimacy) / Selfishness

It’s only after you capture the attention of a potential customer because you have what they need, that they will wonder about you and your company. “Do I want to do business with this company?” “Can I relate to the people who work here?” Answers to these questions can increase your credibility, but you may never get the chance if you appear selfish to begin with.

…And the Answers You Should Expect to Hear.
The search engine optimization field is extremely fragmented, with companies ranging from solo independent consultants working from their garages to large established organizations. The barriers to entry are low. There is a ton of information online, allowing anyone who is interested to pick up information and profess themselves an SEO expert.

I wrote about this in my blog entry SEO Industry Has Some Snake Oil, But Also Much Success. I do think there are good SEO vendors out there now. But, in the fragmented SEO industry, the wide range of capabilities and prices  make it more difficult to know which vendor provides the best value. Furthermore, SEO is a technical specialty that not many of us understand. The fact that we are dealing with a fragmented industry and uninformed buyers begs the question, “How does a lay person who doesn’t understand SEO choose a vendor?”

Below are the 12 questions you should ask any SEO vendor before hiring them. Before you talk to vendors, try to  educate yourself about search engine optimization best practices so that you can make an informed decision. One source of SEO information is Search Engine News by Planet Ocean Communications. For the past ten years, I have found this to be a great source of SEO best practices. Planet Ocean rewrites the book on SEO and publishes the results to subscribers each month. Planet Ocean provides timely information on search engine algorithm changes and how to deal with them. With their service, you can get accurate, high-level information and the ability to drill down into the how-to when you want. Even if you don’t do the SEO work, it might be a good idea to subscribe to stay current so that you can better select and then manage your SEO vendor.

12 Questions to Ask When Choosing an SEO Vendor

1. Can you provide me with references I can contact about your performance, results, responsiveness, etc.?

The SEO vendor should easily give you at least 3 references. Ask the references if their expecations were met and how (timeliness, results, professionalism, ability to explain technology, etc.).

2. What methodologies or best practices do you use in search engine optimization?

You should hear that the vendor uses white hat SEO techniques, focuses on keyword analysis and content updates, manually generates quality inbound links, and uses cascading style sheets or other techniques to separate a web page’s content from its design. The vendor should NOT do black hat SEO practices such as link farming, keyword stuffing, or doorway or gateway pages.

3. What steps does the SEO vendor take to understand your business before search engine optimization?

The SEO vendor should take some time to learn about your business so they know which audiences you need to target and the best way to reach those audiences through SEO. You should get a sense of how strategic the vendor is and how much they can think outside of the box to make your SEO project a success.

4. How do you conduct an analysis to determine what needs to be done for our SEO project?

The SEO vendor should have a proven methodology including a checklist of steps they go through to anayze your SEO needs. Find out if they reverse engineer competitor sites to uncover techniques and opportunities. Ask them what tools they use for keyword analysis, and find out if they use any other automated tools to assess your web site.

5. What methodology do you use to you submit our web site URL to online directories?

Submission to key online directories should be done manually, not through automatic submission programs. The automatic programs have been recognized by certain search engines who dismiss the submissions as spam.

6. What features do you recommend we add to our web site to enhance SEO?

Current practices call for inclusion of a variety of media to improve search engine performance. This is mainly because Google places more emphasis on video, audio and blogs on web sites in search engine results.

7. How do you recommend we go about building links to our site from other sites?

There are programs that automate creating links to your web site. But the major search engines recognize when you get large numbers of links into your web site in a short period of time and will rank your site lower as a result. You are better off getting a few links from related, quality web sites each week to build your incoming links.

8. Is SEO your only service or do you have others?

Find out if search engine optimization is the focus of the vendors you talk to or if it is a sideline to other services they offer like web development and marketing. The most important factors in your decision are the quality of the service the SEO vendor provides and the results their work gets for you. But it’s important to know if SEO is the core service a vendor offers or a sideline that they provide using someone else’s automated tools.
9. How many years of SEO experience do you have?

The longer an SEO vendor has been practicing the art, the better. More years experience means that the vendor has dealt with more optimization issues and challenges and (presumably) has found solutions. SEO vendors with more experience will have a better perspective on the history of search engine optimization and understand how work-arounds to search engine algorithms are negatives once the search engines figure them out and rank web sites that use them lower or delist them altogether.

10. How do you stay up-to-date with the ever-changing search engine algorithms and techniques for optimization?

SEO vendors should have some process for staying up to date on algorithm changes and proven techniques for SEO success. The Search Engine News service that I mentioned above is one of several reputable service that you can follow. In addition, SEO vendors should be part of industry associations and professional groups (see next question).

11. From Lee Odden’s blog entry: Have you been vetted and listed in industry directories? Selection guides?

If SEO vendors are serious about SEO, they probably will have a presence in the industry and may speak at industry conferences and programs. Some directories and listings of SEO vendors include SEMPO, SEOConsultants,  TopSEO.com, Marketing Sherpa’s SEO Guide, and Marketing Profs Vendor Selector.

12. How do you charge for your services? Hourly or project? Are there ongoing costs to maintain the SEO?

Any vagueness in the SEO vendor responses about pricing or ongoing, monthly maintenance fees and length of the process should raise a red flag. It is not unusual for a good SEO project to begin with initial programming and changes and then continue for at least six months with monthly analysis, tweaks to keywords and programming changes. The analysis and tweaks on an ongoing basis should not be expensive, especially if the SEO vendor uses automated tools to do the analysis. Small keyword and program tweaks take do not take much time to do.

I hope these 12 questions help those of you who are choosing an SEO vendor. SEO vendors – did I leave anything out? Please comment using the link at the end of the page.