How to get SEO clients

"It looks like every other SEO agency's website on the planet." Brian Dean, writing on Backlinko about a perfectly professional SEO agency site

That's the problem you have to solve. To a busy owner, you look like the last six people who offered to get them on page one. Everything below is about being easy to tell apart and easy to trust.

Start in the right place

Get your first proof

You need one true story about one real business. Here's how to get it fast.

Tell everyone what you do. Write a list of 30 people: old bosses, old coworkers, friends who run a business, your cousin with the bakery. Ben Goodey, who works in SEO, won two clients from startups he used to work for. They already knew his work. Send something like this:

"Quick favor. I've started doing SEO for local trades, which means helping them get more calls from Google. I'm looking for one business to help at a low price, in return for sharing the results. Do you know anyone who might fit?"

Do one small job. Pick a local business, because local searches often have less competition, so you can see a result sooner. Offer to fix their Google Business Profile and one service page. Agree on two things before you start: you can share their name and numbers, and you'll count calls and quote requests from the first day.

Write it up in three lines. Where they started, what you changed, what happened and how long it took. If you did it cheap or free, say so. Nobody minds, and it saves an awkward moment later.

Fix your own site. When owners choose an SEO provider, they look at reputation, cost and how well the provider ranks on Google, according to Backlinko's 2019 survey of 1,200 business owners. You won't rank for "SEO company" in a big city. You might rank for "SEO for roofers in Ohio". In the same survey, about 8 in 10 US small businesses said knowing where their provider is based matters a lot. So put your city, your address and your face on the site.

Pick one kind of business

"SEO services for all industries" is hard to remember and hard to pass on. "I get roofers more calls from Google" is easy. A friend can hear it once and think of someone.

You can still say yes to a good client from somewhere else. This only decides where your selling hours go for the next 90 days.

Choose a group that passes these four checks:

1. One new customer pays for a month of you. Say you charge $1,000 a month. A roofer who keeps $3,000 on a job needs one extra job. A coffee shop that keeps $3 on a coffee needs more than 300 extra coffees. The roofer is the easier client to help.
2. Their customers search when they need help. People search for "emergency plumber". Nobody searches for a new favorite candle in a panic.
3. You can reach at least 100 of them. One town may not have enough, so widen the map if you need to.
4. You know something about them already. Maybe you worked in the trade, or your brother owns a shop. It gives you words that a stranger wouldn't have.

Turn happy clients into introductions

Promethean Research, a firm that studies agencies, asked 91 agency leaders to rate 34 ways of winning work by how much money each one brings in. Three came out on top: referrals from clients, more work from current clients and referrals from partners. All three start with someone who already knows you. Its other research found that clients who came through a referral stayed about twice as long as clients won through events or by contacting strangers.

Ask right after a win. Don't wait for the invoice. Send it the day the numbers look good, with your real number in it:

"You got 14 more calls from Google this month than last month. Do you know another shop owner who'd want that? A text introducing me is all it takes."

Ask people who see your kind of client every day. Fraser McCulloch, writing on the Ahrefs blog, says most of his referrals come from his accountant. He gave those clients a simple comparison of their site against a competitor's, then got on the phone. Bookkeepers, business lawyers and printers meet the same owners you want.

Talk to web designers. Google tells owners that a great time to hire an SEO is when they redesign their site or launch a new one. Designers are in the room at that exact moment. Brian Dean says a web design agency in Florida offered to send him clients for a commission, and that partnerships like it took his agency from one client to dozens. Try this:

"Hi Priya, I do SEO for roofers, and I see you build sites for trades. When a client asks you about Google, who do you send them to? If you don't have anyone, I'd like to meet. I'll send you the ones who need a new site."

Agree up front who pays what, and tell the client about any commission. Keep your hopes sensible too. In Backlinko's survey, relatively few owners found their SEO provider through a supplier like a web designer. Most came through word of mouth, Google and review sites. So ask every happy client for a Google review while you're at it.

Find owners who already spend money

When you run out of people who know you, go to people who don't. In the Promethean survey, agencies that close sales quickly rated email to strangers as highly as referrals. Selling to small companies tends to be the quick kind.

Start with owners who already pay for marketing, because they don't need to be sold on the idea. Alex Valencia, who co-owns an SEO company for law firms, looks for businesses that keep their site updated, post regularly and run ads.

Here's a quick way to build a list of 30:

• Search for the service and city on Google, the way a customer would. Note who sits low on page one and on page two. They're close.
• Put each name or website into Google's free Ads Transparency Center. It shows the ads a business is running through Google. If they're paying for ads, they already have a marketing budget. They may also be paying for clicks they could earn for free.
• Check their site on your phone. Try the contact form. Note anything broken.

What to send an owner

Google tells business owners to be wary of SEO firms that email them out of the blue. It puts those emails in the same class as "burn fat at night" diet pills. Google says it gets them too.

So your email starts with a strike against it. The owner has already had the usual one. It says their site has 47 critical errors, and it comes from a Gmail address belonging to a leading SEO agency that can't be found on Google.

You get past this by asking for less trust. Give them one problem they can check themselves in a minute. Then they don't have to believe you. They only have to look.

If they're local, talk to them. Alex Valencia went looking for a barber once and hit a security warning on the shop's website. He mentioned it in person when he went in, and he offered to fix it for free. The owner later paid his team for more SEO work. You can do the same without the haircut. Walk down one street of shops, or pick up the phone.

Good things to point out:

• The contact form gives an error
• The site shows a security warning
• Their Google profile has the wrong hours or an old address
• They earn most from one service, and it has no page of its own
• A rival shows up for "[service] [city]" and they don't

Here's an email you can adapt:

Subject: Your quote form gave me an error

Hi Dana,

I was looking at roofers in Tulsa and tried your quote form on my phone. It gave me an error when I pressed Send, so some people may never reach you. You can test it on your own phone in a minute.

I do SEO for roofers, which is why I was looking. I noticed two other small things. Want me to send them over?

Sam Lee, Lee Roofing SEO

123 Main St, Tulsa, OK

This is a marketing email. Reply "stop" and I won't write again.

Follow up once, with something new. Then leave them alone.

Keep that last part of the email. In the US, the law on marketing email also covers email to businesses. You need an honest subject line, a real postal address, a clear note that it's marketing and an easy way to stop your emails. If you write to people in other countries, check their rules too.

Keep free audits small

Joe Davies, who has run an SEO agency for more than ten years, says 8 or 9 out of 10 companies given a free audit won't come back to you. So spend 15 minutes on one. Send one finding and a two-minute screen recording. Save the full report for people who ask.

A website audit lead magnet works differently, because the owner asks you for the check. That one is worth building once you have a site people visit.

If you need to see their Search Console, ask for read-only access and say why. Google tells owners to give that and nothing more at this stage.

Answer what owners are told to ask

Google's page for owners also lists questions to ask before they hire an SEO. Careful owners will ask them, and the rest have the same worries. Put your answers on your site and bring them to every call.

Never promise first place. Google tells owners that nobody can guarantee a #1 ranking, and to find someone else if an SEO does. A promise like that can lose you the careful owners, and those are the ones you want.

Be ready for two more moments.

"Google says I can do this myself." It does say that about small local businesses. Agree with them. "You can, and I'll send you Google's starter guide. I'm here for when you'd rather spend those hours on your business."

"We tried SEO and it didn't work." Expect this. In Backlinko's survey, only 3 in 10 owners would recommend their SEO provider to a friend. A quarter weren't sure what they were paying for. Ask "What happened with the last one?" and then stop talking. Whatever they say next is the thing you have to do differently.

Google also tells owners to look for an SEO who asks what makes the business special, who its rivals are and how customers find it. Those questions make a good start for your agency discovery call.

Find out their budget before you write anything long. In plain terms, agency lead qualification means asking what they need, when they want to start and what they can spend. Then you won't give away a day to someone who can spend $200. Fraser McCulloch's habit helps here: say a price range out loud and ask if it fits, before you write a proposal.

Make your site do its share

An owner who hears your name will look you up before they call. So your site needs one clear line about who you help, your story, a starting price and how to reach a real person. A starting price lets people rule themselves in or out.

Then there's the owner reading at 9pm who has a question your page doesn't answer. Maybe it's "have you worked with a shop like mine?" A form won't help them, so they leave. That's the moment we built Possible for, so weigh this knowing it's our own product. Possible is an AI built on real sales psychology. It asks each visitor the right question at the right moment, remembers the answers and guides them to a booking. It's free to start, and here's more on Possible for agencies. It won't replace having proof, so get that first.

Keep the clients you win

In Backlinko's survey, owners who left an SEO provider mostly blamed results and cost. About a third also blamed poor service, and you control that part completely. Every month, send a short note: what you did, what changed, what's next. Count calls and quote requests, because those are what the owner cares about. Good customer retention strategies matter a lot in SEO, because results take a while and a quiet client is often a leaving client. The client who stays also sends you the next one.

What can wait

Until you have a few paying clients, skip these:

• Writing a book or building a free tool. They're slow when you need a client this month.
• A blog about SEO news. Owners care about the phone ringing. In the Promethean survey, agency leaders said blogs and newsletters bring in little of their money.
• Ads for your own services. In Backlinko's survey, only 8% of owners found their provider through online ads. Ads cost real money while you're still learning what to say.
• A new logo. Nobody hires an SEO for the logo.

Your first 30 days

1. Week 1: Pick one kind of business. Write your list of 30 people and send the message.
2. Weeks 1 and 2: Land your small proof job. Fix the main line on your own site, and add your address and face.
3. Every weekday from week 2: Spend 45 minutes. Find five owners, check their sites and send five notes or make five calls.
4. Week 3: Message three designers and your accountant.
5. Week 4: Write up your proof, and ask that first client for a review and an introduction.

Keep a simple sheet: messages sent, replies, calls, clients. If 50 messages get no replies, change the problem you're pointing out or the kind of business you're writing to.

Questions about getting SEO clients

Go deeper on conversion tactics.