Last time we discussed the ROI of SEO Data, one of the most important topics.
Many claim that SEO is free but it's actually not!
Luckily, this goes both ways.
Many intangibles can be used to make money. Let's explore the rabbit hole!
P.S. v7 of my Analytics for SEO ebook is out!
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Time & Costs
One of the most common misconceptions by non-techies is that data is purely used for SEO.
Absolutely not!
What we do for SEO can be used for:
- Market Research
- User Experience
- Improving Products
This is key to understanding what I am going to show you next...
The most important benefits are saving time and money.
This isn't an urgent issue for a small website but it is for bigger players.
Many forget that there are looming factors in what we do that are hard to quantify...
but still quantifiable!
Lost time is never found again.β
β
Benjamin Franklin.
From SEO To Raw Business
You need people to work on websites and you need money to make it so.
Employing people on the wrong tasks damages your business.
If you can get the right insights from data or automate processes... you can do yourself a favor.
Below are some possible examples of how you can use your Web data:
To get $$$ you need data and processes to handle it.
Then, with proper communication and by acting, you can reap the benefits!
Content Pruning
This is one of the most common use cases when doing content audits.
The thing is, many expect to pay for SEO results, which in this case you have absolutely 0 certainty of providing.
Pruning is often pointless for small websites.
But if we are talking about websites with a 10-year content debt... things change.
Updating old content can be quite expensive:
Assumptions:
20 minutes to update an old article on average (including editing and publishing)
$50 hourly price (underestimation)
2000 articles
40,000 minutes = 670 hours (90 hours/month, meaning 7-8 months)
670 hours x $50 = $33,500
There is no SEO involved here, this is pure business math.
Now... this is only an example, in practice costs would be higher because your initial plans will rarely hold.
And yet, how many people think about this?
The Case Of A Freelancer
Freelancers have a lot on their plate and getting quick wins is essential to get trust.
Well, look no further, this is the best thing you can do now!
Let's say you have to crunch some data for your client, this is how it goes:
- You ask for access to the data
- You get it and then load everything in Google Sheets
- After days of work, you get something
- You got something wrong and restart again
Then you have to do a Loom/presentation and all the grunt work.
All of this subtracts time and mental health.
This is also an opportunity cost because you could be working on other projects instead!
See?
What if you could give your client recommendations after just 1 hour? Wouldn't that be awesome?
It would, because this builds trust and they will be amazed by your speed.
P.S. Everything can be measured. Be careful though, not everything makes sense.
Some Numbers For You
I want to share my experience with you to put these ideas into context:
- Saved 1000+ hours of my time
- Saved $10,000s if not more of tools per year
All of this even back then with basic skills uh.
The ROI of learning Analytics and some automation pays off.
What I listed is on a personal level, for companies:
- You can save thousands of $$$ and even more
- You can allocate your resources to more profitable activities
- You improve efficiency by reducing errors and time to complete tasks
Ways To Get Quick Wins
The most common methods to get some nice wins or provide timely insights are:
- SERP Clustering
- Categorizing pages
- Analyzing queries
- Internal Linking
- Covering new topics
- Improving Title Tags
While you can't estimate their impact (unless you like whacky predictions), they are easy to automate.
That's a key point: you can scale those recommendations.
All of this can be automated with Google Cloud so you don't have to waste time on it.
I classified several solutions as follows:
You should focus on Low Complexity, High Business Value first because they are quick-wins.
In the long run, you should move left and implement custom solutions and automation.
The Basic AI Automation you see on social media (Custom GPTs) doesn't stand a chance against actual software.
The same goes for super complex solutions that will never be used and ditched after 1 week.
Scaling For Enterprise
Now, small gains aren't worth the hassle.
You can't do complex data work just because you can save some bucks.
Enterprise is quite different because your work can produce results on many business units/branches.
For example, let's say you have 100 websites, one per country.
You discover that there are opportunities to:
- Improve an entire content cluster
- Cover new topics
- Update decaying content because you are losing money
- Launch new products
One change in a country isn't much...
But do it 100 times. Do you still think it's the same?
Shadows Looming
One of the worst things that can happen to any big website is losing money and discovering it later.
Even worse if that could have been prevented.
I have good news for you, this is possible!
Having monitoring systems helps in preventing damage before it goes out of control.
For example:
So you define what you actually mean by damage:
- Less traffic?
- Less $$$?
- Downward trend?
If yes, how much?
There's no universal answer... but! You need to have some protection.
If something happens, you should already know how to react!
For example, if you have a lot of articles that peak around Christmas, you should update them before that period.
This sounds obvious... but do you know how many businesses don't do that?
Takeaways
Most of what is in Seotistics is about Analytics and Business common sense.
As you see, there is no subversion of SEO or negating the importance of the basics.
The important is presenting the benefits in the right way.
Thinking about SEO in a silo makes your life extremely hard.
I like thinking of SEOs as modern webmasters so let's not limit ourselves to think in terms of rankings alone.
Homework: think about a time you couldn't quantify the impact of one of your recommendations.
π₯ Join Our Community
Our Discord community offers a small place where we can talk business, SEO and data.
If you hate all the noise of social media, then this place is for you.
π Analytics For SEO Ebook (v7 Available!!!)
If you want to expand on the use cases I showed and get the best resource on Analytics for SEO, this is for you.
It will teach you or your employees to:
π Prepare audits that make sense and are actionable π₯
π Avoid common pitfalls that cost you money πΈ
π Create analyses that add value and moneyπ―
π Move the needle faster with efficient SEO systems β³
This comes with periodical updates to keep the content fresh.
v7 added:
β
More SQL
β
More Data Visualization
β
More on auditing websites
v8 will include even more SQL examples for BigQuery and auditing tips.
π Recommended Reads - Peak Contentπ»
This is the same as last time:
Some LinkedIn posts you may have missed:
π One-Hour Call
Want to implement an SEO system to do what I wrote here?
Problems with Content or SEO Data?
Look no further, I can help you:
βοΈ Feedback and Recommendations
If you have ideas/recommendations for the next issues of Seotistics, you can simply reply to this email.
Marco Giordano
βSEO Specialist & Data Analyst
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