Above all else, clients want to see (good) results.
So, when it comes to client reporting, Gareth Hoyle, CEO and MD of Marketing Signals, believes it’s better to show rather than tell.
In fact, the agency has launched a new reporting tool to do just that for SEO results.
“Links are the majority of the signal for Google, for trust and authority. Probably 80% of the budget clients spend on SEO is used for links and PR. But when you get the output, it’s quite often just a spreadsheet with URLs of coverage,” he says.
To combat this, the agency created a tool called Coveragely, which screenshots coverage and results, and shows clients exactly what has been achieved.
“If you click on any of the screenshots, it’ll open up where the link goes, what the link is, all the individual metrics… it covers it all,” says Gareth.
“And what we’ve found is, it’s all about trying to get buy-in from the C-suite. Especially at the moment when budgets are pretty tight and sometimes getting cut, these are usually the decisions made by someone who doesn’t understand what they’re buying.”
Being able to visually demonstrate results for clients – whether it’s SEO, paid search or anything else in between – is a strong asset in performing successfully, and also retaining work too.
“If the CFO comes to you and asks why you’re spending £20k on this, and you can only show them a spreadsheet of URLs, it’s not exactly the sexiest way to get them on board,” says Gareth.
“Whereas these reports give them a better understanding of what they’re buying. We’ve already seen greater buy-in, more budget released, and fewer customers cutting budgets since launching this.”
In this month’s session, we’ll be hearing more from Gareth about he’s levelled up his client reporting strategy – and how you can apply it to your paid media results reporting too. We’ll also be talking about client touchpoints, and how to make better use of both your agency and your clients’ time.
This event is in partnership with Diginius, Microsoft Advertising Global Partner of the year.