Today’s SEO tip is a goldie and a goodie.
It’s a brilliant idea, really.
In fact, you might think I’m having a laugh with it.
But I’m not.
I’m giving you something that will spare your sanity. And that of your SEO consultant. And anyone else remotely attached to your business.
It will also save time and money – resources we know are always limited.
I can’t begin to express how important this is.
So here it is:
ASK FIRST.
That’s literally it – just ask your SEO consultant first before you do anything!
Why?
Because 1 dollar of SEO prevention is better than 10 dollars of SEO recovery.
Everything you do on your website has an impact, in some way shape or form.
For example, you may wish to change domain names – that’s fine and there’s lots of reasons to want to do this.
But without a proper migration plan in place, things can horribly wrong.
Customers will either not see the right website or they won’t get the right info – or they just won’t see your website anymore.
For longer established sites, a poor migration plan will mean a loss in rankings and traffic which ultimately means a loss in sales.
And this is just for migrations.
What about when you want to delete pages, sections and content in general? (not every CMS plays nicely!)
How about if you want to integrate other apps and services with your site? (will it add to page load times? will it compromise security?)
What if you decide to throw a 10mb JPEG on the homepage with a link to an external site?
A particular problem I see all the time is this:
Everyone except the SEO team is aware of a new product or feature launch.
Said product/feature is launched, without any SEO consideration.
Said product/feature interferes with SEO strategy, causes a bunch of problems…and then the SEO team has to fix it.
And by fix it, I mean, modify course and ‘deal with it’.
As in, change how the strategy works to accommodate a product/feature that makes it harder to do SEO.
GOTTA LOVE IT.
Even if you think it doesn’t impact SEO, just ask.
You know why?
Because it will be the SEO person’s responsibility to fix things.
Most of the time anyway.
We’re always seen as the ‘website fixer’ people. And that’s partly true but often we’re called into fix the mess we had nothing to do with.
Seriously – even something like “I want to start an email newsletter” or “I want to email people as a once-off” – impacts everything.
Like, will you be sending people to the right page? How will you track visits and clicks? I, mean, this impacts data and we’re all about data! (If your SEO person isn’t, find someone who does care about data).
Ask your SEO person, understand the risks and then make a decision.
And if you’re going to go against the SEO person’s recommendations, understand that you’re taking a huge risk.
If things do hit the fan, accept that you’ve done it despite the SEO recommendation.
And then call in the SEO team to fix it and be prepared to pay for it.
Thems the breaks. I don’t make the rules.
JUST ASK. Please.
It’s so EASY.
And QUICK.
And CHEAP.
And saves everyone the heartache, headache and everything else ache.
Your friend, the one you can ASK at any time,
Jaaved
