How do you Know When it’s Time to Fire Your Clients?
On occasion, everyone deals with a difficult client. They might be very sensitive to keyword choices and hyper-sensitive to optimized content and internal anchor links. It’s understandable. Because, hey, it’s your brand and it has to be represented a certain way. As a search marketer, as someone concerned about their own brand and image, I get that.
And, yes, “difficult” can cost you profits if handled incorrectly, be a total time-sink, and in some cases, ruin your day. Yet, how you perform with difficult clients, in the worst of times, will only make you that much better with everyone else. It’s the easy, amicable clients that get you into trouble. After all, you can’t hit homerun everytime out, and the struggle is where joy arrives.
At what point does difficult turn to “fire-able”? That’s the question. And, everyone has a different answer. Every person has a varying tolerance level. Some could/can tolerate it forever because the client is the “Golden Goose”. Others, based on past experiences, have a extremely low threshold, won’t put up with the slightest rumblings, and pull the trigger. It all falls along the bell curve and standard deviations.
There’s Only So Much Shit You Can Eat.
Be honest, there’s only so much shit you can eat. Even the most easy-going, lax, and tolerant person has a limit. So I asked the question:
Clients do need to understand that this is the last resort. I don’t think anyone EVER wants to fire someone. You always think it’ll be better the next time around. Maybe just a phone call to explain my point-of-view on the situation and how it affects our partnership. But I’m learning: once an asswipe, always an asswipe. Clients don’t change. I think Ian Lurie put it best:
The McDonalds-ization of Client Service
“The client is ALWAYS right.”
Unfortunately, that is not the case. There is an overwhelming pressure to kowtow to the client’s wishes, one that has infiltrated businesses across the globe. And, with a global depression/recession in full-swing, the client knows they have an advantage. They’ll press you. They’ll barter, bargain, and attempt to de-value your services because there’s a global crunch and they think they can. They ignore you to avoid having to approve work they were so desperate to get.
The fact of the matter is, it’s NOT ok. The client is not right. They want filet mignon at chesseburger prices. If your search marketer is worth their salt, they completely understand you’re marketing budget got tighter. That every dollar needs to be accounted for, stretched, and maximized. But, that does not mean that I have to grossly de-value and debase myself and my services to fit your budget.
Time to Fire Your Client…
It’s time to fire your client when the relationship is completely lopsided and no mutual balance can be found. Or as Alysson Fergison put it:
[when the] need to understand that their decisions impact other people’s lives
Then it’s time to fire your client.
Marketing Pilgrim Post: Small Business PPC Art of War
To change some things up this week I wrote a post for the SEM Scholarship 2009 at Marketing Pilgrim. Check it out and post some comments. And, a special thanks to Andy Beal for holding such a great contest.
PageRank Sculpting Dead? (Not Exactly)
With all the chatter over the last week and half over “rel=nofollow” and Matt Cutts’ statement about the link attribute, I think it’s time to weigh in on it. There are a few great post that should be considered required reading before reading this post:
- Rand Fishkin’s latest: Google Says: Yes, You Can Still Sculpt PageRank. No You Can’t Do It With Nofollow
- The Gypsy’s (David Harry) latest: SEOs Are Not Criminals
Is “nofollow” Worth Using Anymore?
After listening and reading hours of material from everyone and anyone, my consensus is no. Additionally, I’ve also started to notice that “nofollow” has stopped it LinkJuice drafting ways on numerous sites I work on. Not to mention Matt sounds quite serious about the levying penalties for sites employing nofollow to sculpt and/or restrict content as a means to “manipulate” PageRank. And, remember, you are an “enemy” to engines.
What Matt Cutts Has To Say About Nofollow
Q: Does this mean “PageRank sculpting” (trying to change how PageRank flows within your site using e.g. nofollow) is a bad idea?
A: I wouldn’t recommend it, because it isn’t the most effective way to utilize your PageRank. In general, I would let PageRank flow freely within your site. The notion of “PageRank sculpting” has always been a second- or third-order recommendation for us. I would recommend the first-order things to pay attention to are 1) making great content that will attract links in the first place, and 2) choosing a site architecture that makes your site usable/crawlable for humans and search engines alike.There may be a minuscule number of pages (such as links to a shopping cart or to a login page) that I might add nofollow on, just because those pages are different for every user and they aren’t that helpful to show up in search engines. But in general, I wouldn’t recommend PageRank sculpting.
Additionally, there’s this nifty NEW tag that Google created a while back called the “rel=canonical”, which should help the majority of sites out there with duplicate content issues.
How To Sculpt Without Nofollow:
Rand posted some good methods for sculpting, which work, but it feels unnecessarily sneaky to me. A better way is to allow, as Matt Cutts suggests, to allow your PageRank to flow freely. Interconnectivity (internal site link structure) is a key element here. You want your site to have a “flat architecture”, and even though it may not be. It’s really a play off the Bruce Clay method of siloing, but ensuring that major sections of the site become visible through an internal linking structure. This allows those pages to, if the practice holds, to share and share-alike the PageRank while only giving minimal amounts to other site areas.
And, yes, removing the nofollows will be a pain in the ass, but it’s one that worth it. And, yes, I really don’t like that Google went back on their word with this attribute. But to put it in perspective: “It’s Google’s World. I just live in it.” And, that’s the fact. I’m an enemy combatant.
