What are the Right Questions to ask an Internet Marketing Consultant?
28 June 2010
Finding the right
SEO expert to handle the
Internet marketing for your online business can be a tough task if youre not prepared for the hiring. A lot of people simply outsource their jobs to the cheapest available or the highest rated workers and hope for the best. More often than not, this ends in disaster and no one gets what they want out of the deal.You have to approach an Internet marketer just like youre the boss looking to hire an employee, because thats exactly what you are the boss, and the marketer is going to be working for you. Its imperative that you start out by asking questions. You need to see what the marketer is made of and if he/she or the company is going in the same direction. What are some of the best questions you should be asking? These questions will range from simple and basic to precise and intuitive.
The first question to ask: What are you goals for this project?
This might seem like a question they should be asking you, but this will work to give you a feel of the marketers intended direction for your site. From there, you can get into more specific questions about their tactics. Always remember to ask a follow-up for this, though: Do these methods work the best for you?What types of programs have you carried out in the past and who are some of your best clients?
You want to know exactly which websites have benefited form this marketer and how theyve worked to promote the sites in the past. What makes you different from the competition?
This is simply to see if you can get some honesty or if youll be fed a cookie-cutter mission statement answer. You want an open line of communication in a working relationship, so listen up for a sense of legitimacy in the answer. Have you ever failed to promote a website?
Again, this works to credibility and knowing if theyre being honest with you. A follow-up question to this would be, Do you expect any of the same problems with my site?A good targeted question to ask is, What is your target demographic?
All youre looking for here is knowledge of SEO on their end. They should be sticking with your
niche market unless instructed otherwise. The goal is to get you real traffic and customers, not simply to be seen. You want to build a business. Can I have a breakdown of all the services and pricing packages youre offering?
The answer here might be really long, and you might be referred back to their site to read the fine print, but this is the kind of stuff you need to know. In all honesty, there are a few dozen questions you should be asking, but these will suffice. One final question to ask: How involved will I be in the SEO?
Youre looking for control here. Even though theyre the experts, they should still operate at your say-so.
