The document outlines five key SEO benchmarks crucial for new clients, focusing on enhancing visibility and traffic. It emphasizes the importance of crawlability, on-page factors, link value, link diversity, and deep links, addressing common issues associated with each benchmark. These benchmarks serve as a guide for setting client goals and demonstrating the value of SEO services.

1. THE 5 MOST
IMPORTANT
BENCHMARKS
FOR A NEW SEO CLIENT
Nicolette V. Beard, Raven

2. Welcome!
 Business Owner
 Editor / Publisher
 SEO Consultant
 Ghost Blogger
 Online Marketing Strategist
@RavenNickiB

3. Reach-Based Benchmarks
Reach represents SEO work toward increasing
visibility and traffic.
 More reach means more visitors.
 More visitors take more actions.
 More actions lead to more results.

4. Our Sample Client
 BulkCandyStore.com,
an eCommerce website
based in Florida
 Sells candy to
consumers, primarily
for special occasions
Raven’s Evaluation Tools
• Site Auditor
• Site Performance
• Backlink Explorer
• Research Central
• Competitor Manager

5. Benchmark No. 1: Crawlability
For Web Design firms:
• Is there a proper site
map?
• Are pages blocked in the
robot.txt file?
• Is the site architecture
creating duplicate or error
pages?
Search engine bots
need to find your website
and its content quickly.
Common issues:
 Blocked pages
 Redirected pages
 Load time

6. Benchmark No. 2: On-Page Factors
For Marketing Agencies
• Are your writers, SEOs
and developers working
together to created
optimized content on the
page and in the code?
Search engines require
quality pages to index.
Common issues:
 Stub pages
 Duplicate content

7. Benchmark No. 3: Link Value
For Marketing Agencies
• Is the content link
worthy?
• Is there evidence of
sharing social content
with industry peers and
customers?
• What outreach has
attracted online media
outlets?
A valuable external link is
trustworthy and relevant to
readers and search
engines.
Common issues:
 Few .EDU and .GOV links
 Few social shares

8. Benchmark No. 4: Link Diversity
For Marketing Agencies
• Does the target website
have evergreen content?
• Are there ways to add or
promote content that
would encourage linking
and sharing?
• What niche forum might
your audience participate
in that could drive traffic?
A large, diverse set of
trustworthy sites linking to
yours indicates quality.
Common issues:
 Total linking domains
 Types of linking domains
 Quality of linking domains

9. Benchmark No. 5: Deep Links
For Marketing Agencies
• Does the target website
contain a resource hub or
newsroom?
• Are there ways to add
content that would drive
deep links without
creating a huge burden
for your client?
Deep links can drive more
traffic to the most relevant
destination.
Common issues:
 Too many links to home page
 Too few links to key hub pages

10. Goals and Results
These benchmarks help
you set goals that clients
can understand and you
can reach.
 Report milestones
 Remind clients why your
services are valuable
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