How to avoid clashes with other silos in your company when their efforts get in the way of SEO.

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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Winning In-House SEO Battles
When Friendly Fire Strikes
Ash Nallawalla
Fractional SEO, CRM911 Digital
Author of “Accidental SEO Manager”
AI images by
Microsoft Image
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
• SEO consultant at CRM911.com
• Moderator at Webmasterworld forums
• Mostly in enterprise SEO roles, notably
Carsales.com.au, Suncorp Insurance
Group, NAB, ANZ Bank, UBank, Optus
and Yellow Pages; also
Macromedia/Adobe, Royal Australian
Air Force etc
• International SEO
• Ham radio operator
• Book author (Amazon)
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
WHAT IS FRIENDLY FIRE?
Introduction
ALMOST
COMPLETED
AVAILABLE

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@ashnallawalla
With Friends Like These…
• Medium-to-large enterprises
usually operate in silos and
each silo tries to meet the
assigned targets.
• Sometimes, that might
thwart SEO efforts to meet
the same assigned targets.
• Why does this happen?
• Has it happened to you?
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5. #pubcon
https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Why Do Silos Clash?
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SEO Team Silo
Causes of tensions Goals not linked Roles not understood
Shared KPIs/OKRs Often there is no overlap
Communicate! Always a great idea

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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Our Frenemies
• The Doubters
• Recruiters
• Finance
• Marketing
• Legal
• Product Owners
• User Experience
• IT/Engineering
• Content Teams
• Analytics
• And more…
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Doubters
• Some execs are sceptical about
SEO and will resist allocating a
budget for it. This is usually in
the startup phase, but it can
happen for later SEO requests.
• A startup founder builds the
website personally, or asks a
family member to do so.
• Solution: None, if there is no
SEO hired to help. Explain the
SEO benefits clearly.
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Recruiters
• Recruiters are (IMHO) the
biggest threat to SEO.
• They can eliminate the best
candidate for a vacancy for a
non-SEO reason, e.g. age, or
other illegal but unprovable bias.
• My solution was to let me (the
SEO Manager) to see all the
applications (100s) and
interview five or six, and arrive
at a short list of three. Then I
included a recruiter in the final
interview. Be sure to follow all
corporate protocols.
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9. #pubcon
https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Finance
• Finance does not get
involved with the daily SEO
tasks, but can unexpectedly
cut budget, e.g. reduce
headcount, reduce tool
subscriptions, etc.
• Regular communication
about the importance of
SEO will help.
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Marketing
• (In Australia, SEO is usually not a
part of Marketing)
• In one company, Marketing was very
possessive of all content on the
website and even wanted to approve
meta tags. E.g. We cannot use the
word “cheap” because we are a
premium brand and it goes against
our brand tone and voice.
• The agreed solution in such cases
was to use such language in the Title
tag or Meta Description.
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Legal
• Legal might object to certain
language on the page, e.g.
superlatives that cannot be
substantiated, e.g. “Best.”
• Solution: If a neutral person, a
reviewer, for example, declares our
product the best in class, it might
sway Legal into allowing such a
descriptor. Industry awards are
another example.
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12. #pubcon
https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Product Owners
• The larger the company, the
greater is the possibility that the
product owners are not in your
building or city.
• The owners might disagree with
suggested changes to the page
content.
• Explain the SEO benefit of the
proposed changes. Use
corporate metrics, such as KPIs,
OKRs to show how the product
owners will benefit.
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13. #pubcon
https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
User Experience
• UX can reject SEO input,
e.g. navigation, accessibility
and use vague claims – “our
customers prefer this.”
• Present SEO case and
escalate if necessary.
• Request input into user
surveys.
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14. #pubcon
https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
IT/Engineering
• Conflicts with SEO can occur:
– Firewalls that block SEO crawlers or even search engines!
– Security policies – blocked sites, locked down PCs, inability
to add browsers or add extensions, blocked network
protocols, e.g. traceroute, ping etc
• Solution is communication:
– Explain need
– Ask for exceptions to policy
• If all fails, get an unofficial laptop that is outside the
network and has its own network connection.
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15. #pubcon
https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Content Teams
• If the content writing team is not integrated with the
SEO team, they might be sensitive to SEO input.
• If the CMS team is separate, factor them into the
workflow.
• Agree on a content brief template and a workflow that
goes through the SEO team, e.g.
– Primary query
– Additional search terms (provide a Keyword Register)
– Linking suggestions (internal and external)
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Analytics
• Audit tracking tags
regularly. Many were
placed out of curiosity and
nobody is using that
information now.
• Often nobody remembers
who asked for the tracking.
• Suggest the unclaimed
tags be removed.
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17. #pubcon
https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Ideal Solution
• Promote the SEO manager to the C-suite.
• Title such as “Chief Web Officer”, “Chief Webmaster”
or “Website Success Officer.
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https://accidentalseomanager.com
@ashnallawalla
Thank You!
• Please connect via LinkedIn and mention Pubcon.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashnallawalla/
• Read my book/s.
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