How “SMART” Are Your Search Engine Optimization Goals

Virtually everyone who’s engaged seriously in the practice of search engine optimization would have come across surprisingly versatile results at some point in time or another. In order to set yourself apart from other consultants, develop a cost-effective SEO Process with a high return on investment. Therefore, our highly skilled team of SEO experts always set goals that target the site’s business needs and take into consideration the market and site behavior, characteristics, restrictions, available resources and time to end up achieving high-end results.

A great way to set goals with your client is to follow the SMART goal setting methodology:

SPECIFIC – The more specific you are for your goal, the better it would be. If the goal is to improve rankings for a bunch of keywords but conversions don’t increase. This means that they were not the right keywords. Therefore, set clear expectations from the onset of the project to save yourself from awkward conversations later on.

Set The Specific Goal: We will end up increasing non branded organic traffic by 15% in the next 6 months and non-branded conversions from organic by 5%. Also, have answers to these 4 “W questions”:

• WHAT – What is the business goal of your site? What is the present SEO situation of the site, its rankings and optimization?
• WHO – Who are the decision makers and the stakeholders? Who will be involved and you can count to support you in the SEO Process -developers, writers, link builders?
• WHERE – Will be the SEO process activities implemented: In-house, an external agency or freelancers? Where and in what all social media platforms the site has its presence?
• WHICH – Which are the technical, content or promotion constraints? And which all are the most important products or services for your business?

When you have the answers to these questions, prioritize the list of requirements of the site, an overview of its online business, reliable resources and organizations.

MEASURABLE – Due to ease of measurement, online marketing is becoming so popular. With the help of Google custom reports, our SEO experts are able to provide the client what all they need to know in terms of progress. When you have clear milestones laid out, it helps in creating the timeline that further helps in managing and meeting the expectations.

The team of knowledgeable professionals always ensures to measure the success and failure of the efforts they have put in. They also keep track of each step adopted in the process.

• How often and for how much time duration you will measure the achievement of each of the SEO process goals.
• How can you organize and automate data gathering and reporting?
• Track the activities and presence of audience
• What will be the key performance indicators?
• What tools are you going to use to track the progress towards the goals achievement?

First review the goals, and then answer these questions one by one. Prior starting the process make sure you have access to the data and all the necessary information.

ATTAINABLE – Now when you have the list of desired goals, list of site requirements, restrictions, present status and resources, check how you can afford to rank the targeted keywords. On the basis of site characteristics and their importance, choose the most feasible SEO strategies to achieve these goals.

We always prioritize our clients in accordance with the present SEO Process. However, if they are too ambitious and not realistic, we try to adopt certain other methods.

RELEVANT – Once you have specific, measurable and attainable goals in mind, ensure that you spend your time wisely. It is also very much required to verify the site business and the type of conversions and lead you are looking to generate through SEO practices. Look what importance and benefits each of the specified goals has towards the site. Make sure that the expected benefits are reasonably higher than the related costs of implementing the strategies to achieve them.

TIME BOUND – Although it has been already mentioned under Measurable, yet setting a time frame along with dates helps you implement the strategies and related activities to meet the desired goals. Again, being honest with your clients is key. If you feel the date will be missed, let your client know up front. We tell the client very clearly how long will it take to start getting results for each stage of the SEO Process. Not every SEO project goes on smoothly and not every date will be missed, but we always send out advanced warning signals to show our proactiveness. Our team always develops a schedule that is further used to follow-up the SEO activities implementation and goals achievement.

You might have already begun your SEO process, it’s never late to mend. Our Search Engine Optimization Services focus on your organizational objectives and adopt smarter -not harder- goals to help you achieve the results in the given time frame. Our SEO Consulting Services helps you get more qualified traffic, build brand awareness, get top ranks in search engines, and increase conversions.

To know how Source Soft can help your business grow!