Marketing And IT

"Go where the money is...and go there often." - William "Willie" Sutton, a prolific U.S. bank robber.

Google is where the money is online.

So we market to Google... both organically and paid (PPC). Sounds like alot of work... and it is. Of course it's worth every dime spent by your company as you bring in more names and more sales marketing to Google than via any other source.

Google is like having a billboard, no make that a store, on Times Square with everyone passing by... and everyone has an opportunity to drop in. Not just random strangers... but potential clients who have shown an interest in your subject matter.

But did I mention it's alot of work?

Oh Yeah... but not impossible. It just means hiring someone. So the choices are you can hire an outside consultant, bring in someone as a full-time employee or find someone in your company to do it. But not part time... this is a full time gig.

My advice... bring all your SEO in-house.

Consultants can be too detached... SEO is not a turn-key. Unless they already know your business the learning curve is too high. You'll end up just spending money and seeing limited results. So please be careful. Do your due diligence before hiring.

Bringing SEO in house is the best way... now who is going to do it and whose team is this new person going to be on.... marketing or IT department?

Uh oh, here comes company politics... yeah sometimes that rears it's ugly head but let's examine this without that dynamic.

I don't think it matters if you hire fresh or transfer a team member... but let's be clear about this...

This a marketing job.

I find it's easier to teach the technical skills to a marketer than to teach marketing to an IT geek. (I use the term "geek" with affection, of course.) The position does require knowledge of both... now if you can find that person - hire him or her now!

But you won't find that person - those kinda of people are hard to find. So I look for an individual with a marketing background first... specifically direct mail. Those are the principles that I think an SEO campaign should be based on.

To me... it's all about landing page copy. It is the conversion of this one page (or versions of it) that will make or break your cost per acquisition and ROI. An IT geek won't understand that.

I am not saying the technical aspects are not valuable. In fact, they are mandatory. You can't even be in the game without the proper technical skills. But that is less than half the battle. It's all about constantly improving conversions and you do that by testing, testing and testing.

Thus you need a marketer to lead this effort AND that is why this blog is marketing based. We need marketers to understand the concepts of technology and then fall back on direct mail theory.

So you should go out and hire a marketer, right?

No.

I WANT BOTH.

That's right... this is a two person job. First, a marketer to lead the SEO efforts, set the strategy, work on the copy, administer the campaign and test the crap out of it. Second, a tech geek is needed plain and simple. Someone has to be there to implement the optimization techniques and make the pages.

Time is of the essence on the web... everyday a campaign is not LIVE you are losing opportunity... losing names and losing sales. So having two employees will speed up your efforts. The return on your investment will be faster with two.

So don't be cheap... if you're going to do it - Do it it right.

Go to Google and two time them!


AP