I’m currently in the process of setting up my own SEO/PPC company having recently left my position of Search Engine Marketing Manager for an agency in Leeds. One thing that has become abundantly clear since I started actively trying to recruit clients is how many small to medium sized companies are dissatisfied with the level of service they are receiving from their existing SEO/PPC company. This is good for me because i’ve been able to poach 4-5 new clients on the back of a simple promise to provide a better level of communication than their previous consultancy. It’s pretty bad for the industry though because it creates distrust and dissatisfaction that affects everyone within the SEO/PPC community. IMO it comes down to pure complacency – an arrogance born out of working within one of the world’s fastest growing, most dynamic and certainly most exciting industries.

I’ve been involved in Digital Marketing for around 3 years in which time i’ve seen a number of companies cutting their teeth with small to medium sized clients before abondoning this strategy to chase the big fish. Now this is completely understandable but it does tend to leave the original (smaller) clients receiving a poor level of service through no fault of their own, while the agency concentrates their efforts on ensuring the newly acquired bluechip clients are satisfied.
Given that small to medium companies make up around 99% of all companies in the UK that’s a lot of potential clients left by the wayside – a lot of companies who, if they do choose to invest in SEO/PPC consultancy, can expect to receive a shoddy level of communication and service. Now I realise that there are a lot of generalisations in this post but I can only provide commentary on my own experience.

If, as predicted, digital marketing moves increasingly in-house with larger companies creating internal teams to oversee their integrated digital marketing strategies what does this mean for agencies?
Firstly I think it’s safe to assume that a lot of agencies will lose employees to client-side roles – higher salaries, greater profile, improved job security and better perks will prove too tempting to resist.
No doubt some agencies will go out of business, particularly those for whom 70-80% of their sales come from two or three big clients.
Most significantly though I think it will lead to a huge about turn with agencies reverting to providing SEO for small businesses because this is where the greatest concentration of potential clients will be found. Afterall, how many small companies have the financial resource to employ in-house digital marketing teams?

Anyway the whole point of this post is to highlight the pitfalls of creating dissatisfaction and distrust in a market we could all be relying on for our salaries in the coming years. If you nurture your small clients now they’re more likely to increase their spend with you as they grow. However, if you leave them feeling like their business doesn’t matter to you then i’ll poach them from you and it’ll be me who benefits.

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