Ranking Reports

[deanPlumberseo]

Looking for some advise, we are using BrightLocal to show keyword ranking reports to our clients. We do keyword analysis but for the most part local traffic is low anyway. Reality is that a main keyword like City + Plumber for example drive some clicks but the majority are of the long tail. You campaign could be doing well but in the clients mind if you are not ranking for the main word that drives some traffic then they feel unhappy.

Looking to see how you all handle or address this:

1. What are your explanations?

2. Do you use keyword traction reports that expose this?

3. Looking for new ideas

Thanks in advance

Dean

 

[Laustin1878]

A post I found on the subject: http://localsearchforum.catalystema...ing-reports-how-report-serps-changing-so.html

I tend to agree, with Google changing their mind and tweaking the SERPs like some change their underwear, it's nearly impossible to keep track of rankings. I think the majority of clients have little clue as to what they are looking at on reports. They will attribute a decline in rankings to you doing a poor job when the real problem is another Google experiment. I use rankings for my internal adjustments only.

Now, it also depends on what you agreed to do for the client. My agreements are usually to improve leads or calls. I have no control over what happens after that. I was dealing with someone who constantly complained about leads from the forms on the site. 90% of the time when they called the customer back, they didn't answer. They chalked this up to me not doing my job. I re-affirmed them that my job is to get you leads, which I am. After that, it's on your employees. The issue: they were taking 1-2 days to respond to form completions in a saturated industry. The recommendation was to change that and respond more timely and extend their hours or remove the forms when they werent able to answer immediately.

Rankings are the meat and potato's of a campaign. Higher rankings = more visits = potentially more leads. I just don't think the common client understands this on the level they need to, despite how many times or different ways you explain it.

 

[deanPlumberseo]

Yes, I agree. It's just hard to get customers to understand anything when they are constantly getting calls from shady companies like [name removed] telling them they can get them on page 1 guaranteed.

 

[Thaddaeus]

I use Bright Local for my reports also but find they are incomplete. A lot of keywords that the reports track do not show rankings for press releases and local events.

I've found that my clients don't read the reports anyway, so I too am looking at alternatives to Bright Local.

 

[Chris_Gregory]

@deanplumberseo - To answer your first question I believe it's all about setting the right expectations at the point of hire. I explain to customers that it's our job to get them an ROI on the fees they are paying us. Without that we won't have a long relationship and we like long relationships.

It takes time to rank for the main keywords and until we rank for the longtail keywords and build their authority online we won't stand a chance of ranking for the shorter "sexier" keywords. Also by ranking for the long tail keywords allows the client gets a quicker ROI while we are building up enough authority for the main keywords. I have never had a client say they don't want a quick ROI so this isn't an issue after this point.

Now the second part of that is you have to show them that they are getting leads from the long tail searches. Setting up goals in analytics and running reports every month showing them monthly increases in their organic search traffic goes along way to proving the campaign is working even if you aren't ranking for the main keywords yet.

In the end it's all about setting the right expectations at the beginning and then having constant contact with the client on the improvements that are happening.

If the expectations are all about rankings for the main keywords then you might need to adjust that a bit at the beginning.

As far as BrightLocal's ranking reports go - I have found them to be one of the most accurate ranking reports out there and the white label reports they provide are great. However, I think it is vitally important to go over the reports in person or with a screen share so the client knows exactly what they are seeing. Backing up the rankings report with an analytics report of the increase in traffic is also very key. If you are showing more than ranking reports to your client then they won't fixate on just rankings.

Hope that helps.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Excellent Chris. Great explanation!

 

[Linda Buquet]

Just skimmed this but looked related and like good info.

Why You Should Stop Using Google Rankings as Your Primary SEO KPI

 

[sergiuliano]

@Dean - all you have to do is to set Conversion Goals in Google Analytic and show your clients that your campaign is generating more conversions than they had before.

Which keyword is the traffic is coming from will not be so important anymore.

My advice for you is to use Google Rankings not only as a KPI but also to spy on top ranking website Local SEO strategy, this will help you rank your clients on top for generic keywords also.

You will be amazed to see than less than 1% of the top rankings local website have top5 Local SEO factors implemented, so building a better strategy is a simple task.

 

[nonstop99]

Yup, I also agree with this statement about Google.

A post I found on the subject: http://localsearchforum.catalystemarketing.com/local-seo-ranking/6693-ranking-reports-how-report-serps-changing-seo

I tend to agree, with Google changing their mind and tweaking the SERPs like some change their underwear, it's nearly impossible to keep track of rankings. I think the majority of clients have little clue as to what they are looking at on reports. They will attribute a decline in rankings to you doing a poor job when the real problem is another Google experiment. I use rankings for my internal adjustments only.



Now, it also depends on what you agreed to do for the client. My agreements are usually to improve leads or calls. I have no control over what happens after that. I was dealing with someone who constantly complained about leads from the forms on the site. 90% of the time when they called the customer back, they didn't answer. They chalked this up to me not doing my job. I re-affirmed them that my job is to get you leads, which I am. After that, it's on your employees. The issue: they were taking 1-2 days to respond to form completions in a saturated industry. The recommendation was to change that and respond more timely and extend their hours or remove the forms when they werent able to answer immediately.

Rankings are the meat and potato's of a campaign. Higher rankings = more visits = potentially more leads. I just don't think the common client understands this on the level they need to, despite how many times or different ways you explain it.