We're Bringing an International Search Flavor to Philly!
Why did we launch?
The catalyst for launching International SEO is twofold. First, we recently turned an existing client away for an international opportunity (we don't believe in offering services where we don't have DEEP expertise) because we didn't have the right person. In the same way that SEER didn't launch PPC or Analytics until we had the right PEOPLE, we waited, and waited, and waited. My desire to be the BEST trumps my desire to be the most PROFITABLE by a mile. After seeing that client get 200 content spam links in 30 days from some other agency, I was furious that we had turned this down and allowed them to work with a sub-par agency - and decided there was only one person I would call to help me with this... Secondly, our clients needed us to. This year alone SEER consultants have helped clients in Brazil, Canada, Argentina, South Africa, England, Germany, France, and India. We wanted to have DEEP expertise to service them better and also an ability to work on their timeline. Our US-based clients both big and small have seen international expansion of their business as a KEY to their success. Their businesses have expanded in countries spanning the globe, yet their SEO had not, we are here to help our clients who are expanding to be able to take the work we've done improving search visibility in the US and help them to realize those gains in across the Globe.
Who is that person? ... Well it started with Bulls
Last last summer while I was in Pamplona for Running of the Bulls I stopped in Madrid and met someone whom I had been following on twitter for a while, and thought wow, this person has a passion for SEO, and seems to just be an amazing person. We had cervesas in Madrid with a bunch of other SEOs in Madrid (they dot some talent there for sure!) she was the kind of person other people wanted to be around you could tell, so we constantly kept in touch more and more, when i had architectural issues, international issues, Spanish issues, I hit her up for help, and then she presented at Mozcon, showing those of us in the US who she was and what she was about, it was a wake up call for me. This was the right person. Her presentation on SEO project management - which is an area SEER has always valued, was phenomenal. I have always liked to surround myself with people who manage projects well and can help me get better at developing processes to increase on time, excellent service delivery to our clients - I think she's gonna whip me into shape.
I saw her willingness to help people in the community, her ability to stay focused an on point, and her delivering results and thought, wow, this person BLEEDS what SEER is all about. Oh It also helps that she speaks 4 languages fluently and has been developing strategies on international SEO for some time now. Many of you probably know her already... Aleyda Solis. Below you can see an image from her presenting on mobile SEO.
Added Benefits
The world is getting more mobile, that is not news, but the question is how much DEEP knowledge do SEO's have on the minor nuances of Mobile SEO? Well again Aleyda's been speaking, and writing on this as well. Her approach on how to do mobile right is refreshing, you can see her post from a few weeks ago in .net magazine. This gives us yet another area where we can help our current clients retain the value of our SEO campaigns as their customers move to mobile phones to engage with them. Her leadership and skills in large site technical SEO and taking that to an international audience is going to be a HUGE value add for SEER's growing technical SEO team as well, combined with a few recent hires that speak fluent Korean, Portuguese, etc I think SEER's starting to look more and more international everyday, even from Philly.
What about not having remote workers / culture
Its True, I never wanted remote workers, but more than that I always wanted to service our clients well and kick a lot of butt for them, so I guess you could say I am starting to break a rule. This is the beauty of blogging your heart and soul out, looking back at myself being a hypocrite just a year or two later. But I realized that in this instance to get the BEST person for SEER and for our clients, I had to change course. We have made several investments to keep Aleyda as one of the team. Primarily we moved to an all laptop environment - ouch 50+ laptops at once :) But we wanted everyone to be mobile and have webcams so we can skype/G+ not just IM/email. Keeping the personal connection which makes us, us. And we've budgeted for 4 trips to Philly to keep Aleyda in the know with SEER and meeting her colleagues. And maybe we can get (oh I mean FORCE) Crystal to go back to Madrid to pick Aleyda up and go take a vacation (oh I mean strategize) on SEER's PPC expansion over drinks in Barcelona :)
Sorry friends, we are not in the UK, yet...
We build our teams around people, and when we found Aleyda we knew she was the right match to represent SEER to our clients in the US, Europe, Asia, and Beyond, She represents the "SEER Way" in the industry (she speaks more than I do and is very willing to help anyone), and be involved in helping others in the community. So regardless of where she was, we knew she was the right match, and you'll see that too.
So there you have it, Aleyda, get on a plane, we'll see you on Monday at the searchchurch!!
