First potential client has gotten in touch with me

thedon23 said:

Thank you! I'll keep everyone posted.

BTW, my plan is to not charge him for SEO until he see's results. I know some of you mentioned not doing this, but I feel like no one is going to want to pay someone new upfront for that sort of work. His market is not competitive at all, and I'm pretty confident it will be pretty easy to rank.

As far as the initial setup and such (which I will charge him upfront)..what do you guys think is a reasonable price? I mean, for the following:

- Facebook, Twitter
- Yelp
- Google Local Listings

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You've already given him the results, he just won't pay you.

thedon23 said:

Thank you! His market is not competitive at all, and I'm pretty confident it will be pretty easy to rank.

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You said you used craigslist and he found you, then you mentioned that he's a professional photographer. Your profile says your in California, so I assume he is local to you in CA.

I'm working with 2 professional photographers in southern California, and i can tell you that it is a pretty competitive market.

Mesach said:

You said you used craigslist and he found you, then you mentioned that he's a professional photographer. Your profile says your in California, so I assume he is local to you in CA.

I'm working with 2 professional photographers in southern California, and i can tell you that it is a pretty competitive market.

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Based on the keyword research I did, for the city he wants to rank for, the site ranking number 1 is 1 year old and has 13 backlinks. I'm not surprised that Southern California is more competitive. I'm located in Northern California.

Do not be honest about not having any experience, no one wants to pay you to learn while experimenting with their website.

The best way to start out is to team up with a more experienced seo services provider.
That way you can "borrow" their credentials while you are starting out.
You can show their work, use their pricing (mark it up, obviously) and of course, use their services (since you really don't have the experience). You loose a little margin, but you gain a lot in return and you free up time for sales.

The standard line for credentials is "My clients prefer to remain anonymous, so I can not reveal specific domain names. However, I can tell you I have worked with over 100 websites to get first page rankings for competitive terms like 'California Dentist'. I am sure I can do the same for you."
That's enough for 99% of potential clients.

BTW, my plan is to not charge him for SEO until he see's results.

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That is a serious mistake. 1. He will prefer to get results instead of a discount, and if you don't charge it's going to be harder for you to invest in services. 2. It might take longer than you think, and 3. (MOST IMPORTANT) define "results" - you might get him to first place for a term that ends up not converting for him - he's not going to see the value.
...or he might decide that he got to the first page because of his own efforts not yours, or he may simply disappear once you get him ranked.... etc,etc,etc
Also, to be honest, it simply looks more serious if you charge him.

Offering a discount for no reason says:
"I don't believe that what I am doing is worth what I am charging"
doing it for free says: "it is worth nothing"

2) Since your references suck, give him a full outline of what you'll do for him. I don't mean to go into what you'll technically do, but in very nice marketing terms create a full proposal. My proposal was like, 9 pages long. It impressed my client. Format it very professionally. Google around for examples to copy if you don't have any idea right now.

3) Tell him that you can tailor your work as per his budget, and get him to tell you his budget. That way you don't have to worry about overcharging/undercharging.

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-100% agree

Be sure to identify what you can do for him, but do NOT give out your complete plan and do NOT give him the list of keywords you will rank him for before he has paid. You do NOT want to go into details about the way you build links or how backlinks work. -If he knows a little seo, he no longer needs you, if he knows nothing you are only confusing him.

THIS is what the potential client wants to hear:
I can get you an additional 1000 potential customers to your website per month.
I can improve the quality of the visitors to your website, improving your conversions (do this by targeting buy-trigger keywords)
I can give you an onsite analysis that will improve conversions
I can provide ROI <- guess what? THAT is the one they MOST care about. Are you going to earn them more than you cost them.

Make sure you do the research to back up those claims though, don't throw out numbers that aren't there and calculate traffic from spots on the first page, but not #1.

agente808 said:

Do not be honest about not having any experience, no one wants to pay you to learn while experimenting with their website.

The best way to start out is to team up with a more experienced seo services provider.
That way you can "borrow" their credentials while you are starting out.
You can show their work, use their pricing (mark it up, obviously) and of course, use their services (since you really don't have the experience). You loose a little margin, but you gain a lot in return and you free up time for sales.

The standard line for credentials is "My clients prefer to remain anonymous, so I can not reveal specific domain names. However, I can tell you I have worked with over 100 websites to get first page rankings for competitive terms like 'California Dentist'. I am sure I can do the same for you."
That's enough for 99% of potential clients.

That is a serious mistake. 1. He will prefer to get results instead of a discount, and if you don't charge it's going to be harder for you to invest in services. 2. It might take longer than you think, and 3. (MOST IMPORTANT) define "results" - you might get him to first place for a term that ends up not converting for him - he's not going to see the value.
...or he might decide that he got to the first page because of his own efforts not yours, or he may simply disappear once you get him ranked.... etc,etc,etc
Also, to be honest, it simply looks more serious if you charge him.

Offering a discount for no reason says:
"I don't believe that what I am doing is worth what I am charging"
doing it for free says: "it is worth nothing"


-100% agree

Be sure to identify what you can do for him, but do NOT give out your complete plan and do NOT give him the list of keywords you will rank him for before he has paid. You do NOT want to go into details about the way you build links or how backlinks work. -If he knows a little seo, he no longer needs you, if he knows nothing you are only confusing him.

THIS is what the potential client wants to hear:
I can get you an additional 1000 potential customers to your website per month.
I can improve the quality of the visitors to your website, improving your conversions (do this by targeting buy-trigger keywords)
I can give you an onsite analysis that will improve conversions
I can provide ROI <- guess what? THAT is the one they MOST care about. Are you going to earn them more than you cost them.

Make sure you do the research to back up those claims though, don't throw out numbers that aren't there and calculate traffic from spots on the first page, but not #1.

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Awesome post man. Thanks for taking the time to write that.

Now, to be honest, I've sort of trapped myself on this one. Basically, in the Craigslist ad I posted, I said I charge for everything up front, except offsite SEO. Basically, I said I would not charge until you see results. I thought this would be a good way to get a few clients, to get the ball rolling.

I'm not even sure if he found me through Craigslist; he sent me a message directly from my website contact form. I won't make any mention of the pay after results until he does. I'm meeting with him tomorrow.

You make some great points. Do you have MSN/AIM? If so, let me know and we can exchange IDs.

Cheers
thedon23

agente808

That is great advice. I had a company for 3 years that I closed in 2007. We got most of our clients from cold calling. We chose to subcontract for small agencies and others that couldn't handle the work. 1/2 of our revenue was from made for adsense sites (I'm not interested in that now).

Interesting, because our portfolio was so kick-ass, most clients didn't require references. They understood that 90% of what we did was sub-contract and those people really didn't want to do references. So, I still think sub-contracting is a pretty go way to go because it can assure you higher volume of work and you don't have to work with clueless pain in the ass clients like those in a biz where they don't have any tech/web experience (Real estate people, grrrr).

I lost a money at the end AND went through a life changing event that was not related. So I pretty much had shell-shock, and said screw internet work-- even though I'd had about 5 years experience of on since 1996. I was recruited for a fantastic job in another area and have stayed in that area.

Now I I'm going back in! So I've been building credentials through a review site of sorts that targets SEO and soc media in my particular city. It ranks very well, and I have a high profile online. Started getting back in the game last Jan.

This is another way to go for those of you that want to work on your own but usually did your OWN work.

So my problem is I've been out of contact with clients from way back 4 years ago. And, some of the most important are way too high level now for me to ask them for references for anything other than a big job or for just a few references per month. That sucks. The work I did back then was pretty big projects and people liked us a lot.

BTW, the main reason the company didn't work is because I didn't focus enough on sales! Direct selling and meeting prospects is 1/2 the time spent when you're doing web services.

Anyone have suggestions given that these references are from 4 years ago and i didn't stay in touch? Really, there's no much of an answer. Main thing is maybe if I can get them to have me manage projects for them again & hire freelancers to work with me. But mostly they've got new people/businesses to help them while I was out of the picture.

This thread has become a fantastic primer on starting a career as an SEO professional. Good work, guys!

Thanks for all the help everyone. Really appreciate it. So I'm meeting up with him tomorrow.

I just did some keyword research on MS, just to have an idea of his niche. Anything else you guys think I should have with me tomorrow?

Have some hard numbers about what quantity of traffic you think he can get.

Also, this guy is starting out with a brand-new site, right?
Be sure to let him know that brand-new sites can't be ranked as quickly as aged sites, so he is going to have to wait longer than normal to see some results, don't make promises to rank in under 3 months (even if you think you can).

As for the sale - don't act over-eager. You have to be the desirable one, make him want you - play hard to get... (ok this isn't ewhoring, but you get the idea ) no wonder this stuff is easier for girls, hahaha

Just pretend like you have enough clients and that this guy needs you more than you need him.
Act like you are wanting to help the guy out because you think he's a nice guy, & give him some general tips.
*example: "I normally work with established clients that have a history of metrics to work from, but your website is in an interesting niche and I think I could get you 100% ROI within the first year. You should try targeting a couple of less competitive phrases first to get the traffic coming in quicker, then go for the big ones."

Most important: don't get caught up in getting the sale at all costs, some clients are not worth it and you have to get a feel right away about who is worth spending time on, and who is going to be a problem down the line. There will be more potential clients, so even though you really want this one, be ready to walk away if it doesn't feel like a good deal for you.

Best of luck on that meeting!

Get yourself some books, about getting clients & how to be on the phone for example, or at meetings. Seriously, you can learn a lot and skip some problems from the beginning.

Thanks for all the help everyone! I just sealed the deal. He wants me to rank his site on Google for a few keywords to start. He's still deciding on the social media stuff. I'm just kinda stumped as far as how much to charge.

If anyone would be nice enough to have a look at the keyword competition and tell me what you think would be a reasonable price, shoot me a PM and I'll send over the keywords. I appreciate it

ALWAYS charge a premium. Never, ever cheap out.

A fan page, $1k/month with design/maintenance included