Listen, this isn’t a fun topic or article to write.
I’ve been through a lot in my career as an employee. Now, as an agency owner, I understand how economic factors, downtimes, and other ripples can have a big impact not only on budgets, but also on careers and lives.
Downtimes, downturns, and anything negative connected with the economy can mean a lot for marketers.
Whether it is due to the immediate need to scale back quickly, a lack of focus on longer-term digital marketing strategies, or the fact that it gets connected to pull-backs in broader marketing budgets, SEO is often impacted when a company encounters downtimes.
When you’re faced with shrinking budgets, having fewer resources than you need, and feeling the pressure to achieve SEO results, I have a lot of empathy.
As SEO pros, we already do a lot of work to get the dollars, software, resources, and commitment needed to achieve short-term actions that will lead to long-term performance.
My hope is that these eight steps will help you get the most out of any type of SEO downtime you might be facing and push forward.
1. Cultivate Situational Understanding
In some cases, you might be fully expecting and feeling downtime or economic circumstances. It could include global economies and have a number of different reasons for it.
In other situations, it could be something you have encountered and experienced in a specific region, industry, or vertical.
In other cases, though, downtime could be less extreme and more surprising. That doesn’t make it any better, and it means that you will need to adjust your strategy accordingly.
As an in-house SEO or digital marketer, an external consultant, or an agency professional serving clients, you need to have a situational understanding of the “what” and the “why” behind the downturn.
This doesn’t mean that you have to be an economist or policy expert.
You’ll likely be asked to do as much or more with less during a downturn.
So, before you can get deep into the “how” that you’re asked to accomplish from an SEO perspective, you need to have enough understanding of what you’re facing, the impact on your company/client, and how this reframes the organization, marketplace, and your work world overall.
2. Demand Analysis
Drilling down into the specifics and putting your SEO hat back on, the most important thing to understand is whether factors impacting budgets are tied to business and market conditions and what the impacts are on demand.
If you’re on the brand side or are in an agency or consultancy that focuses on a single industry, you likely have some ideas.
However, if SEO budgets are being reduced or cut and you have to do less with more, you need to do some analysis to understand whether demand is down overall for your product, service, or market.
Are fewer people searching? Are fewer going through the funnel or customer journey? Is there some new drop-off point that didn’t exist before?
3. Revisit Goals
Similar to demand analysis, you need to revisit goals more broadly.
Even if the market is the same, if you’re receiving less budget or fewer resources to work with, you need to reset your own expectations – and those of stakeholders.
Can you do as much as you did before with fewer dollars? Can you work with fewer internal and external resources – and still make SEO successful?
If you have to cut content, technical support, or even SEO research and strategy, even if market demand hasn’t taken a hit, you can assume that the outputs and results won’t be the same.
Revisit your goals, communicate them, and make them as objective and tied to budget and resources as possible. If you’re being asked to do more or less, that’s ok, but know that going into it!
AI is a great tool right now that can help you do more with less, so leverage it where you can in smart and quality ways.
4. Narrow Digital Footprint
I hate this tip, but it is important.
I’m typically all about more being better if it is high quality – whether that is content, features, functionality, or aspects of customer journey paths and funnels.
However, in lean times or on limited resources, you do need to limit your digital footprint.
Whether it is due to streamlining resources or your own focus and budgets, you have to scale back. If market demand is diminished, zero in on where people are still searching and have needs.
It could mean shortening your topic and keyword list to address the part of the funnel you want to be strong in or on the most profitable product or service offering.
With a narrower focus and fewer resources, you can also reduce your website resource needs.
Whether it is getting really detailed with a certain section, sub-section, subdomain, or microsite, you’re likely going to have to make some decisions and strategic and tactical choices you wouldn’t in abundant times.
You may not be able to optimize a full site, so get as narrow as you need to and focus your attention there.
5. Focus Resources
SEO is impossible to do as one person wearing all the hats unless you’re in a unicorn situation.