Have you ever felt like your team has a million great ideas but is held back by the challenges of getting the buy-in required to just get things done?
If you are an SEO with a little bit of experience, you know this is the hardest thing. Where the sheer scale of initiatives and approvals required can threaten the success of even the best ideas.
In this guide, you’ll find best tips to help you bridge the gap between SEO and the rest of the business, driving growth based on my own experiences of overcoming in-house objections.
Understanding the Importance of SEO Buy-In
From the beginning, I often felt SEO was undervalued; we had so much potential but lacked enough buy-in to get traction. I realized that to get the support we needed, we had to stop talking about SEO in isolation. Instead, we needed to tie SEO into specific business goals – the macro benefits.
It's easy to stay focused on your tasks, but understanding how uyor company operates, creates value, and generates revenue is crucial. As business evolve, so should your knowledge. Switching from eCommerce to lead generation, requires learning the new business model.
Actionable Tip: Set up meetings with different departments or business partners to understand their roles, contributions and succes metrics.
Know the the overarching business objectives and key results, this prepares you to align your SEO goals with the business's success metrics.
Actionable tip: Familiarize yourself with metrics like market share, scroll depth, video plays, or customer lifetime value. Market share, for example, involves understanding how your website's performance compares to competitors. Benchmark your SEO efforts against other players in the industry to see where you stand and identify areas for improvement. This approach is especially useful if traditional SEO metrics don’t resonate with your organization.
Even the best ideas can fall flat if presented poorly. You can prevent this by avoiding long presentations on SEO tactics.. Instead, create a clear document that includes screenshots and three bullet points that answer who, what, why, and how – with a strong emphasis on the why.
Actionable Tip: Keep detailed information available for questions, but focus your main presentation on the critical points and their direct benefits to the business.
When I first started, I hesitated to make projections. But as the in-house SEO authority, I realized I was best positioned to do so. I learned to use the tools and data at my disposal to make informed projections confidently.
Actionable Tip: Leverage existing SEO forecasting articles and tools to create rough projections that can help secure buy-in and justify prioritizing your SEO initiatives.
Not every SEO initiative is of equal importance. Learn when to stand firm and when to compromise. Understand that your work isn't always the top business priority.
Actionable Tip: Create a two-year roadmap that outlines your SEO initiatives. This helps you prioritize tasks effectively and ensures long-term planning for addressing the numerous aspects that need attention/budget in SEO.
When faced with questions or resistance about SEO, take a step back and see things from the perspective of those not familiar with SEO. Build relationships and look for opportunities to educate your colleagues.
Actionable Tip: Create a best practices documentation library for SEO basics. This can be a valuable resource for educating new team members and partners.
Getting support for your SEO ideas is just as important as the ideas themselves. That's why it's crucial to learn how to communicate with marketing leaders as you progress in your SEO career. Embracing these strategies will lead to better understanding, resource allocation, and ultimately, successful SEO projects that drive significant business results.