Building a Bulletproof SEO Agency

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In 2024, the global marketing agency count surged to over 433,000, up 2.6% from 2023.
Emerging markets and rising digital needs fuelled this growth.

The U.S. alone has over 41,000 agencies, reflecting steady growth. However, challenges like economic uncertainty and AI are reshaping operations and client acquisition.

This is why we bring industry leaders onto the “Diary of an SEO” podcast, to explore agency hacks and insights.

We were eager to welcome Ryan Stewart, the Managing Partner of Blueprint Training, Ryan Stewart Consultancy, and Webris.

“The Blueprint Training” helps SEO agencies scale to $100k/month. They use their Sprint Methodology. With over 7 years of experience, they have helped many SEO agencies grow.

Ryan’s consultancy helps clients with customer acquisition. This gives him insights into the latest trends in SEO agencies and their place in the economy.

We were grateful to have Ryan on the Diary of an SEO podcast.

We discussed the current health of SEO agencies, and what owners can do to grow their agencies sustainably.

SEO Agencies Staying Afloat

We presented Ryan with rumours whereby 25% of agencies may close in 2024. This is due to many external factors, like the economy and post-covid effects.

Ryan offered that many factors could cause the a weaker SEO agency to fail. He stated it wouldn’t be the market, but their offering and business approach.

Ryan adds:

‘Most SEOs are selling a service when they should be selling an outcome. In a book I just published, The Blueprint Training, the first chapter is about the history of agencies and consultancies. It covers how long they’ve been around and why. It’s a great model for the future as well.’

“If you’re solving a problem that needs to be solved, there will always be a need for your SEO agency.” 

A Sharp Mindset for Growth

Ryan sees a big problem with SEOs. The point of SEO is now blurred. It’s gone from marketing and growth to just a professional service.

Ryan adds:

“I believe the SEO agency market will be fine. But, cycles will always purge the weakest businesses.

Bad businesses will fail, no matter what industry.

Clients don’t care about keyword research, etc. they care about money. SEOs need to look at the strategy in this approach.”

In Ryan’s latest book, the ‘market offer fit’ is explored, where you take a product to solve a specific problem the market faces. ‘Agencies don’t do that’, Ryan adds, mentioning that the problem is that not everyone needs SEO.

“You need to strategise to meet the needs of your market. Try to focus on niching, and then you know who your target client is, what they care about and what they need.” 

Ryan advises building your company to be the best service in that market.

Search markets are still the top lead source for many niches. Once you know that niche, you can strategize pay-per-clicks, etc. and focus on them.

“Our agency’s successes come from doing what other SEO agencies in that niche aren’t. They’re always pitched against agencies that churn out unwanted content.”

Breaking it down to one strong angle, Ryan advises:

  • Focus on local SEO, each phone call can be worth $2000 each to their niche (law firms, for instance). That’s the strategy to identify what they are doing within search.
    They don’t do search. They do lead generation for law firms. So, things like SGE and ChatGPT can take off. But, the agency will be fine. Search is just one of many ways to generate leads.

Ryan ends by returning to his initial point on agencies hit by the market downturn:

“I agree that agencies are at risk. I don’t agree with the fear tactic. But, I do agree that some agencies stopped evolving years ago. They’re trying to jam a square peg in a round hole, and are getting bad results.””

Ryan’s Recommendations 

  1. Return to the essence of marketing:If you hire someone to market your business, what do you expect?
    More leads and profit.

    If you want to have success, you need to go back to the core of what marketing is.
    It’s not engagement, content, etc.It’s an outcome in terms of results.
    You need to sell against a projected outcome.

    When you change your entire mindset, what the northstar of your business should be, it changes everything.

  2. Position your business as an outcome:Is your service doing what’s best for our clients?

    Is it putting them in a position to meet the goal that we’re setting for them, and that they’re coming to us for?

    You need to be able to massage the needs of the client to what your business offers and deliver them (market position is so important).

  3. On the topic of market positioning, choose a strong, intentional niche:Ryan chose law because it had such high competition.He also added looking into market funnels–for instance, no one Googles a gym. It’s not a gym’s main way to get clients. They market through ads, etc. But, law firms get many clients through Google.

    People search for things like “I need a divorce lawyer.”
    That’s worth $25k.
    These searches are a lot of money and can result in a lot of clients.

    Other great niches to explore are:
    – Roofers
    – HVAC
    – Male plastic surgery
    – Hair replacements

    Also, any on-trend, taboo, Google-able topics.

    With high-ticket stuff, you can just hit one goal per quarter.

    Your retainer is good for a lifetime.
    Low-ticket stuff will require much more content per client.

    Eg. Ecommerce must consider the customer’s journey. They may have a few tabs open on similar products from various sites and be comparing them.

Targeting the Unaware Client Base

This explores the customer’s buying journey through 5 stages of awareness.

The bottom funnel is most aware and ready to buy.

They want SEO services but are talking to a few agencies.

Stage 4 is the unaware stage–where they have a problem that they are unaware of. The ‘aware’ category is a wide funnel.

SEO targets

Once someone knows they need content or SEO, it’s a race. It’s too competitive for the SEO agencies that are pitching. The sweet spot is catching a client in stage 4.

One Key Takeaway

Ryan offers one last actionable tip to help your SEO agency grow: which is to simplify.

“When you flush that through the business, it makes things better.

If you’re making $25k or less a month, really hone down on this.

Focus on a single type of client that needs what you do, in a single type of acquisition.

Make an offer that delivers on that promise.
Then, systematise and productise it.

Our business, in essence, is a notion document. It delivers on our promise, which will make our clients a lot of money.

Also, find one lead or traffic source to focus on. Podcasts, LinkedIn, etc. For our agency, we made a video, and that’s how we do it.

And lastly, productise the sales process–you need to send someone a proposal the same day. You need to keep their interest. Doing this will help that process out.”

If you’re looking to follow Ryan for more tips and industry insights, you can find him on Linkedin.

Want to hear our full webinar with Ryan?

Who would you like to see next on the Diary of an SEO?

Let us know in the comments below.

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