Freelance SEO Copywriter Tip: Blend Your Sources

Had a couple things recently on the gig that made me remember that blending the sources of information can be a crucial safeguard to freaking-out.

The first was a client with a SERP fluctuation for one keyword. I reported the slip for this keyword the day I saw it, and we have been watching it do some weird things (mostly bad). It basically fell from page one to page three for no apparent reason, and was a keyword this client had been actively building on for more than a year.

The owner was a little bit freaked, seeing his most targeted keyword getting dinged in Google. This is a relatively new client - I have only been helping them for a couple weeks so far. But in that time, I have not known them to freak out unnecessarily.

But experience told me not to join in the panic, and to look deeper into what could be happening.

I looked at some recent changes we had done, and nothing leapt out as unusual. I looked at the analytics of the web traffic and saw some interesting things, the most important one being, that visits were not down, and nor were conversions. Read that part again - it was the meaty bit.

Referrals were actually continuing to rise, and so though there was definitely less traffic coming in on this keyword, it only seemed to affect a direct match to this keyword...the long tail stuff was all intact. And more importantly, it was only visible in Google. Yahoo was holding steady, and Bing was cruising on fire.

The point is, I blended the information from a couple different sources, and did not let the one bad indicator make me believe it was all in trouble. Now this is not to say that I won't try to fix it. I actually believe it could be improperly weighted anchor text, and am taking some steps and continuing to watch it.

But the tip here, is once I was able to see, and make the point that the business was not suffering - just changing - the client was calmed down, and we can continue to try to find the issue with a coooler head and therefore a more detailed and methodical approach.

Story Two: A Slanted Source
The other illustration I had recently was a client who was tracking his site's ranking using a pretty outdated methodology. The source he was using was understandable, as it is pretty visible, and some people seem to value it (or did a few years back). But once you know how it collects its information, you know that this is a very limited option.

So in this case, it was not that the information he was reviewing was incorrect - it was simply one still frame of a larger moving picture. Nonetheless, it was making him a little sad to see a competitor overtake him. I don't like it when good clients are sad, so I asked him how he came to understand this competitor was doing better than him. The answer was this outdated technology told him so.

The thing I did, was show the client the small print in the software he was using to show where some of the shortcomings were later identified by other sources I trust. I showed my client some newer versions of the one he was using, as well as additional ones he could strategically employ in his SEO evaluations - many were free, and others had fees equal to or less than what he was used to paying.

What it did, was show him that one source of information is not a holy edict. None of the tools I showed him would necessarily be the single answer he needs either - but by blending a bunch of the information from a variety of sources, he'll get a much more clear picture of what is happening out there.

And that seemed like a perfect thing to offer you here as an seo freelancer tip...find multiple sources of data that you can trust, and learn the value of using the information together.

Work Again Postpones Work

Landed a couple of great copywriting gigs. One is pretty SEO-heavy - building out a catalog of really nice product descriptions. The other is more generalized - I am doing some press releases and content pages for a retailer.

But both gigs are the result of cold calls from the site. The site is old, and I was in the process of updating it...but now I am sidetracked again with other things to do.

Unfortunately, this is a trade I have had to make repeatedly over the last year or so....but I will get to my rebuild sooner than later. It is a personal goal more than anything else, because professionally this old site seems to do just fine for me.

Knowing Your Limits
So the SEO copywriting tip that best applies to my situation here, is to know your limits. For instance, I know, with the 2 newly signed clients, one other new one I have starting later this week, and the existing clients I serve regularly, I am pretty much at maximum capacity for the next 3 months. This is great - I look forward to the new work, and the money will be nice when it is all said and done.

But at this point, I need to be really careful in balancing my workload and managing my client's expectations. If I am not careful, being busy becomes being frantic, and that hurts the copy and that is never good. I know my limits, and I am about there right now - very comfortably busy, but not frantic or harried. I don't want it to go any further.

However, freelancing experience tells me that when it rains, it truly pours. So I expect more of this - more cold calls and existing relationships asking for favors and projects. And I'll need to determine when enough is enough.

Usually, I determine whether or not I can do more work based on the creative demands I have during any given day. To me, most site building and code maintenance is pretty easy to do on auto-pilot, while writing can be much more mentally demanding.

And there is a definite sway of the dollar to consider. If I have a client that I know pays well and is responsive, I am much more inclined to do all I can to keep them wanting more. If a client is a demanding, cheap, pain-in-the-butt (and believe it or not, there are a few) I feel no anguish in letting them find someone else.

I will end up picking the jobs I most want to do, and either delaying or passing completely on the rest. I do my best to be judicious in evaluating the demands of each experience, so I can feel like each is receiving my best. My clients are paying me to make sure of it, and I don't disappoint.

But I do so often get a little too happy with my commitments...Iwant to do everything for everybody all the time, so I might get a little overwhelmed if I am not careful. I will do my best to follow my own advice here.

And I will also take the problem of being too darn busy...it is a really nice problem to have.