Not only are they still important, but they’re still misunderstood, whether that’s by the businesses that need them or the agencies that are trying to sell them. Many big SEO agencies still don’t understand the real difference between local SEO and traditional SEO, for starters, let alone why local citations and business listings are still more important for some businesses than they are for others.

But, here’s the thing, there’s an art to selling these services to stakeholders or clients. You need to sell the value, without overselling it. As experts in selling citation-building services and listing management, with years of experience, we know a thing or two about the mistakes people make.

So here’s how to do it properly.

6 Tips for Selling Local Citations Services and Listings Management

1. Educate, Educate, Educate

So let’s start with the truth here: many people simply don’t know what local citations are, or why they form part of a strategy.

We often find this to be true of both the businesses themselves and those that are doing the selling. A few people understand the concept, but then don’t understand the importance, or why they’re still useful in 2023.

The simplest thing to do is to educate. People talk about listings, citations, links, and Google Business Profiles… but they don’t understand the differences between them.

2. Don’t Sell Listings and Citations as Link Building

The truth of it is, many businesses are completely mislead when it comes to local citations.

A lot of people still talk about business directories like they’re link building. Sure, back in the day if you added your site to a hundred directories it was part of your link building campaign. But citation building isn’t quite the same thing. Yeah, links are involved, but there’s more to it than that.

Tell your clients what listings are and what citation building actually is and cover how it differs from link building. If you don’t know yourself, then read about local link building here.

Remember, they’re not links in the traditional sense, so they shouldn’t necessarily be used as link building. This means that when you build citations, if you’re buying a batch from a service like BrightLocal, they’ll all come through across a short period of time.

Agencies in particular have a habit of asking to buy batches so they can report on supplying clients with a certain number a month.

So, if you’d hoped to pay a one-off fee and then trickle out links to clients over a number of months, you’re looking at the wrong thing. Get out there and build actual links.

3. Don’t Oversell Them, and Be Honest

Citations aren’t going to take your client to the moon, so stop telling them they will.

We regularly get asked the classic SEO question “How quickly will this make me rank number 1?”, which further highlights both a misunderstanding and a complete misrepresentation of listings to businesses.

Citations and listings won’t propel your business to the top of the local rankings. But they will provide you with a solid base to build from. Google generally prefers businesses to have a solid listings profile so it can verify information about your business. It’s simply the first rung on the ladder.

Being dishonest with your clients is just going to lead to anger or disappointment when the work you deliver doesn’t fire them to the top of the SERPs as you promised. But it doesn’t mean you can’t show them real value.

4. But Really Show the Value

This makes it sound like there’s no point in building citations and listings in 2023. But the reality is they offer so much more value than just a link.

We have a lot of experience at selling in the true value, to help agencies and their clients really understand what it is they’re buying.

For local citations, we find that the true value comes in highlighting the brand perception. You need to make sure your external listings are all accurate—if you have name, address, and phone number (NAP) inconsistencies, it’s going to look bad to prospective buyers. Actively building your own citations and managing them will help your information stay accurate.

Sure, that takes a lot of time and effort, but it’s where services like Citation Builder and Active Sync come into play.

If you’re selling in more advanced listings management services, outside of just a one-off citation-building campaign, then things can get a little more complex. The value is still a great place to start, though.

5. Consider Angling Citations and Listings Differently

When we’re talking to potential clients we often find it easier to make these two things different.

For building citations, the conversations we have usually focus on the following:

• Getting to the bottom of the problem. Is there missing or inaccurate information? Is it causing poor brand perception?
• Is there a knowledge and time gap? Often one feeds into the other, a lack of understanding makes the job seem either pointless or like too big a task.
• It’s rarely about SEO. People usually come to us saying “Oh $#!+, something’s wrong and it’s affecting the business”.

For listings management, we center conversations around the following:

• We use the engagement and authority layer that ActiveSync targets.
• We highlight that these layers build a really solid foundation and are the first step everyone has to take.
• With our own system, we can highlight that businesses get access to their listings permanently, which is a real bonus to be able to sell to prospective clients. This is something to consider as a real bonus when you’re selling them yourself.
• Once these important listings are built, there’s always an option to bolt on the maintenance layer when it’s applicable. Interestingly, despite being a bolt-on, clients tend to want it.
• We know people don’t go to page 6 to find a MerchantCircle listing, for instance, and we’re open and honest about that.

6. Audit Your Potential Client’s Current Standing

Before you even start selling though, you need to get prepared. The most critical thing to do is audit your potential client’s current standing in terms of local citations and listings.

It’s no use approaching someone if they’ve already got a flawless listings profile. But the truth is that many local businesses don’t.

Highlight the issue and you’re on to a winner. Do something like this:

• Understand where they are performing in terms of share of voice. Are they getting the catchment on the keywords they are interested in?
• Look at their existing citation profile – use this using a tool like Citation Tracker or other citation scanning tools.
• Then go to them and show them the inconsistencies. Highlight it and ask them whether they know, then emphasize the negative impact these inconsistencies could have.
• A frequent response here is “Arrrgh what happened here???” followed by a bit of a panic.
• If they don’t rank, ask them when they ever last looked at this
• After you’ve looked at their citation profile, do a deeper audit based on industry and geography. This will help them see the opportunities against their competitors.

What else is important?

Outside of these tips, before you start selling citations we’d recommend getting to know the whole process yourself.

Understand:

• How long it will take if you do it yourself, and how long it will take if you use a service like Citation Builder.
• The platforms available for your client to get listed on. Find the best business directories.
• Pay attention to which directories are actually important for your client or business. Find the best citation sites by location and the best by industry.
• How you can monitor the listings once they’re live and keep them updated.
• That some services will only allow you to rent your listings (not us!).

It’s also worth pointing out that a lot of the bigger, more successful agencies don’t actually know much about local SEO. A shocker, I know. If you’re one of those agencies, and you’re doing local work for clients, then spend some time getting educated. There’s plenty of resources out there, like BrightLocal Academy and local SEO learning hub.

If you really don’t have the time though, and you’re not sure you can sell in a service you know is needed but aren’t as confident about, don’t be afraid to hand over the communications to people that do. We often work directly with agency’s clients to do this, helping clients sell the service that’s needed.

Your “Too Long, Didn’t Read” Tips for Selling Listings

Basically, what it all really boils down to is three simple things:

• Educate yourself and your clients.
• Be upfront and honest. Set expectations.
• Audit their presence.

If you do that, you should be on to a winner. If you need support with any of the steps, whether it’s a citation-building service or listings management, BrightLocal is here to help. We’re experts in both selling the value and actually doing the work so that we can help agencies at every step of the process.

Welcome to Advance Your Agency, a series devoted to helping digital marketing agencies grow and succeed.

“Employees leave their managers, not their companies.”

It’s one of those quotes that we often hear, or see plastered all over LinkedIn, but probably don’t know whether to believe. 

Yet, the statistics suggest that managers really do hold the keys to an employee’s engagement at work. In the US, a study by DDI found that 57% of people leave managers, not companies.

It’s similar in the UK, too, where a study by Totaljobs found that almost half (49%) of employees in the UK leave their jobs because of their line managers.

Furthermore, Gallup found that 70% of team engagement is determined solely by the manager. And, in the UK, another study conducted in late 2022 found that employees who feel well-supported by their line manager are 3.4 times more likely to feel engaged at work.

Here’s an overview of what I’ll be covering in this article:

The world of digital agencies isn’t immune to this phenomenon. If you’re running an agency, or even just managing an individual, you need to understand the impact you can have on their engagement. If you mismanage someone, it could spell disaster for your agency.

How Managers Make the Difference

I’ve always been a firm believer that your experience in a workplace is largely determined by the manager you have. But the concerning thing for many agencies (and something which has probably led to the stats shown above) is the varying styles and abilities of those placed within these all-important people-management roles.

Agencies, in particular, often have issues with progression. They fall into the trap of “progression=line management”, rather than just increased responsibility as a reflection of their experience. This can often lead to incredibly clever people doing something they just aren’t good at or don’t want to do—managing people—simply because it’s the only way for them to move ahead in their business.

Our direct managers have such an influence on the way we work. They provide our sense of purpose, direction, and autonomy. Plus, they support our professional development. If they aren’t equipped with the skills to effectively deal with people, then this can have a major impact on the experience we have at work.

Yet with Gallup finding that only 20% of employees ‘strongly believe’ that they are managed in a motivating way, it shows that managers get it wrong far more than we may think.

The Pandemic Made This Even Worse

A lack of proximity and distance from the wider organization means that employees with particularly poor managers are struggling even more since the pandemic.

A shift towards far more remote and hybrid working has meant many develop closer ties with those they immediately work with, but looser connections with colleagues in other teams or departments. 

The result? More day-to-day exposure and reliance on the line manager. And if they aren’t great at their role, this impacts the experience of the employees reporting to them in a staggeringly negative way.

Marketing agencies make up one of the prime sectors that can work fully remotely or with effective hybrid working. But if an agency isn’t careful with how they implement this, they can cause real issues for employees and managers alike.

How to Create Better Managers

So, we’ve established that managers play a crucial role in employee engagement. But, what can be done to make them better? 

Determine Whether It’s Something They Want to Do

This is the first question that really needs answering. Is managing other people something that they actually want to do? 

In far too many organizations and especially digital agencies, management is the main step to higher seniority. Many accept that this is what they will have to do to achieve more status and gain a higher salary.

But being a good individual contributor on a technical or practical level does not equal being a good manager.

They are completely different skill sets, with behavioral traits like empathy and adaptability far more important than the technical skills that they may have previously relied upon. 

I would always urge any organization to not put employees into management roles if they don’t want to be spending a large portion of their time dealing with people and motivating them to become the best they can be.

That’s quite the problem, so how do you get around it?

Establish Different Progression Tracks 

Set up and showcase progression tracks that don’t rely entirely on managing people. Have one that includes management, but also one where your employees can simply become more senior as an individual contributor. This means that star employees have options about how they develop in your organization, and they don’t feel ‘forced’ into a management route if this isn’t something they will enjoy, or don’t have the natural skillsets to take on.

Set Clear Expectations and Make Them Accountable

People who do want to go into management need to clearly understand what is expected of them.

This means ensuring that they are accountable for performance around various people-related metrics. These include things like employee satisfaction and engagement scores, probation pass rates, retention, and promotion rates. 

All managers should have relevant goals set for their performance in that role, and be reviewed against them throughout the year. Encouraging them to constantly reflect on their experiences and iterate their approach as they learn to deal with new situations and challenges will help to equip them to approach them far more effectively in the future. 

Afford Them the Time

A common complaint I hear from managers, especially in organizations where their people management standard is not particularly high, is that they don’t have the ‘time’ to deal with people matters alongside their day-to-day work.

In agencies, where so much of an employee’s time is billable, giving managers the time to manage is often treated like a luxury.

Yet managing people takes a huge amount of time and effort—and even more to do it well. In fact, once a single manager gets to the point where they are directly responsible for anything upwards of five people (and certainly once they reach seven), management pretty much becomes a full-time role in itself.

I have to stress that time spent on ‘managing’ is an investment in the future of others.

As we have seen, managers have the potential to have a huge impact on employee engagement and happiness; this ultimately hits the bottom line through reduced employee churn, more focus, and a better quality of work.

As such, it’s crucial that managers are afforded the time to focus on developing their employees. Expecting them to deliver the same amount of ‘work’ as before is only going to end up creating a bad experience for your team.

Provide Them with Training 

Offering support in the form of training and coaching helps you to develop the skills and confidence of your managers. It also indicates to the rest of your organization that you’re willing to make the investment in improving everyone’s working lives.

As mentioned earlier, many end up in management positions with little to no prior experience or training to get them there. This makes it crucial to introduce them to a range of concepts that they may not have dealt with before, such as having challenging conversations, theories around human motivation, fostering psychological safety, and diversity and inclusion.

One-to-one coaching can also be a highly effective way to get your managers chatting to someone about certain challenges or situations they have faced, and reflecting on how they have dealt with that experience and what could be done differently next time.

The overall aim here is to empower them to ‘own’ their development as a people manager and increase accountability for their performance within that role.

Creating better managers benefits everyone, from the top to the bottom of the business. Whether that’s helping people advance, or creating a better culture. We’d love to hear from you in The Local Pack or on social media about your thoughts about the manager’s position in improving employee engagement.

Advance Your Agency is a BrightLocal series designed to equip you with the skills, knowledge, and advice necessary to take your agency operations to the next level. 

Before you get to work understanding your client’s problems to be solved, you’ll first need to educate them on local SEO. To appreciate the value that your agency is going to provide, the client must understand the ins and outs of local SEO, and how you deliver that will vary greatly based on their knowledge level, learning style, and resources. This is especially true when working with your first local SEO client.

In this month’s Advance Your Agency guide, I’ll talk you through how best to educate clients on local SEO, so you can get to work on improving your client’s prospects and showing value.

Why is education important?

It can be tempting to want to dive straight in with a new client and begin showing value right away, but without the education step, your hard work could go completely unnoticed.

Educating clients is important for several reasons:

• It builds trust. Your client knows they are in safe hands and working with someone who truly knows what they’re doing and has their best interests at heart.
• It saves time. In the long run, educating your clients will save heaps of time. Instead of facing endless questioning as you work to improve their local SEO, your client will understand what is being done, and most importantly, why it’s being done.
• It shows value. Building this foundation of education with your client will help prove value and solidify why your services are important to their business and worth investing in.

93% of High Performers have a proper understanding of the difference between traditional SEO and local SEO

Read BrightLocal's Brand Beacon Report 2024

Getting to know your client

Understand your client’s knowledge level

First things first, you’re going to want to assess your client’s knowledge level. They’ve reached out to you for a reason, so we can speculate that they’ve got some ideas about local SEO, but it’s important to get an understanding of where they’re really at so you can begin to fill in the gaps.

This should be a fairly simple process. You can begin by asking them if they know what a local (or “nearby”) search is, if they’re familiar with Google My Business, and if they have an understanding of search engine optimization on the whole, too. 

Some agencies might actually opt for a pretty thorough process here and even go as far as to provide their potential client with a quick survey to fill out. This is a great way to work out your client’s local SEO knowledge “score” before moving onto other things. 

If you do go down the survey route, try not to get bogged down in the nitty-gritty, but instead, offer broad questions that can be expanded upon in a one-to-one phone conversation if needed.

Just remember, it’s worth taking surveys like this with a pinch of salt as some clients won’t necessarily want to admit where their knowledge gaps are. And let’s be real, sometimes you don’t know what you don’t know (just speak to any college student ever).

Next, depending on your client’s knowledge and understanding of local SEO, there will be a few different ways to proceed.

Whether they know nothing or have a decent knowledge, it’s still important to be confident in the way that you communicate, as education is undoubtedly going to play a part somewhere down the line.

Uncover their learning style

While getting an understanding of your client’s local SEO knowledge is arguably the most important step, it’s also vital to shed light on your client’s learning style. After all, different people will respond better to different approaches.

Is your client pragmatic, matter-of-fact, logical, or creative? Are they time-poor, under-resourced, or ultra-involved? All of these things will play a part in how best to communicate with them.

Time-poor clients might not have time to sit on a call for an hour while you go through the process, can you fire over a doc for them to peruse in their own time instead?

Creative clients might prefer to get involved in a collaborative discussion on the matter, while pragmatic people just want to do.

We’ve drawn together a few examples to help you out. Once you know your client’s learning style, simply cross-reference it with this quadrant below and you’ll be able to identify the best learning methods for them.

The simplest way to determine your client’s learning style? Ask! There’s no shame in asking them how they best absorb information — you could even include this in your knowledge survey at the start of the relationship.

However you choose to ask, knowing your client’s learning style will help a great deal down the line. You’ll know how, and with what, to engage your client, which takes the guesswork out of the equation.

Educating your client

Okay, onto the really important bit.

Now that you understand your client’s knowledge level and how they learn, you can cater your education methods to your client.

In this section, we share our top tactics for effectively communicating with your client. Through these you can educate clients on the basics of local SEO, as well as the very real benefits it provides. 

Know your stuff

Do your research

You’d think this is a given, but it’s worth saying anyway — do your research! You’re going to need to try to explain and educate on local SEO as simply as possible, and we all know that you need to understand something inside and out in order to communicate it in the best possible way.

So before you begin, make sure you’re in the know about everything you ought to be, and that you’re aware of any recent changes.

Doing research also goes beyond just the realm of local SEO. Make sure you’re familiar with your client’s business so you can tailor your communications to them. Personalization is a priceless tool that can help things feel more relevant and memorable to people, and you won’t be able to use it without knowing the client’s business properly. If you need to, you can direct them to guides on the basics, like our own piece in the learning hub called “What is Local SEO?“.

Leverage FOMO

We all know that fear of missing out (FOMO) can be a powerful tool when used correctly, and when it comes to educating clients on the benefits of local SEO, it can be even more helpful. That’s why it’s important to have a grasp on your client’s competitors and how they’re performing, too.

I spoke to Bowler Hat’s Marcus Miller to get his take on educating clients, and he said:

Often, fear of missing out is a powerful motivator, so by understanding that if you are not well optimized, other less local businesses may appear above you, then you are losing potential customers that could have been yours. Ultimately, local SEO is the new phone book – when someone Googles for a service provider, typically in a traditional local business category, there is location intent there, so be optimized, be visible, or be ignored.

You’ll notice that Marcus also brings the concept of local SEO back to the real world. Phone books may be a thing of the past, but local Google searches really do work in much the same way (except there’s less alphabetical favoritism!) 

Don’t just rely on one format

Use video

Video can be a great way to educate clients quickly and simply. If you don’t have the resources or desire to create your own in-house videos to serve this purpose, there are plenty online that you can use.

SearchLab‘s Greg Gifford provides a shining example in his ‘What is Local SEO?’ video for SEMrush Academy.

Or, for those more logically-minded, this simple math video, also from Greg, could do wonders. For logic-lovers, it’s hard to argue with basic math, and you can bet this example will be retained.

Using video can be a quick and effective way to educate clients on complex matters. If your client is time-poor you’ll want to share short, snackable videos like the ones linked to above.

If you’ve got the luxury of a more involved and time-rich client, you might want to point them in the way of a webinar or two to further expand their knowledge.

Either way, don’t just rely on long-form blogs to do the educating. Local SEO is complex, and videos can help to bring it to life much faster than print.

Show and tell

Don’t just tell your clients about local SEO, really show them how it works in the real world. 

If needs be, get in your car with your client and drive around the block. Show them how their maps rankings change as your proximity to the business does.

For some people, they really do need to see it to believe it, and while using an online rank checker definitely has its uses, for this first phase, showing the client in real-time how their rankings can drop will have 10x the impact, especially if they’re more pragmatic.

As proximity is a key part of the Google local algorithm, this is a really key concept to illustrate.

Take a look at our example route below. Driving around the neighborhood is a great way to showcase how positions in maps will change based on the user’s proximity to the business.

During Covid times, hopping in a car together may not be feasible, in which case you can lean on a free tool like Local Search Results Checker to mimic the process. Or, even better, you could use a geo grid rank tracker tool like Local Search Grid that actually displays these local rankings and search results on a map. This is a great way to show potential clients their real position in the local search battleground.

Make the most of metaphors

Who doesn’t love a metaphor? Painting a picture for your client can often be the best way to get your point across, especially for visual thinkers.

When it comes to using metaphors and analogies, though, it’s important to use ones that hold meaning to the client. 

Are they a big sports fan? Use that to your advantage! A big 80s film geek? Take a leaf out of Greg Gifford’s book.

When teaching beginners about the importance of local link building, Greg displays the following image:

For those who don’t know, the character in the middle is called ‘Link’, from the movie Encino Man. (Geddit? Link to the past?). Now, the trainee has a visual to associate with the teachings on link building. 

It may seem silly, but using tactics like this is a great way to make principles stick, as long as the visual fits your client’s personality and your agency’s brand.

Whatever metaphor or visual example you’re using, make it relevant and relatable as it’s far more likely to stay in the client’s mind this way.

Another popular metaphor used commonly in local SEO is that of citations and poker.

A lot of people struggle to determine whether or not citations are still important, so often experts will rely on poker metaphors to explain this. For example, citations used to be a difference-maker, but now they’re simply known as “table stakes” — you need to have citations on the table to enter the game and be in with a chance of winning.

Keep clients in the loop

Share your reading list 

If you want to get clients more involved with local SEO, then share your reading list! There are plenty of great blogs, forums, and Twitter accounts to follow that can help shed light on the ins and outs of local SEO. There’s absolutely no harm in pointing your client in the right direction using these.

Alternatively, if you’re working with a time-poor client, then simply shoot over an article you find interesting every once in a while to keep them in the loop or sign them up to a relevant newsletter (with their permission, of course).

Some local SEO agencies, like Sterling Sky, have their own newsletter, which is a great way to keep clients involved and educated on an ongoing basis without much commitment. 

Provide regular updates

We all know that communication is important, and you’ll likely be reporting back to clients on a monthly basis anyway, so there’s no reason education shouldn’t be folded into this, too.

Sterling Sky’s Joy Hawkins recommends:

We do like to educate our clients by putting a page on their monthly report that shows what’s new with Google that month. That way they can better understand why SEO is an ongoing service and not a one-time thing. We also like to ‘over-communicate’ (if there is such a thing) with our clients to make sure they are fully aware of what we’re working on. Then we include a full list of all the work we did on our monthly reports and try to highlight why it matters.

Giving your client the information they need in a report and then explaining it verbally can be a great way to ensure that all communication styles are covered. Plus, you’re educating your client while simultaneously reminding them of the value your service is providing.

Take off your marketing blinders

Get on their level

To us, it might seem that the benefits of local SEO are clear, but finding the right way to communicate these is vital. 

From speaking with your client throughout the setup process, you’ll have an idea of how they operate and communicate, so try to mirror their language (without being inauthentic) where possible. 

Avoid jargon, and instead focus on the real-world benefits that local search marketing and optimization can have. For example, instead of saying “optimizing GMB can boost your position in local map rankings,” say “filling out your Google My Business listing properly and fully can mean you’re more likely to get seen in local search results”.

Sometimes it can be hard to step outside of your role and see local SEO in the eyes of a newbie — but, where possible, try to leave the jargon at home or you could end up alienating your client.

The BrightLocal Academy course for Google My Business can also help give a flavor of this crucial local SEO tool through video.

Put your client in their customers’ shoes

If your client is really struggling to understand the value of local SEO then you might need to participate in a little bit of role-playing… No costumes required!

Blake Denman of RicketyRoo actually suggests his own unique approach to put the client in the shoes of their customer and flip the perspective:

If I’m talking to someone and they don’t know the value of local SEO, I ask them to do a search for their business. How does their GMB look? How many reviews do they have? Does their website communicate their values? If they rank poorly, how much more business could they get if they were ranking for their top keywords? These questions help open up a deeper conversation about what a local SEO company can do for a business that has been staunchly against local SEO or never felt a need for it.

With this tactic, you can also hone in on specific areas to show the impact of different parts of local SEO. Ask your client to look at their reviews afresh, as if they were experiencing this business for the first time. What kind of impression do they leave?

If there are no responses to negative reviews, for example, that’s going to leave a sour taste in the mouth of a prospective customer.

You can do the same thing here with your client and their website. Instead of going through it with the eyes of a business owner, ask your client to visit the website as if it was their first time experiencing it. How easy is it to navigate? Does it load quickly? Does it answer the questions a searcher would be looking for? And even on a basic level, is the business’s name, address, and phone number easy to locate?

Getting a client to see things the way their customer would can help better their understanding of what value a local SEO agency brings and what opportunities they might be missing without one.

Invite questions

It’s important to make sure you’re not just throwing information at your client without a break. When you’re explaining and educating, be sure to regularly ask if your client has any questions, and invite them to challenge anything they don’t quite understand.

A healthy client-agency relationship is a two-way street, so it’s important that the client knows their questions are being heard and valued. Plus, it will help you get a feel for what is and isn’t sticking so you can go back over the basics if needs be.

Create an FAQs page or document

Let’s be honest: you’re not always going to have time to go into this much detail with clients, and that’s understandable, but it doesn’t mean that these important steps can be neglected.

Create an FAQs or education page on your website (or in a shareable document if you prefer), where you provide more in-depth answers to commonly asked questions. You could even record a quick-fire FAQ video to ensure visual learning types are still being catered to. Here, you can include a gif of maps rankings changing as proximity changes (to replace the old ‘driving the car around the block’ trick) and insert photos to demonstrate more complex concepts. It’s also worth including screenshots so clients can get more familiar with things like GMB and citation sites.

It’s worth remembering, though, that this should be considered a bonus, rather than a replacement for one-to-one chats. It will still be important to sit down and speak with your client one-to-one but this will save time and help to fill in the gaps that bit quicker.

In fact, having a page or document like this will be super helpful for clients to refer back to should they find their knowledge is slipping.

Putting exclusive content like this in your client’s welcome pack is a sure-fire way to make them feel in good hands and that you’re already providing value before the relationship fully kicks off.

Dos and Don’ts

We’ve just fired a lot of tactics at you. Refer back to this dos and don’ts for the basics.

• Do work with your client’s knowledge level and learning/communication style
• Do use simple language
• Do share different types of resources based on learning style (videos, blogs, podcasts)
• Do show your client in real-time the impact of local SEO
• Do create engaging, relevant metaphors to explain difficult concepts
• Do explain value to your client in a way that resonates with them
• Do communicate frequently and provide regular check-ins
• Do create an engaging FAQs doc to share
• Don’t get bogged down with jargon
• Don’t try to show off
• Don’t use education as an attempt to justify your prices to clients
• Don’t discourage questions
• Don’t rely on known marketing concepts when speaking to beginners
• Don’t only use one format or medium to educate

Conclusion

Educating your clients on local SEO is vital if you hope to provide them with value and retain them.

By educating your clients properly, you’re setting yourself up to have more successful, stress-free, and time-saving experiences when working with clients.

Just remember it’s all about catering to the client, and education is no exception here. 

Have you got any top tips when it comes to educating clients? Share them with us in the comments below and keep the conversation going!

Further Reading

These resources will be instrumental in helping you to educate your clients or padding out your agency knowledge.

For you:

• Advance Your Agency: What Should My Agency Charge for Local SEO?
• Advance Your Agency: What Should I Do in My First 6 Months With a Local SEO Client?
• Advance Your Agency: How Can I Educate Clients on the Benefits of Review Management?
• How to Determine a Benchmark for Local SEO Work
• How to Scale Your SEO Agency [Webinar]

For your client:

• Top Local SEO Blogs 2020
• Local Search Ranking Factors 2020: What Affects Local Rankings?
• Google My Business Learning Hub
• 17 Local SEO Experts to Follow on Twitter
• How Does the Google Local Algorithm Work?
• 11 Women in SEO Doing Great Things Right Now 
• Local Search Industry Survey
• What is Google My Business?
• Local SEO Learning Hub
• Subscribe to the BrightLocal newsletter
• Local SEO Experts Twitter list

Advance Your Agency is a BrightLocal series designed to equip you with the skills, knowledge, and advice necessary to take your agency operations to the next level.

So, you’ve just landed your first proper local SEO client. How do you ensure that you provide them with sufficient value in the first six months? 

Demonstrating the importance of local SEO and the benefits of work within the initial six months is vital if you’re hoping to retain clients and build positive relationships, as well as securing your agency as a competent player in the world of local SEO.

With so many tasks to manage, from review generation to Google My Business optimization and beyond, it can be a challenge knowing what to prioritize.

In this month’s issue of Advance Your Agency, I’ll talk you through the most important steps to take in the first six months with a local SEO client.

But, I won’t be doing it alone…

Throughout this article, I’ve enlisted the help of three key players in the world of local SEO, who have advanced their agencies and lived to tell the tale. Thank you to Sterling Sky’s Joy Hawkins, Bowler Hat’s Marcus Miller, and RicketyRoo’s Blake Denman for sharing their perspectives and helping to inform this piece.

Read on to benefit from their top tips, actions, and tactics to undertake during the initial half-year period with a new local SEO client. 

Month 1: First Steps

In this section, I’ll explain how to approach your first contact with a new local SEO client.

Talk to Your Client

First things first, you need to know what your client wants to achieve. 

The best way to do this is to have an in-depth chat with your client. What do they want to gain by performing local SEO? Often, you’ll get a response like “I just want to rank higher!” but it’s important to delve deeper. Why does the client want to rank higher? Is it because they want to drive more traffic to their site, get more phone calls, or improve their reputation? 

Beyond just taking the opportunity to get to know your client and their business, there will generally be a few housekeeping bits to get out the way.

Founder of RicketyRoo, Blake Denman, advises that it’s important to lay out the process of what’s to come as clearly as possible.

In month one I schedule a kickoff call, send an email with detailed instructions on what we need access to, and how to go about doing it. Since we work mainly with SMBs, giving them clearcut instructions, step-by-step, is very helpful for them.

There are also ways to streamline the process of identifying a client’s business history and future, such as creating an “onboarding questionnaire”, as Blake refers to it. This allows the client to tell you in their own words exactly what they’re looking for from a local SEO agency and what they’re currently working on.

We also send links to our onboarding questionnaires that give us a good overview of the business, branding, etc. The kickoff call’s purpose is for me to go over the questionnaires, ask a few deeper questions, and see if they have questions. We’ll also go over the deliverables again for the first month.

Once you’ve spoken to the client and sufficiently familiarized yourself with their work and understanding of local SEO, you can move on to the next part of the process: setting goals.

Identify and Set Goals

Ensuring you and your client have a shared vision for your local SEO work is vital. It’s important to understand that local SEO shouldn’t be seen as a “quick win”, but instead, a way to take your client’s business to the next level, provide them with more visibility, and elevate their current business efforts.

Similarly to Blake, Founder of SEO agency Bowler Hat, Marcus Miller, agrees that speaking with a client early on in the process is vital. 

Here, he discusses the importance of setting goals.

At Bowler Hat, there are a couple of jobs that we tackle at the beginning of every project. 

Firstly, we like to get a clear understanding of the client’s objectives and the business itself. We need to know what the client is actually trying to achieve, rather than the specific SEO goals. This is to ensure we give the best possible recommendations and can set some clear and measurable goals (typically SMART goals) that we can use to measure progress.

Sometimes, SEO is not the best fit for the business requirements, for example, if the site ranks nowhere, the goals are lofty and the client needs leads tomorrow, we may suggest another tactic whilst we work on SEO in the background.

As Marcus mentions, sometimes the client’s goals will span beyond SEO, and you’ll need to be prepared to adapt accordingly. In fact, sometimes you’ll need to be prepared to say no altogether if the client’s goals just aren’t a good fit for your skillset or culture. 

Like I said, sometimes a client will come to you saying their “goal” is to rank number one in Google searches, but it’s your job to unpack this and ensure you have an awareness of the client’s real-world business goals and how local SEO fits into those.

SMART goals can be a great way to ensure you’re both working towards the same target. 

To begin setting SMART goals with your client you’ll need to agree on targets that are:

• Specific (simple, sensible, significant).
• Measurable (meaningful, motivating).
• Achievable (agreed, attainable).
• Relevant (reasonable, realistic, and resourced, results-based).
• Timely (time-based, time-limited, time/cost limited, time-sensitive).

A SMART goal might be something like: 

• Increasing revenue X amount from last year
• Increasing the number of new customers by X 
• Increasing store visits by X percent 

Whatever it may be, this will help you to determine the kind of work needed to put your client where they want to be.

Manage Expectations

During this six-month process, you’ll also want to be clear about setting and managing expectations. It’s important not to overpromise, which can be especially hard when just starting out as a local SEO agency. 

A good local SEO strategy is a hugely powerful tool and can be what really takes a local business to the next stage of success. 

That said, it doesn’t happen overnight. Local SEO is an ongoing process, and the ability to rank well is owed to numerous factors — proximity, relevance, and prominence, being the top three. Each factor forms part of Google’s local algorithm, which is ever evolving.

Try not to make promises to your client (“We’ll get you ranking number one in no time!”) and instead be realistic, refer back to your agreed upon SMART goals, and keep your client updated when things go out of your control (unfortunately, local SERPs get their fair share of ranking flux, too).

Complete a Local SEO Audit

Once you’ve established the client’s goals, our experts unanimously agree that the next step is to undertake a thorough audit.

Sterling Sky’s founder, Joy Hawkins, says that, although they don’t have a set “checklist” of tasks to perform, there are some projects her agency tackles first.

Our process is to first do an in-depth audit. We charge for this, it is done manually by a person (not automated), and it is designed to figure out which items are keeping the business from succeeding currently. We do use tools (like BrightLocal) as a part of this audit but I would never suggest completely automating the auditing process as there are too many things that need a human eye. While doing the audit we add labels to the things we find to rank them in the order of high, medium, and low priority.

From here, Joy and her team can identify high priority tasks. Of course, these are the tasks the SEO agent will tackle first.

Our to-do list for month 1 is to go through the high priority items first. Sometimes this stretches into months 2-6 depending on the issues. For example, if the business is getting impacted by the filter, this would be a high priority item and would need to be tackled first. Things like citations almost always get tagged as low priority and are left until much later. Link building is something that almost always gets put as high priority and is done continually (never ends). I’m a big fan of coming up with custom action plans that fit the business, their current scenario, industry, and market.

BrightLocal’s Local Search Audit tool

When identifying your client’s priority items, it’s important to remember that few local SEO tasks are “one and done”. As Joy says, projects such as link building tend to operate on a more ongoing basis.

Additionally, there are some aspects of local SEO that are commonly seen as foundational and, while they may not be game-changers, will need to be done if your client hopes to compete.

Regardless of what tasks you’ve identified as high priority, the next steps will be the same for everyone: getting to work on implementing a great local SEO strategy.

Advance Your Agency is a BrightLocal series designed to equip you with the skills, knowledge, and advice necessary to take your agency operations to the next level.

Web design is a great career. It’s creative and consultative, you get to use the latest techniques to solve very modern problems, and as an industry, web design isn’t likely to be going anywhere soon.

But there are downsides, too. It can be quite repetitive work, it can be hard to price if you can’t foresee required amends, and it can be hard to attain new clients in such a saturated market.

The greatest stress put on web designers, though, is that because web design tends to be contract-based, they’re always on the lookout for the next job, and always a little concerned about whether the work might dry up.

It’s no surprise, then, that more and more web designers are looking to expand their services to offer ongoing value to their clients. Offering local SEO to your local business clients is a natural next step in expanding your revenue and potentially blossoming from overworked web designer to starting a local SEO business. Your first local SEO client is never far away!

In this piece I hope to provide anyone hoping to offer SEO services to local business clients the advice and tools they need to get started. We also have a really popular white-label pitch deck for retainers which you can make a copy of and use yourself here.

Why would I want to deliver local SEO services?

There are plenty of reasons to start offering local SEO services to your web design clients.

More revenue

It goes without saying that offering more ‘paid-for’ services naturally allows you to increase profits from your current client base. How much revenue, though, is down to the effort you’re willing to put in.

Longer lifetime value of clients

Because improving a local business’ online presence is not a ‘one and done’ job, you’ll be delivering ongoing value to clients, most likely via a retainer, and therefore keeping them longer. Again, how long you keep them will be dependent on how much you’re willing to learn and do.

More stability

Thanks to having clients paying you more and staying with you longer, you’re far less likely to be spending sleepless nights wondering where the next client is coming from.

Your clients are already asking for help with it (or they assume you already offer it)

Many web design clients will assume that because you build their websites, you’ll be doing the SEO work on them, too. Sometimes you don’t have to go looking for the opportunity, and it just presents itself!

Future-proofing your career

Sure, web design is a fairly resilient industry at the moment, but as Google inserts itself more and more between customer and business in search, with the various tools it offers like Google Sites and Google My Business, the local business need for attractive websites could well start diminishing.

More variety in your work

Unless you start working with larger clients with more advanced and developed needs, there’s a natural skills ceiling you’ll hit in web design, where you’ll be putting the same skills into practice month after month. Offering additional services gives you a chance to learn something new and feel the excitement of discovery when putting these new skills into practice.

More attractiveness in the market

Offering local SEO services alongside web design will naturally put you in a better position to win clients. This is crucial in such a saturated market where competition is fierce and proof of success is everything.

Where do I start?

There are two ways you can go about offering local SEO services for your web design clients: the hard way, which delivers ongoing results and develops your business, or the easy way, which will get you a quick buck but no real retainer work or recurring revenue.

If you’re looking for the latter, hey, I’m not here to judge you. We’ve got plenty of resources on getting the fundamentals (like building citations and Google My Business) in decent condition for a new website, but do bear in mind that that work is pretty much ‘one and done’ and you stand little chance of getting ongoing retainer work.

No, I’m here to talk you through the other way: the way that requires learning, development and improvement, but that will ultimately make you a better marketer and secure your future career in digital marketing.

Still here? Great, you’re already achieving step one on your way to becoming a local SEO hero. You’ve stuck around to learn.

Step 1. Learn about local SEO

I can’t stress enough how important it is to really knuckle down and get to grips with the key elements of local SEO and how they can benefit your clients. Not only will this allow you to actually perform SEO work that achieves results, but it’ll make you much, much more confident when pitching the benefits in the first place.

There are various ways you could go about training for local SEO, but I’d naturally recommend BrightLocal’s wealth of resources as a great place to start.

Firstly, I’d suggest you sign up for our BrightLocal Academy, a completely free series of guided video courses in which you can learn the fundamentals of local SEO, pick up expert tips, and even learn how to get local SEO clients.

These courses cover everything from link building and keyword research to Google Business Profile management and reporting, and will put you in a great position to start putting these skills into practice for your clients.

If you’ve got time to spare and you’re eager to learn right away, read our Google Business Profile Learning Hub, then check out the ‘Learn Local SEO’ section of BrightLocal’s Local SEO Insights, which is filled with dozens of educational pieces on getting local SEO right.

One thing worth noting here is that you shouldn’t just seek knowledge about the best way to do local SEO, but also the worst ways. You might remember that in the early days of the internet there were lots of spammy, ‘black hat’ tactics that SEOs could use to gain traffic to a website.

While those days are mostly no more for the wider internet (thanks to ongoing algorithm updates by Google), in local results there are sadly still lots of ways local SEOs can manipulate rankings.

It’s important to learn about these spammy techniques, too, because your clients may well be aware of them and you’ll need to explain why the quick, cheap route is never the way to long-lasting success. Not only that, but spam is so prevalent in Google My Business that fighting spam can often be a quick route to better rankings in itself!

Another benefit to learning about spam is that you might have other SEOs making guarantees when pitching for the work, which is never the sign of a sustainable approach; your job is to be the more realistic, honest, trustworthy SEO and quickly debunk myths proffered by your competition. And that starts with education.

Advance Your Agency is a brand-new BrightLocal series, designed to equip you with the skills, knowledge and advice necessary to take your agency operations to the next level. 

This month we focus on review management – a key component of local SEO success.

Local SEOs know just how important online reviews are when it comes to gaining prominence in local search. 

According to Moz’s most recent Local Search Ranking Factors Study, review signals make up around 15% of local pack factors. Put simply, having a high quantity of recent, diverse, high-quality reviews means Google’s local search algorithm is more likely to favor your business and surface it for relevant search queries.

As an agency, though, it can be difficult to explain to clients just how important review management is and what the benefits could be to their businesses.

For example, how many times have you spoken with clients who believe that online reviews will just come flooding in on their own? If only things were that simple, eh?! 

In order to help your clients succeed in local search, you’ll first need to get buy-in on a solid review generation and management strategy — and that all begins with education.

In the first issue of our Advance Your Agency series, I’ll teach you just how to educate your clients on the benefits of review management. And by the end, you’ll be able to inform even the most skeptical merchants of why they need reviews.

Review Management Explained

What is review management?

Firstly, if your clients aren’t already aware, you’ll probably want to educate them on what review management is in the first place.

Review management generally consists of four key components:

1. Generating reviews
2. Monitoring reviews
3. Responding to reviews
4. Leveraging reviews.

It is sometimes referred to as ‘reputation management’, although more often than not clients will refer to review management simply as ‘bad reviews’, ‘online reviews’, or just ‘getting better reviews’ — and it can often be useful to mimic this language when talking to your client, in an attempt to demystify review management from the get-go. Whether it’s in pitch decks or phone conversations, always try to mirror the language of your client. (Not sure where to start with a review management pitch deck? Take a look at our free, white-label templates.)

Where should you get reviews?

Reviews can be gained on any site that suits your client’s business. For example, a hotel would want to generate reviews on TripAdvisor, while a lawyer would find reviews more useful on Justia, and so on. Targeting niche review sites is certainly important — after all, you’ll want your client’s business to appear anywhere that customers may be searching for them.

But, for the purpose of this article, I’m going to focus primarily on Google reviews.

Why? Well, it’s more or less a given that all local businesses will benefit from generating reviews on Google My Business — first and foremost because this is the place that customers are most likely to see first. Say I was to search “plumbers near me”, the first thing that will appear will be the local pack, complete with Google My Business reviews for plumbers — you guessed it – near me.

Secondly, GMB reviews are important because Google is naturally going to favor its own reviews above third-party sites, and therefore building reviews via Google is more likely to boost your placement in the local pack.

With these reasons in mind, focusing on Google Reviews will be by far the easiest sell.

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How to Educate Clients on the Benefits of Review Management

There are near hundreds of stats I could (and most likely, will) share with you about the importance of reviews, but when it comes to appealing to clients, you’re going to want to play on the emotional factor of reviews. Any agency can spew out a handful of facts about reviews, but that should come later, once you’ve established the real-life impact reviews can have.

The Worst-Case Scenario 

First, level with your client; explain to them what not having an effective review management strategy could do to their business.

Let’s use an example of what could happen when a client receives a bad review.

Here, I’ve found a recent low-rated review from a New York-based restaurant:

Now ask your client, what’s the worst outcome that can come from getting a review like this? First and foremost, you’ve got an unhappy customer – they’re not going to visit your place of business again, put any money in your hands, or spread any positive news to their friends. 

But, beyond that, this customer is acting as an active deterrent to any other potential visitors. In fact, they explicitly say “Go eat somewhere else”. Not exactly a glowing review, right? And so, in the worst-case scenario, you’re losing out on potentially hundreds of customers, which means lost profit.

Well, while there’s not a lot you can do to correct this customer’s bad experience (in the words of Cher, if only we could turn back time!), with the help of review management you can improve this outcome drastically. 

If the restaurant provided a response to this negative review (it hasn’t), apologizing for the customer’s negative experience, offering to look into the issue for them, and providing some kind of incentive to return, then not only might they win over a lost customer, but they’d also be showcasing their great customer service to anyone who sees the review.

Think of it as damage control. No business is perfect, and even if your client’s business is running like a well-oiled machine, they’re likely to encounter a fair few negative reviews over time. Responding to reviews in a timely manner means you’re going to limit the amount of damage that negative feedback can do.

When explaining this scenario to your client, don’t be afraid to use one of their real-world reviews as an example. And even better, if you can compare the results with a client who has taken up review management, can you explain how it improved their results or helped them to reach their goals? Taking every opportunity to back up your argument with evidence is the masterstroke that will win you business.

Missed Opportunities

If your client isn’t quite so worried about receiving negative reviews, then you’ll want to appeal to them based on the opportunities they might be missing. 

How could review management take their business to the next level? What are they missing out on by not managing online reviews?

Here, I’ve used a search local to me, “plumbers near me” — and for context, I’m based in Brighton, UK.

Now, here there’s a plumber ranking in the top spot. But as a consumer, am I going to ring them? To give them my hard earned money and custom? Not a chance!

The position in the local pack might sway me if I’m looking for a low-stakes purchase like lunch, but when it comes to industries that present more risk to me if I choose unwisely, such as plumbing, I’m going to pick the plumbing business that can prove that it has the best reputation, the one that leaves a flood (pardon the pun) of happy customers in its wake. And that’s the one with the best review rating.

So, even though the business is ranking in the second position, on this occasion my custom will be going to AC Plumbing, rather than Small Job Plumbing.

If Small Job Plumbing was your client, what would you say to them? They’ve just missed out on business for the sole reason that they’ve not got enough positive reviews. This is a prime example of opportunities missed due to neglecting review management.

Once again, explaining this scenario to a client using real-world examples of their search rivals will only make it more effective. Do they have a competitor that they just can’t seem to shake? Compare the two businesses’ review profiles and see who comes out on top. How good would your client feel knowing that not only that they’ve come out on top in rankings but they’ve also beat their competitors in the process? 

These are the kinds of examples that are really going to appeal to your client, so where possible, always relate it back to their own feelings and goals – you start with the emotional argument then build towards the rational.

Industry Relevance

Although I believe that review management is important for all businesses, there are definitely some businesses that will need reviews even more than others. And you’ll want to explain this to your client in a way that appeals to their specific industry.

For example, YMYL (your money, your life) businesses are much more likely to need reviews in order to gain the trust of consumers.

If you’re dealing with clients who operate in YMYL industries such as health, finance, or business, then you’re going to need to drive this fact home even more – without review management you will lose out on customers.

Again, ask your client to put themselves in the consumers’ shoes. Would you contact a lawyer, a medical professional, an account, who didn’t have a shining review profile? 

Using the search query “Immigration lawyer Texas”, almost every single ranking business has hundreds of reviews with an average of 4-5 stars. Chances are, if your client doesn’t have a high review volume and star rating in an industry like this, neither Google nor consumers are going to give them a second glance. Sure, it’s a packed market, but without reviews, your clients can’t even enter the ring, let alone perform the knockout blow.

In short, if you’re speaking with clients in YMYL sectors, it’s vital to emphasize that review management is essential.

When looking at industry relevance, it’s also worth thinking about industries that are more likely to receive positive reviews. For example, Kick Point Inc’s President, Dana DiTomaso, has found that any business relating to pets is going to get heaps more positive, and more detailed, reviews than other industries.

Think about it. People love their pets, so of course, they’re going to leave rave reviews if they have a positive experience. And equally, if they have a bad experience, they’re also going to use several paragraphs to explain why no one should ever visit that business again. 

Looking at a search for a Seattle-based pet grooming company, each business has hundreds of super detailed reviews. And the negative ones are just as in-depth.

As such, if your client operates in an industry like this — one where people are likely to be more passionate, for example — they’ll need to be extra-vigilant with review management. A negative review could mean lost business for years to come.

Each client’s industry will offer different benefits of review management, so, along with explaining the wider benefits of online reviews, you’ll want to focus on these more niche examples, too. Think about what you, as a consumer, want to see when you’re making a local search for your client’s business type. Putting yourselves in the consumer’s shoes and making a reasonable argument from their perspective will only enhance the case for review management.

The Facts About Review Management

Once you’ve laid the groundwork — sharing relevant examples, appealing to your client’s emotion, and highlighting the overarching importance – you’ll probably want some stats and cold, hard evidence to support your points. This way you’re ensuring you appeal to clients who want to hear a story as well as those who just can’t get enough graphs and charts.

As always, it’s important to align the content of your pitch to what your client’s goals are, so you don’t waste time on sharing statistics that don’t help your argument.

Do they want to rank better in local search?

Do they want more conversions (website clicks, calls, etc.)?

Or do they need to do some good old-fashioned reputation management (managing and responding to negative reviews)? Depending on what goals you identify with your client, your approach will likely differ.

For example, a business wanting more conversions might want to know how reviews correlate with website clicks. Alternatively, clients only interested in ranking higher will need information on local ranking factors.

So, familiarize yourself with these stats, all of which come from reputable sources of research (including yours truly!)

Online Reviews Influence Consumers’ Actions

Our Local Consumer Review Survey showed that a whopping 82% of consumers read online reviews for local businesses, and what’s more, after reading a positive review, 32% of consumers say they’ll go directly to the business’s website. 

If that doesn’t scream “conversion metric”, I don’t know what does!

Online Reviews Lead to Website Clicks

Again, highlighting the conversion power of reviews, our Local Services Ads Click Study found that review ratings are the biggest driver of clicks in local SERPs. So, need more site traffic? Get yourself some reviews!

Plus, with the rise of zero-click searches, review ratings are one of the key differentiators to help your client stand out in the local pack. Even if they’re ranking in the top three, think about it: is a customer more likely to click the business with 200+ 4-star reviews, or the one with just a handful?

Online Reviews Lead to Sales

Is your client looking to make more sales? Well then, they might like to know that, according to the Spiegel Research Center, the purchase likelihood for a product with five reviews is 270% greater than a product with zero reviews. 

Similarly, Location3’s research shows that improving your review star rating by 1.5 could equal as many as 13,000 more leads.

Of course, these numbers will differ based on your client’s industry and other factors, but nonetheless, are they willing to risk missing out on these potential gains?

Online Reviews Build Trust

If your client is more concerned with building consumer trust, they’ll probably want to know that 91% of consumers say that positive reviews make them more likely to use a business, and that showcasing reviews with widgets on your website increases consumer trust.

Consumers Need High Review Ratings to Commit

As consumers continue to navigate a world filled with spam and fake reviews, they’re growing increasingly skeptical. As a result, it should come as no surprise that 35% of consumers will not use a business with less than a four-star rating; consumers read an average of 10 reviews before trusting a business; and 58% of consumers view recency as the most important review factor (Source: Local Consumer Review Survey 2019).

So, without a regular stream of high-rated reviews, your client will be limiting their potential buyers by a great deal. 

Consumers Don’t Trust Outdated Reviews

You might also encounter clients who agree that “yes, reviews are important”, but also insist that their two-year-old, five-star review profile is sufficient to win the business of today’s skeptical consumer market.

Well, to that we say, almost half of consumers will only pay attention to reviews written within the past two weeks. 

That means getting a fresh stream of reviews should be among your clients’ top priorities. Having a shiny five-star review profile doesn’t mean a whole lot if it’s not up to date.

Responding to Negative Reviews Increases Visits

Responding to negative reviews is valuable for a whole host of reasons, as we discussed earlier, but it might be worth telling your client that as many as 45% of consumers say they’re more likely to visit a business that responds to its negative reviews. So if your client isn’t responding to those bad reviews, they could be missing out on yet more footfall. 

Prepare to Answer These Questions

As a marketing agency or consultant dealing with local business reviews management, there are likely to be a few queries that pop up time and time again. Here, we’ve provided a series of review-related questions you can expect to encounter, and some tips to help you answer them.

“Why should I care about online reviews?”

Here, the answer will vary depending on the goals you’ve determined with your client. But, put simply, you should care about reviews because:

1. They’re a local ranking factor
2. They build consumer trust
3. They help with conversions
4. You can’t afford not to 

“I manage multiple business locations; how can we deal with review management at scale?”

This will be a common query if you’re dealing with multi-location businesses. The likelihood here is that this client is already feeling overwhelmed. After all, the bigger the business, the more internal hurdles and restrictions there are likely to be. 

Here, the answer is simple. Generating reviews for your multi-location business is non-negotiable. If your competitors are doing it (which they almost certainly are), then you need to do it too. 

As an agency, you can do things to help here, such as providing your client with the right tips, tactics, and tools, but however they choose to execute it based on their business structure, review management needs to be done. 

“We’re doing fine without active review management, so why should I care?”

Every once in a while you may encounter a client who’s actually doing okay, and generating a steady stream of positive reviews. Regardless, that doesn’t mean review management should be entirely neglected, it just means there might be different benefits at play.

Ask your client, “Don’t you want to know what’s being said about your business?”. Review management is just as much about listening to customers as it is looking good on Google. Being proactively involved in review management not only means being able to listen to feedback, but it also means having more control of the conversation. 

What are people saying about your brand when they think you’re not listening? And how can you influence the conversation?

“I work in an industry that doesn’t really get reviews. What can I do?”

Let’s face it — there are some industries that are going to struggle with online reviews more than others. I can’t imagine many people eagerly reviewing their DUI attorney publicly, can you? 

If that’s the case for your client, you’ll have to work more closely together to determine a successful review strategy that works for their vertical. In a situation like this, it’s key to illustrate that though the project may be more challenging, it’s also more likely to be even more rewarding.

If you’re in an industry where your competitors aren’t getting many reviews either, then having just a handful more reviews could be the difference between you getting chosen over them.

“Can you get rid of my negative reviews?”

There’s always one! Some clients may want you to work wonders and magically remove all of their negative reviews from years’ past. But sadly, not only would that be against most sites’ (definitely Google’s) guidelines, it’s also not possible.

Though it might be tempting to shield your client from the truth, it’s really important to be honest and transparent with your clients here. Do not promise to delete their negative reviews! Instead, work on responding to them, building more positive reviews to push the negative reviews down, and bringing that average star-rating up to something to be proud of.

“My customers don’t do business online. Do I still need reviews?”

Your current customers may come to your storefront to do business with you, but that doesn’t mean they’re not online. And more importantly, it doesn’t mean that other potential customers aren’t going to find them online.

That said, there can still be plenty of value found in taking tactics offline. Google My Business even provides a marketing kit, so businesses can create in-store prompts for reviews and showcase customer feedback in store. 

So, businesses can still benefit from in-store conversions from online reviews and can encourage reviews from in-store customers, too. 

Takeaways

• Appeal to your client’s emotion: how can reviews transform their business, their quality of service, their lifestyle, their day-to-day?
• Highlight the competition: show your client that their closest competitor is doing review management, and they need to, too
• Be honest: don’t promise to transform a client from position #10 to position #1 overnight
• Do your homework: understand the industry your client is working in and what review sites will resonate most with them
• Explain the facts: use reputable research statistics to support your claims
• Understand your client’s goals: have a clear idea of what your client wants to achieve with review management
• Don’t be afraid to go offline: if clients think review management won’t suit their business or audience, find out the methods that will work for them – even if that means taking marketing offline

Conclusion

Having a review management strategy in this day and age is absolutely necessary to achieve success in local search — whatever your client’s unique goals may be. Your client needs to know that if their competitors are doing it, they should be too. 

If you use the process above, I’m confident that you’ll be able to win over even the most apprehensive client, and easily sell them on the endless benefits of online review management.

Resources

If you’re looking for more supporting material to help you educate clients on the importance of online reviews, we’ve got you covered.

• • BrightLocal: White-label pitch decks
  • BrightLocal: 40 Online Review Statistics for 2020
  • Google My Business: Help getting reviews on Google

• BrightLocal: How to Sell and Deliver Reputation Management
• BrightLocal: Local Consumer Review Survey 2019
• Moz: Local Search Ranking Factors
• BrightLocal: Online Reputation Management Survey
• Spiegel Research Center: How Online Reviews Influence Sales
• BrightLocal: Impact of Review Ratings on CTR
• Location3: Positive Google Reviews Improve Paid Search Conversion Rates
• Harvard Business School: Reviews, Reputation and Revenue
• ReviewTrackers: Online Review Survey
• PatientPop: Online Reputation Survey
• GatherUp: Online Reviews Study: Restaurants and Reviews
• Harvard Business Review: Replying to Customer Reviews Results in Better Ratings

We’ll be back next month with another Advance Your Agency to help take your organization to the next level.

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And don’t forget to let us know your experiences with review management in the comments below!