There are many posts out there that claim to hold the secret to a successful SEO strategy. While the true answer is admittedly a matter of self-interpretation, one major element that seem to be missing in most cases is: collaboration.

Collaboration is the process of two or more parties working together to complete a goal. It is essential for success and to put it simply, teamwork makes the dream work.  Below are 5 reasons why we here at Digital Position push so strongly for a collaborative strategy:

To ensure all elements of a website are following best practices. To be successful in organic search, your website needs to check quite a few boxes. In order to do so, you must consider SEO in a number of daily operations. For example, you may need to work with:

• a developer to ensure your website loads quickly and is properly marked up with rich snippets.
• a designer to help create landing pages that are optimized for user experience.
• a writer to create keyword-targeted content throughout the sitemap.
• a reputation manager who will help ensure that your company is being portrayed in its best light across the web. In todays world, your review score matters!

Whatever the need may be, the effectiveness of an SEO strategy relies on the collaboration of all parties supporting or promoting your website.

Accountability. In my years working as an SEO I have seen collaboration provide positive results in EVERY instance I can recall. The reason why is simple: accountability. When people are being held accountable for their actions, they tend to perform at a higher level.

Not all digital marketing agencies handle accountability the same way. For some, SEO’s are required to manage a certain number of clients and maintain a low rate of churn. Employees are held accountable for the agencies revenue stream as opposed to their client’s success. At Digital Position, we base our success on our client’s KPIs. Our model is to staff ahead to ensure employees are not overworked and able to give their clients the attention they deserve. Is this a shameless promotional plug? Yes, but one worth mentioning because this is NOT the norm across all digital marketing agencies.

A better understanding of the business and its core objectives. With different departments focusing on their own goals and objectives, the opportunity for a task to have a negative impact on SEO exists. A perfect example includes the redesign of a landing page. Without SEO being considered in this process, you may find yourself with a product page template that loads slowly which could lead to a decrease in organic visibility. When DEV has a clear understanding of its SEO teams’ objectives, site updates can be carried out with best practices in mind. Additionally, if an SEO is aware that an update is going live, they can QA it before it is rolled out.

I’m not saying that everyone must know the ins and outs of each department, but there should be a moderate understanding of how each operates. A lot of time and money can be saved when all parties involved understand the limits and needs of each department.

Being engaged in the process and strategy. I am relating this more to the relationship between an agency and a client, but it could also apply in-house when talking about the level of understanding between the executive team (or board) and the marketing team.

A campaign running on a high level of engagement makes it easy to know what the current tasks are, and which are most important. An engaged strategy makes it easier to plan out priorities and shuffle tasks if necessary. There is less back tracking needed and everyone can operate like a well-oiled machine when it comes time to do something like launch a promotional strategy. For example, we helped one of our online retailers prepare for an annual sale by developing a landing page and content strategy that targeted sale-related keywords. The campaign brought in nearly twice as much revenue as it did the year before.  If we were not in regular communication with this client, we would have never known there was a sale coming. Our constant engagement allowed us to collaborate on a sales strategy that proved to be very fruitful.

It is also worth noting that not being engaged with some SEO agencies can be detrimental. Some run on the model, “the squeaky wheel gets the grease.” When they get a client that is not active in their strategy, it becomes easy to just collect a monthly check and not do any actual legwork in return.

A collaborative strategy is a lot more fun. Having a collaborative SEO strategy is exciting and it often generates a ton of success. Everyone feels invested in the process and it is a great feeling to see your site listed above your competitors. We often find ourselves manually checking rankings and traffic trends in our free time, as do our clients. We are invested in the strategy and want to see it sustain. The amount of intrinsic value is often comparable to the monetary value.

These are just a few examples for how a collaborative strategy can benefit your SEO campaign. Creating a process certainly isn’t easy but you can get the ball rolling by simply reaching out to the people or teams you need involved. Once the framework is created, it won’t be long before you see the rewards.

Do you have a story about how collaboration improved your businesses performance? Let us know by leaving a comment below!