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The battle between Development agencies and Search Engine Marketing (SEM) agencies is almost as widely discussed as the Search Wars (battles between MSN, Google and Yahoo for web dominance).
In South Africa, as the importance of search engine marketing is becoming more apparent, and more so, to see the results that could be achieved from a well optimised website; could be precisely the reason for the ensuing battle taking place on our shores.
There are thought leader agencies, that do realise the potential and values for themselves by partnering with SEM agencies. This is ideal as, in my opinion, it is best to focus on what you are ultimately good at, don’t try to water-down your specialty.
To the skeptics I say “embrace the search marketer”. We are not here to steal your clients, or to cut you out of the loop. We are here to assist you and save you time, ultimately to make your structure look good.
In defence of Development focussed companies, I must admit that I have seen a fair share of SEM companies that have indeed tried to pry away clients, but they are not the majority.
Top 10 reasons why developers should embrace search marketers:
Your company looks good. Your development, bespoke CMS and structure looks good, because the site succeeds in delivering traffic and conversions.
Gain more work. You might be issued more work from the client because of this success.
Referrals. The Search marketing company might refer development clients to you, because you have a good working relationship.
Word-of-mouth. The client might refer potential contracts to you, because their site is a success.
Robust bespoke CMS systems. The Search marketing company can advise you on global system capabilities such as Joomla, Drupal and WordPress etc and also help you to implement search and user-friendly methodologies in your bespoke systems.
Leader of industry. Displaying forward thinking in terms of website set-up. Your ‘out-the-box-system’ just became that much more valuable.
Improved client retention. By offering these services through a specialist you will retain the client and not have them look elsewhere for such service offerings.
Focus. By using SEM specialists you do do not have to employ an in-house person and can retain your focus on what really counts - design and development.
Cut down Redevelopment. Getting all the basics (in terms of Search friendliness and usability) right first time, thereby saving you time and money.
Remain competitive. Gain the upper advantage and set yourself apart from your competition by offering a SEM solution.
It is win-win concept. Experience it.
This entry was posted
on Monday, July 7th, 2008 at 6:30 pm and is filed under Perspective.
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I concur, and agree that it is an important part of most project’s lifecycles.
I have even turned down large projects because the client refuses to proceed with any form of online marketing and assigns no budget to it. I’d prefer not to be involved in a failed project.
Some people make the mistake of thinking that the website “is” the marketing, but what/how do you market the website? With thousands of new websites being published every day, without marketing, you’re throwing a message in a bottle in the ocean… wishful thinking.
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