“When can I stop doing Local SEO?” and “What if I quit and come back later?” These are FAQs, and we have the answers. We also know the consequences. During the time we’ve been doing local marketing and SEO, we’ve heard it all, and the answer isn’t black and white. Are you ready to find out what’s real?
When Can I Stop Doing Local SEO?
It happens sometimes. We’ll have a client who’s been with us for some time, usually a couple of years, and they’ve reached a very comfortable coast-along speed. Their website traffic is up and increasing steadily, their revenue reaches a stable and predictable level, and they’re happy with the business they’re getting.
Then, of course, at some point, they start thinking about where they could be saving money. This is normal for any entrepreneur. It’s important to reevaluate and change course if it serves your business.
But it’s important to think through these kinds of things so that you don’t look back and live to regret a move. So, we thought we’d share some real client experiences we’ve had through the years so you have all the helpful information possible to make the most informed decision.
Here we go…
What We Hear
“I’m ranking well, and business is great, but we think it’s time to coast along. We’ve been blogging and are in a good spot on Google… it’s time to pull back.”
The Problem With That Is
Well, there’s more than just one problem with this mindset. But let’s start with the following:
Your Competition
You have other local competitors that continue their SEO efforts to reach or maintain page 1 of Google while you sit back to coast along. If you don’t keep up with knowing what your closest competitors are up to, you will surely sink in rankings. If they keep up with regularly checking all those pesky SEO boxes, and you don’t… guess who loses?
Real Example
We have a naturopathic doctor client and know there are approximately 200 naturopathic doctors in and around San Diego. All 200 of those docs compete for one of the 3 spots in the Google 3-Pack, leaving 197 doctors in the dust (aka page 2 of Google, and that’s where listings go to die).
That’s a lot of businesses competing for one of three spots. It won’t take long for one of them to get bounced from their spot if they stop focusing on SEO.
RebelFish Local is based in San Diego, and although we can do local SEO marketing all over the country, many of our clients are in and around Southern California.
SEO Is Like Health and Fitness
Doing local SEO can be compared to health and fitness. What you do now, and consistently for the next few months, will show. It will take time, but you will see results. The point is to maintain consistency.
This can be hard to remember, especially for clients who have experienced results and are enjoying the fruits of their labor. Naturally, just like when you’re working on getting fit and healthy, you start to see the results and pull back your efforts. Over time, this results in a regression, a plateau, or the complete annihilation of past efforts. Before you know it, you’re right back where you started, or worse, even behind your initial starting point.
This is not good. This is not what you wanted. This is not where you want to be.
SEO Takes Time
You are not going to see results right away. In our experience, it usually takes anywhere from 4 to 12 months to see meaningful SEO results. That’s not precise, and if you’re a business owner waiting for results, it can be an unnerving amount of time to think about waiting.
It’s frustrating to wait for results. Even more frustrating is to experience success from your efforts and then the inevitable disappointment from the fallout of quitting.
We know you’ve had this question because we always hear it. Read Why Does SEO Take So Long? for more answers.
How’s your business messaging? Are you communicating as clearly as possible to your intended target audience?
We’ve Also Heard
Too much success too fast from some companies has also been a thing. The problem is that they don’t have the systems in place to handle the growth as fast as it comes to them. This is the better problem to have, but it still leads to challenges, and we understand that.
Real Example
One of our clients, Sun State Solar in New Mexico, came to us in June of 2020. They quickly began dominating in their area and didn’t want more leads. Again, too much business is the better problem to have, but it can still be an issue. (See our Case Study on SEO for solar companies.)
Another client we had, Rabino Winery, for whom we launched a StoryBrand website, sold out of all their wine way too fast. Many positive reviews helped with this. The owner contacted us and actually asked us to take down the website and put the old one back up because it was too much growth too fast.
This is what quality local SEO can accomplish.
What Does an SEO Company Do to Alleviate This?
While the wine company mentioned above may have made the right decision for them as they would not have been able to handle such fast growth, that was a drastic move and we wouldn’t recommend this for most situations.
Need some marketing ideas? These aren’t just for laundry services… you can choose and implement most of them for any business.
It May Be Time Just to Downgrade Your SEO Service
What does this look like?
Well, it just means we no longer do things that help you ‘build’ an online presence. So no more articles or service pages. We are not actively building local business citations or review sites anymore. And we’re typically just letting them use our review-gathering platform. So we’re still streaming reviews to their website. And then we are emailing, asking for reviews if they want to do that.
Once you downgrade your SEO services, you can opt to have us host your website. This is recommended because it’s important to keep up with monthly updates that are necessary for performance. Remember, a poorly performing website will affect your ranking. So, while it may be a good decision to downgrade your services based on your business needs, you never want to stop updating your website.
Our clients generally opt to do this if and when they choose to downgrade SEO service.
What If I Quit RebelFish Local and Come Back Later?
This happens for many reasons. Here are some things we’ve heard from clients who are considering quitting…
And here are some things we’ve heard from clients who come back…
How Long Does It Take to Regain Lost Progress After I Return?
This will very much depend on your local competition. How well are they doing? Have they been staying consistent? It will also depend on how long you were ‘out of the game.’
Again, it’s like eyeing the fit person flexing their muscles in the mirror on the other side of the gym. They were consistent when you dropped off the plan. Both create results. Theirs are just more coveted.
Ranking well on Google will take time and effort, but we want you to think about what your business and life will look like when you stick to the plan. What things will you be able to focus on better once you’ve accomplished a good ranking? How will your day-to-day be easier and more efficient? Will you be able to hire more employees? Will you be able to get the expansion you’ve been thinking about?
Have you ever used a StoryBrand BrandScript? See how your marketing and messaging strategy could improve dramatically.
How Long Does It Take to Get to a Sweet Spot?
We’ll start by saying that every market is different. So, it depends on the general market, the type of business, and how much competition they have in their local area. However, we’d say it usually takes 2-3 years to reach a good ranking, allowing the business owner to pull back and coast along a bit.
3 Important Factors for Effective SEO
These are just a few factors that will help your SEO strategy and lessen the time it takes to establish an effective online presence:
- Targeting low-competition keywords
- Organically building and earning reputable backlinks
- Building citations with consistent NAP (name, address, and phone number)
Building and earning reputable backlinks is the most difficult part of an effective SEO strategy. However, if you understand what Google is trying to accomplish for its searchers, you’ll understand why this is the secret to building online authority and consumer trust. Google bots will say, “Hey, look at this business… people are searching for something just like it, and this one has a good reputation, which means it’s safe to send our searchers to.”
How Does RebelFish Local Handle This?
When it’s possible to coast along a bit, and the owner is happy with the amount of traffic they’re getting, we have a conversation about downgrading SEO services.
This approach can look like this:
- We can lessen the number of articles we’re writing for their blog(s).
- We can stop updating website pages.
- We offer the possibility of doing ads.
- We can focus more on social media and/or email marketing.
- We can solely focus on hosting the website and doing monthly updates.
Generally speaking, it will be wise to divert the money you were spending on initial SEO services to another marketing area. Different styles of marketing can get you different results. That would be the smart thing to do, and that is what most of our clients end up doing.
You must be willing to spend the time and money, but sticking to your SEO goals will result in a better ranking. There’s nothing that feels worse than knowing you could have been farther along. There’s nothing that feels better than reaping the rewards because you stuck to your plan.
Schedule a call today, and we’ll get started on your Google audit so that you know where you currently are and can work through these questions to determine the best move for your business.
Not everyone is cut out to be a rebel. But, honestly… we think you are!