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The difference between Employed and Independent SEOs
Went Hot: July 16, 2007 - 2:52 pm
Posted By: Harith 419 days ago
Topic Type: Discussion
Category: SEM Industry
As independent SEO my focus was mostly on achieving short term results because I wouldn't know whether clients have penitence to see themselves spending money on a projects which would be rather difficult to document their success before next payment!
Also there was no time at all to spend much needed SEO-educating hours on those clients and for example tell them that SEO is a continuous process and not just an isolated operation.
It was also a challenge to work with web developers of clients during implementation of SEO steps. You could see it in their eyes. Those web developers wouldn't always extend the full cooperation needed to conduct a successful SEO plan.
Now things are much different. I would say to the better. As employed SEO you are able to make your own long term strategy SEO planning. Web developers regards you as one of their own "gang". And most important you are able to spend time SEO-educating hours for both the management and web developers too.
22 Comments
Comments
Gosh. You don't paint a very cheery picture for independent SEOers.
I feel you big time, showing the clients good ROI on the 1st month is difficult, sometimes I loose money on the 1st month in an effort to please them buying directory listings, once you get the trust though I find that they throw money at you. Most web developers are just nightmares as are most content management systems.
It's not hard - managing your clients expectations from day 1 is an important part of the job. And not all experiences are the same.
For example, as an employed SEO, I worked for an agency that forced an outdated, lame approach to SEO on their clients (a few of whom didn't even need the services we were "providing"). So I had to sit there and give out advice that I knew was wrong / guesswork / arrogant opinion. All for a crap salary?
On the other hand, I can freelance - manage less clients (in fact, pick and choose who I want to work with) - I know all of my clients will benefit from my services - I have more free time - oh, and yeh I earn 10 times my agency salary and can work whatever hours I want! :)
I find it ammusing to read that agencies are superior to independent SEOs (who only think about the short term pay cheque?). Just cos in my experience, agencies are the biggest liars in the industry and in most cases they are nothing more than glorified call centres offering half assed SEO advice to unsuspecting clients.
At the end of the day, SEO is business - well, marketing anyway. It is the process of getting eyeballs on the right page. Taking this back to the original title of the post - the difference between employed and independent SEOs is one or more extra zeros on your bank balance and actually taking the responsibility for your services.
I'm sure many SEOs can't think of anything worse than having to take that weight on their shoulders which is fair enough - self employment isn't for everyone, but personally I can't think of anything worse than spending my life making someone else rich while I do all the work! :)
Plus, the relationship between SEO and web developer doesn't turn into a glossy picture of humility and grace as soon as you "represent" an agency. It's exactly the same relationship as a freelancer - in fact I've found that more web developers are prepared to work with me as an independent consultant! It's all down to how you manage your client - granted a lot of SEOs coming from tech backgrounds don't put importance on this (or any other area of business), but it is very much an essential part of business life. Working for an agency just means you have other people to do the jobs you can't do - hence, it might seem it works out better.
It's really down to the individual though - some people are natuarlly interested in and attracted to business life - others would rather do their job and go home at night without having to worry about anything else. There's no "best" solution - it's just down to how you feel about it.
MG
Re: Marketing Guy
"in most cases they are nothing more than glorified call centres offering half assed SEO advice to unsuspecting clients"
Let me break out an old school... ROFL. That is one of the most accurate and blunt statements I have seen about our industry!
When the "real" talent stops doing the "real" work, and attempts to train twenty and thirty-something job seekers to fake it til' they make it, the end result is crap. And this is exactly what 90% of the agencies out there provide.
Personally - I like working for a company that allows me to take a "far out" idea and make it into something profitable. I will say I have a lot of "far out" ideas that aren't worth the brain matter they reside in - but 1 in 10 is good enough for me and my boss. My situation is probably a bit unique - my boss trusts my judgment and lets me run with ideas. My clients trust my judgment and will spend money where I tell them to spend money - because I give them a good return.
Being an independent has it's perks too - you can control how much you make by how much effort you put into making it. I think I'm grossly underpaid, but i get to live in the mountains of Colorado and that makes a lower salary almost bearable. I don't have a college degree or 10 years experience, so getting a position elsewhere as a "telecommuter" is probably close to impossible (a whole other issue there too.)
Also - I'm not super keen on the "twenty and thirty-something" comment - I'm a young "thirty-something" and I would never "fake" anything. It's more about ethics and effort than about age.
The job I currently have is the first one I've ever put my SEO practices into play. In fact after talking with my boss about it in great extent he ended up making me head of the department.
What's great about my company as opposed to some others who have already had SEO packages or plans in place is basically they are looking directly to me to keep on top of the current information and trends, which I am more than happy to provide.
I can imagine being a independent SEO contractor could be difficult. After three-four months into an SEO plan some of our clients are starting to get antsy, but the only way we can relieve this is to keep track of the data, and lots of it. If I was fighting for a paycheck from them after the first run, I might be a little more paranoid. I'm on salary, so I just keep doing my job the best I can.
I gave a client proper expectations on day 1 yet it didn't keep him from calling me 3 days later asking why he wasn't ranking number one on all his terms yet...
I'm still walking the fence on this one.. I am a contractor where I work, but they are really my only client.. I have somehow managed to work myself in to a position that lets me have most of the best of both worlds..
1 client with realistic expectations that lets me experiment and test yet I can come and go nearly as much as I please.. Plus I gave myself more vacation time than he gives his real employees..
In the long run being employed is far less stressful mentally and economically than running my own shop ever was.. And with the new pay package it pays nearly as well..
Having been on both sides of this fence it comes down to setting expectations for the team - be it clients or fellow employees. The pro of being an in-house SEO I found was that you had a lot more control over what you implement. The pro of being an outside SEO consultant is you have a lot more control over your life.
Andrew,
"Gosh. You don't paint a very cheery picture for independent SEOers."
It wasn't that bad to be independent SEO. But I find the opportunity to "practice" SEO is better when I'm employed. For example, I don't need to spend efforts and time on soliciting clients, in a relatively small market, which took big part of my time in the past.
I was offered and accepted what I consider a unique opportunity; a position as SEO/SEM coordinator (consultant) within the largest newspaper publishing group in my country . The group covers 14 daily newspapers and almost 50 local newspapers. Great opportunity to focus on SEO/SEM work, learn new things and meet new people.
Yeah, but when you are a freelance SEO you only take clients when you are bored - long term plans are for your own stuff!
(Kudos on the 'unique opportunity' dude! :))
Wow, dim pictures for those of us that have just left the cage. Here's my scoop on the pro's of independent consultation:
-interesting and fun clients, you choose the jobs
-challenging clients, I love the hoard of approaching suburban small-loan agents
-ability to learn at your own pace, no hiding browser windows or looking over your shoulder because you overused your monthly R&D allocation
-build relationships with related industries, you're just not motivated to do that inside the cage. no links = no work
...since we're all in this together:
-financial benefits. we all want to eat dinner, question is, paper or plastic?
@MarketingGuy, Well said!
Chicken, Egg, Egg, Chicken, WHATEVER! The answer is to create stable revenue by offering an excellent SEM product. Agencies sometimes get in over their head too. Small "boutique" shops offer cutting edge practices that might be off the beaten path for an agency.
We used to be independent. Now aimClear is a growing company. The ethic is the same as it always was. The product gets better each day no matter what the sign over the door says.
...and btw-I was "employed" even when I was an "independent."
:)
I've never been entirely independent, but I was with a design firm where I basically went out and created the SEO component, and I only got paid for work I did. So that was pretty close. Now I get a better salary and benefits working with a big company providing SEO services to clients. These clients are actually a lot more rewarding. The smaller clients often required a lot of un-compensated education, then wanted immediate results, even when they didn't implement the most important parts of my proposals. Now things move very slowly, but at least I can take time to explain why we are doing things and why they take time.
I've always found the best web developers are the keenest to learn more about SEO and have always sought to share aspects of SEO with them. I still think it's a crime that so many sites are created without any thought to SEO. Also the best clients are the ones that want to learn more about SEO and thus understand that investment in it produces much better ROI than going the PPC way.
I've worked as SEO in a SEO firm, as an in-house SEO and as an independent doing side jobs now and then.
The SEO firm was a rush, rush, rush to get a site optimized as quickly as possible and move on to the next one. Focus was only on keyword positioning in organic results.
I never saw the site again unless clients went for a monthly maintenance plan.
The side jobs I try to pick and choose, but usually it's someone I know that needs work done. The clients pay for a specific goal/project. Not much follow up if goals attained. I'm thinking I should start charging a maintenance fee, to continue tweaking and building links after main project complete. . .but really no time anyway.
As an in-house SEO, I get to work on long range goals, I get to check and test results all the time. Keyword rankings isn't the only goal: traffic and conversions is even more important. It's great to see the results of different projects, redesigns, to see better conversions, and gain links naturally.
There are downfalls to in-house though. You're stuck with the same clients, the same site, the same topic day after day, week after week, year after... ugh.
Client expectations will always be the catch what ever role, and each client is different.
As a start up independent SEO I have the ability to work all the time until I develop that client base - long hours (any new business). Some times payed SEO looks pretty good... but I am hoping that things keep growing as they are and then ... payed employment sucks.
From experience there seems like a very vast difference between independent/solo operators and SEM agency teams. I think that knowledge sharing within the agencies is much better, also they seem more client focused, where as individuals are as mentioned above usually focused on trying to bring in business or generate revenue via a number of means. I think you learn more and get to access to cooler tools as part of an agency.
I don't entirely agree with that Teddie - while agencies can have much more elaborate knowledge sharing channels, each individual within the agency tends to have a much different level of experience, which makes it hard to standardise information so it is pallatable for everyone.
Explaining patent documents to non techies (or even simply training up non techies from day 1) can be a very time consuming process - I'm sure everyone here knows the difference between 1 year, 2 years, 3 years, etc experience in SEO. Independents don't have this "weakest link" problem and while that is obviously contrasted to a wider range of industry experience within agencies, I still think that many agency business models are seriously flawed - some are not far off automated SEO / site builder programs! ;)
Plus on the individual side, personally I don't spend that much time trying to generate business (I probably spent more time doing it working agency side, dealing with enquiries, writing pitches and so on). That said, I guess I've technically been "marketing" myself for the past 6 years through forums and stuff like that, so a lot of my business has come on the back of that - things will be different for someone just starting out.
That all said, there are still great agencies out there with solid teams who offer a great service. It's just trying to weed through the sales pitches from the rest that can be the problem for clients.
Swirleigh
"There are downfalls to in-house though. You're stuck with the same clients, the same site, the same topic day after day, week after week, year after... ugh."
As employed SEO, it isn't always the case. It depends on how large the company you are working for and how many different sites it owns. For example some companies own 10+ sites related to different topics. Also the sites might as well be of different types.
Moreover most companies keep updating their sites or move them on new platforms.