Web clients notoriously expect developers to perform tasks outside their area of expertise. They often expect developers to be graphic designers, SEO gurus, copywriters, and marketers.
At the end of the day, your focus should be on getting your clients the best results possible. Sometimes that means outsourcing their SEO strategy. While you might have some overlapping skills, a seasoned SEO professional can get your clients expert level results that will make them happy. Just remember to get your client’s permission to outsource the task so there’s no confusion around who is performing the work.
Here are several good reasons why you should outsource client SEO requests to seasoned professionals:
Clients appreciate honesty
The main reason web developers should outsource client SEO requests is because clients appreciate honesty. If SEO isn’t your core competence, your clients want to know. It’s not fair for clients to pay top dollar for add-on services rendered by someone who isn’t yet an expert.
If you’re not an SEO expert, it’s probably fine to implement basic tasks like on-page optimization and making sure your client’s pages are getting indexed. However, many SEO strategies are more complex, like link building outreach.
Many SEO strategies are inherently advanced
Unlike basic link building, link building outreach requires time, knowledge, and experience to personally generate backlinks from high authority publishers. An experienced SEO expert has the best chance at landing those high authority links for your clients. However, if your client knows you’re not an expert but wants you to do whatever you can, professionals at Seo.co recommend the following five tools for SEO link outreach:
- PitchBox. This tool will help you find authoritative publishers, bloggers, and influencers in your niche in mere seconds. PitchBox provides outreach templates designed to boost responses to increase your chance of getting more high-quality backlinks.
- Ahrefs. The multi-tool of link tools, Ahrefs helps you grow search traffic, spot broken links, generate high domain authority (DA) sites to target for outreach, and more.
- Guest Post Tracker. Guest posting is a critical part of link building outreach, yet it’s challenging to keep track of all your posts. Guest Post Tracker has personal relationships with more than 1,500 websites that accept guest posts. Use this tool to generate backlinks from authoritative sites without having to solicit opportunities.
- BuzzStream. Instead of using spreadsheets to track your email outreach, use BuzzStream. There’s even a built-in tool that allows you to find new link opportunities.
- Majestic. Now you can verify the quality of your backlinks. Majestic tracks the “trust flow” of your backlinks and allows you to see where your competitors are getting their backlinks so you don’t miss out on opportunities to boost your rankings.
Experience prevents costly mistakes
Imagine taking on a massive SEO project for a client who doesn’t know you’re not an expert. It’s possible you might make mistakes that cost the client more than money. For instance, you might get caught up in generating backlinks from a private blog network without knowing it. When Google blacklists those sites, this mistake will cost you time and money. However, what will you do if you end up generating backlinks on websites with low authority that make your client’s brand look bad?
Considering your client’s reputation may not be the first thing that comes to mind when launching a backlink campaign, but reputation is always a priority to an expert SEO professional. Professionals can usually spot bad link opportunities right away. They can see beyond the surface since they’ve already experienced many of the most common mistakes.
Expert SEO professionals are also less likely to make mistakes like setting state-specific PPC ads to display across the entire United States and putting branded keywords in non-branded campaigns.
Outsource your client SEO requests – with their permission
With your clients’ permission, outsource their SEO requests, especially link building strategies. Your clients will be happy to have a seasoned professional managing the task. If they’re not willing to pass the task to a professional, be forthright about your level of expertise so they don’t expect bigger results than you can provide.
Ultimately, your client has the last word in whether or not you can outsource their SEO strategy, but if you can convince them it’s in their best interest, they’ll have a professionally designed website that shows up in the search engines and gets the traffic they deserve.