I really worry about having standard one-size-fits-all “SEO Packs” for clients – because Search Engine Optimization is not a product, it’s a competition and the results you get depend on so many factors, it’s not funny. There is no real deliverable in SEO – the result you want is to beat some other people and get to the front page of the search engines at their expense.

The best analogy I can think of is competitive running. Not every runner can come in the top ten in any competition – of the thousands who compete, there are just ten – and in fact with SEO it’s even worse, one competitor can have five of those ten spots, or all ten.

You could think of generic keywords as being the Olympics – score the gold in ‘websites’ or ‘SEO’ or ‘business advisor’ or whatever is the main generic keyword in your business. And like the Olympics, the competition is tough and it takes some real commitment to get to the top or even in the top ten.

But then there are a whole bunch of regional championships, more specific keyword phrases “SEO company in California”, “Web design, Sydney”, “How to choose the right web design company” and so on. You have far more chance of making it in these competitions – often they are dominated by last years winners who are resting on their laurels and sometimes you’ll find winners who didn’t even know they were in the race – They just stumbled onto the field and were running to get away from the stampede.

And often the more targeted keywords bring good quality traffic with a much higher proportion of buyers than generic keywords.

So having a one-size-fits-all SEO pack is like assigning the same caliber trainers and giving the same training program to olympic competitors as you are to regional ones and allowing them to expect good results. The SEO work that clients need really depends on the race they are in and the competition they are up against.

So the best thing clients can get, is a good assessment from an SEO company followed by a pay per click campaign with good adwords management by an experienced campaign manager to identify the best performing keywords for a long term investment in time.