4 Proven Ways to Enabling SEO Across Your Company

It is therefore important to get stakeholder buy-in for the smooth execution of an SEO project. But, this can be quite a challenge. According to experts, a great way to overcome this problem is by trying to get SEO a seat on the table for that much-needed prioritization and buy-in.

However, SEO experts should think beyond just that. What if you haven’t been allowed to speak at that table? There may be many who would not support your opinion, and you may not even be invited to speak. While getting a seat at the table is important, it is not just enough.

So, you should think about how to enable non-SEO teams to make the best SEO decisions while supporting the organic channel on their own – whether you are present at the table or not.

SEO Enablement Ensures SEO Implementation

Often, SEO professionals are forced to work both as “gatekeepers” and “janitors.” As gatekeepers, they are responsible for making technical decisions and maintaining the quality of all types of content to ensure that best SEO practices are properly followed. And as Janitors, they adjust or attenuate their decisions that could jeopardize SEO progress.

To be true, neither of the two is ideal. And, this is where SEO enablement comes in. It is an ongoing process of sharing SEO tools, resources, and knowledge to enable other teams within an organization to make well-informed decisions that always conform to best SEO practices for every project. It further facilitates the development of an SEO mindset across the organization. Here are some positive outcomes of SEO enablement:

• Makes it easier to gain project buy-in as you have support and backers from multiple departments.
• Helps SEO to stay at the top on the priority list by other teams when creating a roadmap.
• Improves workflow efficiencies
• Promotes the development and execution of well-coordinated cross-team and cross-channel strategies.

Not only does SEO enablement help turn SEO into a team sport, wherein every team across the organization shares its own set of responsibilities but sets SEO professionals free from the role of gatekeepers or janitors.

How to Enable SEO across an Organization

Here are 4 great ideas to enable SEO across various teams within an organization:

1. Teach, but Never Preach:

Technical jargon is frequently used in SEO. People who don’t understand SEO, like SEO professionals, may find it unappealing, which may cause them to become reluctant toward SEO. If you want to avoid such a situation, make sure that whenever you share an SEO recommendation, consider it as a compelling essay or a mini SEO business case. You need to keep your audience tied up while making them understand everything you would want to convey to them.

Whether you are sending out an SEO POV mail or you are presenting SEO data to stakeholders, don’t just make a recommendation without backing it with smart charts and other types of data. No matter how long it takes, craft your message in a way that it can easily be explained. Also, never hesitate to explain the same concept multiple times to the same set of people, if required.

When recommending to stakeholders, following the format below:

-TL; DR Executive Summary: This should include your SEO recommendation at the top with 2 to 3 sentences.
-The Problem: This part includes an explanation of the SEO-related issue you would want to resolve. Typically, covers jargon definitions.
-Its Importance: Here, you should explain why SEO needs to be involved in the project in focus. Try pulling out quotes from industry mavens, best practices, and other similar elements to back the importance of SEO.
-Its Impact on the Performance: In this section, you can explain what they can expect if they follow your recommendation. Simultaneously, make them realize what could happen if they partially follow your recommendation or turn down it all together.

The easier the explanation, the more it supports your concept, eventually making it easier to assimilate for stakeholders.

2. Try Generating SEO Skills Outside of Your team:

Some SEO skills are critical to making great SEO decisions. Therefore, other people too in the organization must bear such skills. Assisting your team and colleagues in developing these skills is a great way to remove hurdles to decision making and execution. It also helps them with professional growth.

– Analytical Skills: Too many website projects are likely to hamper SEO performance. Thus, other teams should be made aware of this issue while making them understand how to leverage the most appropriate SEO datasets that can help them with the progress of the project.

– Stakeholders should realize the value of including SEO data in their day-to-day workflows. Hence, let them know the reports and metrics that are most critical and why they are so.

– Developers: Show them the importance of technical SEO. Teach them to track and fetch important insights by assessing crawled data.

– Writers: Let them know why keyword research is all-important. Also, make them learn how to check keyword visibility of their content.

– UI/UX Designers & Strategists: Explain to them how search engines crawl pages while showing them the impact of poorly linked pages on traffic.

– Shortcuts in Excel: Most SEO work begins and ends within Excel. And, not knowing it can be a hurdle for many key decision-makers. Even if they now know to use SEO data, it can be tedious for them to manually sort such a huge pile of data.

To overcome this problem, make other teams as well as your colleagues learn some common Excel formulas, or share with them an Excel template with pre-inserted formulas and rules to make it easier for them to use.

3. Give People the Right Tools:

Remember that if you want to get out of the “gatekeeper’s” role, you should not restrict the access and knowledge of useful SEO tools only to yourself. If it’s only you who knows how to use SEO tools, other people will have no option, but depend on you for SEO-related things. This will put SEO at the periphery, rather than being the center of their workflows.

Offer training and tools to other teams so that they can include SEO effectively in their day-to-day tasks. This will eventually help create an SEO mindset across the organization. Share access to the following platforms with other people in your company:

– Keyword Analytics
– Content Analytics
– SEO Chrome Extension & SEO Tools
– Website Crawling

With the ability to monitor and research SEO on their own, other teams are expected to feel that they are partly responsible for the SEO channel and they are likely to make decisions accordingly.

4. Foster Knowledge Sharing:

The old Chinese saying, “Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day. Teach a person to fish and you feed them for life” perfectly fits the situation. Teaching SEO concepts to other teams is an excellent way to enable SEO. Here are some proven ways to do so

– Organize SEO workshops
– Host lunches to promote knowledge sharing
– Set-Up Recurring Meetings during Office Hours
– Create an Open Channel to share SEO articles, tips, case studies, and more.

In Conclusion

In light of overwhelming priorities, finding the time for SEO enablement can be tough. That said, SEO enablement is critical to ensuring that SEO gains the right buy-in and value. So, you shouldn’t just aim to give insights to stakeholders. Rather, give them a clear picture of the steps you would take to meet your goals. Also, make them learn how they can resolve issues on their own if they face any in the future.

The time invested today in SEO enablement will pay off in the long run by allowing you to focus on most important projects while generating a system of SEO proponents, who readily support the organic channel.