Whether you’re outsourcing your SEO for the first time or have years of experience working with freelancers, going into the process with a well-structured plan will help you get the most out of your support team.
It is even more critical at the enterprise level to have high levels of communication and accountability for any SEO project.
With so many pages to manage, the possibility of costly mistakes or errors increases.
It is your responsibility to prevent as many of these as possible.
So, how do you go about assembling a successful team of enterprise SEO freelancers?
These seven-pointers may be useful.
1. Provide them with detailed briefs
No matter how large your site is, you will always know more about the company and its objectives than the freelancers you hire.
But this is also why it is your responsibility to properly educate your freelancers and provide them with the inside knowledge they require to do their work effectively.
With sites that have hundreds or even thousands of pages, it can be very easy for a freelancer to become disoriented about the site’s structure and why things are set up the way they are.
Giving them a detailed brief ahead of the project start date will give them time to review, follow up on, and clarify anything that may make their work more difficult or less successful.
Your brief should include information on the goal of the work you want the freelancer to complete, as well as everything that is expected of them in terms of deliverables.
You should also clearly outline any project deadlines, as well as agreed-upon processes such as standing meetings or check-ins.
2. Establish Specific Deliverables
While goals like “increase organic traffic to the site by 10% this quarter” are admirable, your freelancers must have concrete deliverables in place that indicate when the work is complete.
If you’re not sure where, to begin with, these, keep in mind that deliverables are about controllable outcomes.
When you look at them, you should be able to ask, “Was this task completed or not?”
Yes, you are hiring freelancers to help your business grow.
However, their role is to complete the tasks required to get you to those goals, not to guarantee that those goals will be met.
Ultimately, no matter how hard you work, the outcomes of growth or performance goals are out of your and your freelancer’s control.
Setting clear, measurable deliverables is one of the most effective ways to keep everyone on track and ensure a positive working relationship with your freelancers.
3. Outline Success Metrics Right Away
Before you begin any new digital marketing project, you must determine how you intend to measure its success.
At enterprise-level companies, key performance indicators (KPIs) will differ from one another and even from one project to the next.
Take the time you need to plan out your measures before delegating work to freelancers.
Traffic and rankings are two common SEO KPIs to think about. Are you seeing an improvement in both of these as a result of the work done by your freelancers?
However, your success metrics do not always have to be hard data.
When internal teams are overworked and pulled in too many different directions, mistakes occur more frequently.
Seeing fewer errors or less time spent on corrections is a valid success metric you can use with your SEO freelancers.
It may not be as flashy as traffic or rankings, but it can make just as much of a difference to the bottom line of the business in the long run.
4. Provide them with access to necessary documents and tools while also respecting their process
When you hire freelancers, you must create an onboarding process in the same way that you would for a new member of your internal team.
This includes giving them access to any documents or tools they’ll need to complete the tasks you’ve assigned to them.
Internal documents can become buried deep within computer files and internal systems, so make sure to clearly outline where these files can be found and how the freelancer can access them.
Set them up as a new user in your project management system and schedule a call to walk them through where everything is and how your internal team uses the system.
The same is true for your website.
Give your freelancers the access they’ll need to complete their work and take the time to show them where key pages are or any problem areas you want to draw their attention to.
Many businesses, however, make the mistake of expecting their freelancers to use all of their tools, apps, and internal communication channels.
It is critical for freelancers to stay connected to the project, but they may request that you not add them to your Slack, that you do not give them additional email addresses, or that you ping them directly if they are added to internal communication systems on the channel they use the most (generally their own email).
This ensures that updates are not missed, projects remain on track, and they can manage the number of places they need to check for feedback across clients.
5. Establish a procedure for ownership and check-ins
Every day, you probably have hundreds of tasks on your plate if you work in enterprise business.
After all, that’s why you hired freelancers in the first place: to help lighten the load!
While those freelancers are accountable for the work they do, you are ultimately the point of contact and project manager.
It is critical that you schedule regular check-ins with your freelancers, either at specific stages of the project or on a weekly/biweekly basis to see how things are going.
Create an internal process for these check-ins that will increase efficiency for both you and your freelance team, especially if you’re working with multiple freelancers on different parts of the project.
It is your responsibility to stay on top of everything, to ensure that deadlines are met and that work meets your expectations.
The best way to stay on track is to communicate on a regular basis without micromanaging your external team.
6. Hold regular meetings to keep the project on track
While weekly or biweekly check-ins are beneficial, it is also important to schedule standing meetings and calls to keep the project moving forward.
Most teams find that these standing meetings are most useful near key deadlines, such as the completion of an SEO audit or the start of a project.
Check-ins are frequently more informal and conducted via email, whereas these standing meetings should be conducted in person or via video call and should be structured more like a formal meeting.
Prepare an agenda and send it to your internal team and all of your freelancers at least a few days before the scheduled meeting time.
This allows everyone to go over it and make any additional comments or suggestions.
Review what has been completed thus far and how this has gone during your standing meetings.
Set aside some time to discuss any changes that may have occurred internally that may have an impact on the work that your freelancers are doing, as well as to discuss upcoming deadlines ahead of the next meeting.
Standing meetings can certainly consume your time, but they are an essential part of managing an outsourced team.
Knowing you have a scheduled meeting to discuss the project will keep the momentum going and will go a long way toward making your freelancers more successful.
7. Implement a Quality Assurance Process Prior to Go-Lives
Just as you are responsible for ensuring that work is completed, you are also responsible for ensuring that work is of the highest possible quality before it goes live.
Yes, everyone makes errors.
But it’s critical that you catch these before they spread to the rest of the world.
Incorporating a quality assurance process into your project launch schedule can assist you in maintaining the necessary checks and balances in-house.
This could imply having several sets of eyes look over a piece of the project before it’s posted on the website, or requesting final approval from a senior member of the team before sending feedback to your freelancer.
Once your process is in place, be steadfast in maintaining and adhering to it.
Thinking you can save time by skipping a step or two is a sure way to let something slip through the cracks.
Working through each item on the checklist may take longer, but it can save you embarrassment or, worse, money when your project goes live.
Conclusion
Enterprise SEO is a one-of-a-kind and difficult beast, but it’s also incredibly rewarding when you see your efforts pay off.
Working with freelancers is one of the most effective ways to bring specialized expertise into your team and fill gaps that must be filled in order to launch a successful project.
With the right systems and processes in place, you can help your freelancers deliver their best work for you while also establishing a long-term working relationship that will benefit your enterprise business for years to come.
Learn more from SEO and read A Complete Guide to Amazon SEO for Sellers.
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