SEO workflow, a real impact booster

Contrary to what than you might think, SEO is not just a matter for SEO experts. Other actors, from different departments, are also involved. However, companies often struggle to coordinate these different actors and to distribute the tasks between them. Consequence? Too few implementations, disappointing SEO results and widespread frustration.
In this article, we help you better understand the SEO workflow principle and give you some tips on how to increase your organic visibility by defining your own SEO workflow.

What is an SEO workflow?

In a few words, the SEO workflow includes all the activities that the company must implement to obtain a result in natural referencing.

The notion of workflow also includes all project stakeholders, the responsibilities of each of them, the prioritization of tasks as well as the associated deadlines.

Here is an example of an SEO workflow:

• Marketing Department The marketing manager defines the global and digital strategy of the company. He also coordinates campaigns and defines the products/services that need to be focused on.
• Digital Department The SEO manager has the role of Project Manager (PM). He designs the SEO strategy taking into account the marketing priorities – alone or with a SEO agency. He is in charge of the follow-up of the tasks and the reporting of the SEO results.
• Communication/Branding Department The communication manager writes the content of the website. He receives a briefing from the PM including the main keyword of the content to be produced and the good SEO practices. He ensures that SEO optimization and the company’s brand image are reconciled (tone of voice).
• IT/Web department: the developer integrates the technical optimizations of the site based on the tickets introduced by the PM.

How can this help you in your SEO project management?

Setting up a good SEO workflow in your company allows you to clarify everyone’s role and to rely on their expertise to gain efficiency. The main challenge for an SEO Project Manager is to mobilize the right expertise around him to focus on his core business: SEO strategy and identification of the best optimization levers.

Once clarified, the SEO workflow allows you to eliminate potentially unnecessary steps and prioritize each one.

In other words, it will allow you to make your project as efficient as possible, by improving the coordination of your teams, speeding up the decision-making process and reducing errors. The result? You see your positions rise much faster!

How to define your own SEO workflow?

Step 1: SEO strategy and detection of optimization projects

First of all, it is important to define your SEO strategy, which is based on 3 pillars:

• Semantic analysis What are the most promising keyword themes?
• An inventory of the popularity of the site Is it considered as an authority in its field of activity by Google?
• An inventory of the technical health of the site The technical foundations : do they allow a good indexation and understanding of the site by the search engines

The SEO manager will need to communicate this strategy to each stakeholder who will play a role in the implementation. SEO goals must be shared by all, and everyone must understand the impact their actions will have on the project.

Step 2: Identification of SEO quick wins and task allocation

Once you have defined the work sites, you need to identify the tasks that are performed several times during the same year, such as creating landing pages, creating blog content, optimizing existing content, correcting SEO markup errors (several H1s for example), …

For each of these tasks, it is worthwhile to define who is going to do what, in what time frame and with what tools. The SEO strategy will then allow you to prioritize your actions, starting with the SEO quick wins, i.e. the tasks that allow you to have a maximum impact with a limited effort. Ideally, each action will be assigned to a specific person who will be responsible for its execution within the allotted time.

Step 3: Monitor your progress and report on SEO results

Don’t forget the most important thing: follow the implementation of the tasks and monitor your progress. A good practice is to set up a reporting system from the beginning of the project by answering the following questions

• What are the performance indicators (SEO KPI’s) ?
• How to monitor my evolution in terms of visibility, traffic, revenue generated.
• Which reporting for which use?

Avoid the classic trap of providing as much data as possible to your management. In SEO as in design, “less is more”. Consider the priorities and level of expertise of each person in selecting the type of information to be included and its formatting.

What project management tools should I use?

In most projects, a lot of time is spent on the organization of the project itself, wondering if the teams working on the project are progressing properly and meeting their deadlines. Many messages are then exchanged, and sometimes lost or forgotten. This is where some project management tools can help. These will allow you to centralize all the tasks and to see the progress of each person involved.

To help you manage your SEO processes, you can use project management or communication platforms like Slack, Asana, Teams or even Trello. However, these are not specifically designed for organic referencing. You will have to take care of the set-up, feed the platform with your different analyses and make sure that the tasks and their impact are followed up.

You can also simplify your SEO workflow by choosing a dedicated platform that does some of the work for you. This is commonly known as an Enterprise SEO platform.

The SEO workflow, a good way to stay motivated!

When an SEO workflow is set up and approved, all stakeholders share a common goal. It’s no longer about performing a tedious task but about contributing to a better organic visibility. For this to work, it is essential to be able to show that each task serves this SEO performance objective. “What impact did my action have? This question is tricky in SEO because it is often difficult to link a single action to an improvement in visibility. And yet, it is key to motivation and commitment!

There are solutions, such as Semactic Enterprise SEO platform, to help you make that connection between implementations and impact. In a context where SEO competition is increasing, keeping your teams motivated over time has become crucial to continuously optimize your site.

So, are you convinced by the value of SEO workflows? Want to know more about it?

Do not hesitate to contact our teams for a more in-depth discussion.