Educating the Consumer

I am a firm believer in education for education’s sake.  Learning is exciting and empowering, and educating myself on a topic allows me to ask the right questions, purchase the right product, or have interesting things to add to conversation.

Education is important for our customers as well.  I have always loved the Syms Clothing Store’s tagline  “An Educated Consumer is Our Best Customer”. How true! Educated consumers understand value, what to look for in a garment, and how those garments are priced in the retail world.

In the SEO world, that education is equally important and that is one reason that our own Rick Simmons spends time on the road making presentations.  In the SEO world, an educated consumer is also a good customer and client. Rick is very open about sharing information about the SEO process with potential customers.  The more they understand about what is involved, the more they can appreciate the differences in the firms courting their business. In addition, the firm that provides good information in a language the customer can understand has a leg up on the competition.

Education does not stop once the customer has become a client. The contract we make with our clients commits us to do our best in every way to raise the visibility of their web site.  But as with most things, this does not happen in a vacuum.  Often, the more the client is involved in the process, the better the results.

Early in the relationship, we educate our new clients about the importance of the research we do.  We explain the need to build a quality foundation for the campaign, and how our partnership will involve co-education.  We do the research but we won’t ever know their business as intimately as they do. So while we educate them about what we need, they need to educate us in the relevance of our research on their behalf.

In another example, when a newsworthy event takes place for our clients, we like to  distribute an optimized press release about it. It helps raise their visibility and is good for SEO. We depend on the client to 1. let us know about the event and 2. to provide us with ample information to create a compelling piece for distribution.  Not all clients are comfortable with the writing process or have someone on their staff who has the time and ability to do it. Dinkum provides guidelines for writing press releases to our clients so they can either try their hand at writing or know what kind of information we need to write it for them.  Once they understand the reason for an Optimized Press Release and something of the process of creating one, they are much more willing and able to do their part to get us the information we need in a timely manner.

There are many other areas that involve educating our clients or being educated by them about their business, and as I have stated before, that’s why I love this job. What are your thoughts on educating clients or being educated by them?  Let us know!

Regina

photo credits:    http://www.sxc.hu/profile/lusi http://www.sxc.hu/profile/svilen001

Regina Sillitti is Project Coordinator for Dinkum Interactive. She has worked in programming, design, business analysis and quality assurance. Her background in design and data processing give her a unique perspective on client - tech translation. You can reach her at [email protected], or find her on Twitter, @ReginaSillitti.