Any SEO company knows about Google Analytics, how to track conversions, how to improve your Google ranking, and lots of buzz words to sound very impressive when talking to clients. The truth of the matter is that the all-powerful Google hides how they rank websites and no SEO company full understands all their dirty little secrets. We can say that we know about key factors in ranking like content, having valuable keywords on your pages, inbound links, external links to reliable sources, but we are all just shooting in the dark. There is a reason Google won’t tell you how they rank websites, the reason is how they make all their money, Google Ads.
Google Ads is the secret behind why Google is so secretive about their Google ranking algorithm and why all SEO pros are left in the dark with some observations only anecdotal of how SEO truly works. SEO pros are often good at what they do because they have experience with many companies; writing blog posts, posting to social media, and doing all the boring tasks that most business owners don’t want to learn how to do. Through that painstaking experience, SEO pros can say with lackluster confidence that content is king, or posting to social is essential, or whatever flavor of SEO flair they tend to throw at their customers this month.
Not Giving Clients access to their data is the biggest mistake
As an SEO pro myself, the biggest fault I have seen when dealing with onboarding new customers is the greatest mistake an SEO pro can make and it is so basic, so fundamental, it should be emblazoned on the stone tablets of SEO lore. The mistake is not giving full admin access to client accounts on every platform they work with. The truth is that the content and data created during any campaign for a client should be the clients’ data and property. The issue is that often, clients have standard rights access or no access at all. This causes major problems down the road.
It happens all too often, clients say that they do not have access to their Google Analytics data, this is valuable data on user clicks and behavior of how they interact with your website.
Why is this such a problem?
If a client does not have access to their analytics and they switch agencies then they can lose all of their past analytics website search data. I recently encountered this problem with multiple clients. Often, the client will have to reach back out to their old marketing firm and request access. More times than not, the firm doesn’t spend any time on a past client and it falls in the “to-do” work pile, which means, it doesn’t get done.
If you rely on reports sent by your marketing agency you might be missing key performance indicators as well. Some SEO companies will only give you what they want you to see to bolster up their campaigns. I recently had a client who showed a Google Ads report that didn’t even include the CPC or cost per click he was paying on various keywords. This is valuable and without this data, the marketing company can really manipulate the results.
By limiting client access to data, marketers are only showing part of the story to their clients. With full access, clients can better understand trends, know what is going on, and be excited when new improvements happen. The reports that clients get from marketers don’t tell the full story. There are plenty of easy ways that clients can access key parts of data using mobile apps. Google Analytics, for example, has a great mobile app that shows tons of easily understood data on user visits to your website. By empowering business owners and giving them full access you are creating smarter, more educated clients, which is what any firm should want. The conspiracy theory is out there for why marketers would want to dumb down their clients.
How To Fix It
Demand that your SEO or marketing company gives you full admin rights and access to any data platforms that they use. You should have full rights when it comes to Google Search Console, Google Analytics, Bing tools, even your website. I am surprised by how many business owners do not even have full rights access to their website. It’s your data, you paid for it, you should own and control it so take control!
At Kow Abundant, we give all of our users full admin rights to their data like Google Search Console, Google Analytics, and their website as per our policy. We do this so that you can take your data to any other marketing company or developer and you remain in control of your data.
If you have questions let us know or we would love to hear what you think. Has this happened to you?