SEO Client Success Advocate
Propellic Career Opportunity
There is nothing more refreshing than an SEO agency that truly cares about culture, champions its values, and consistently drives home outstanding results for eCommerce clients across the USA.
We are a small team that is outwardly driven by a desire to be unequivocally transparent, knowledge-forward, and accountable for all we do – good and bad.
What is an SEO Client Success Advocate?
Client Success Advocates (CSA)s are our answer to SEO account managers. Where another agency’s SEO account manager earns a commission for increasing client spend, our Client Success Advocates are paid above-market salaries, removing financial stability from the picture, and ultimately inviting the Client Success Advocate to put the client’s success front-and-center (hence, being an “advocate” for the client’s success).
At Propellic, we know we can only retain clients when we do two things better than other agencies: we deliver results, and we make the client experience painless. SEO Client Success Advocates are responsible for two metrics that relate back to our client retention philosophy:
- Client Happiness – We send clients NPS® (Net Promoter Score) feedback forms where we ask them to rate their overall satisfaction with Propellic as an agency, only focusing on the relationship, not the results.
- Satisfaction With Results – At the same time, we’ll send clients a second NPS® feedback form to let us know, without factoring in the agency relationship, how well they feel their campaign is performing.
The Client Success Advocate, as the primary point-of-contact for clients, and the person responsible for making sure we follow through on all we promise our clients is the guardian of both of these metrics.
High-Level Responsibilities
The CSA’s core responsibilities can be described, from a high level, as follows:
- Relationships – Build & maintain relationships to deliver an exceptional client experience
- Task Management – Ensure on-time and complete delivery on commitments made by the team
- Reporting – Report on campaign progress and outcomes through video & graphic reports
- SEO – Identify SEO opportunities and develop a strategy around those opportunities
Success Metrics
The CSA is ultimately responsible (and will be held accountable) for the following metrics:
- Client Happiness Rating, on a scale of -100 to 100 (NPS®), the CSA’s clients give an average rating of 80.
- Satisfaction with results, on a scale of -100 to 100 (NPS®), the CSA’s clients give an average rating of 70.
- 95% of all monthly tasks are completed on time (Side note: our Brand Promise Guarantee outlines that, should we not deliver something on time, we will volunteer our time to a charity of our clients’ choice).
- Generate at least one review from a client on Clutch or Google My Business every month.
- Per-project profitability targets (While important, this is the least important metric on a month-by-month basis).
Daily Objectives
- Communicate with and respond to clients
- Send deliverables to clients
- Complete task list & assign tasks to team members
- Conduct video calls with clients
- Work with the team to facilitate on-time delivery
Weekly Objectives
- Keep up-to-date on SEO industry trends
- Monitor changes in SEO campaign performance
- Review content that is written by contract-based writers
- Onboard new clients
Monthly Objectives
- Comparing what we promised we would do for clients to what we actually did for clients in a given month, adjusting team member tasks to ensure we are on target for the next month, and communicating the situation to clients.
- Developing & sending client reports that were built throughout the month.
- Adjusting client strategy
- Requesting approval and sign-off from clients when necessary
Tools You’ll Use
- Project Management System – Teamwork
- Email & Document Management – GSuite/Gmail/Google Drive
- SEO – SEMRush, Ahrefs, OnCrawl, ScreamingFrog
- Reporting – Google My Business, Google Analytics, Google Search Console, CallRail, Google Data Studio, Google Tag Manager, HotJar, AgencyAnalytics
- Link Building – Pitchbox
- Content Management Systems – WordPress, Shopify, BigCommerce
Our Philosophy on Training & What You Can Expect
We feel that culture fit comes first, then motivation, then level of skill. This is because, while skill can be acquired, it is harder for one to become motivated where they once weren’t, and nearly impossible to mold one with a cultural disconnect into a culture fit.
If we are considering two candidates, one with culture fit and passion – but no skill, and a second with passion and skill – but no culture fit, we will welcome the candidate with culture fit, and provide the necessary training to bring her or him up to speed.
Employing a combination of one-on-one training and video courses we have invested in, we have the tools to teach the following skills that relate to this position:
- 6-Step SEO Audit Process (You are not responsible for the audit, but can deliver a much higher level of value to the clients if you understand them thoroughly)
- The Link Building Process (Again, not your responsibility, but ideally, something you’ll be able to understand and help oversee)
- The Content Ideation Process
- Coordinating Content Writers
- The Propellic Organic Visibility Framework™ SEO Process
You may have noticed that we don’t have training on how to build relationships. That is because, much as a result of our small size, we have not been able to pinpoint what helps develop the client-agency synergy that is so important for this position.
The Best Parts of a CSA’s Job
We believe that some of the best parts of an SEO Client Success Advocate’s job at Propellic are as follows:
- The opportunity to be a part of a full-time team that you can count on one hand means there is outstanding room for growth, as the agency grows.
- Every decision you make has the opportunity to improve the lives of a business owner by giving them more freedom to live their lives and build their organizations.
- On an ongoing basis, you get to search for personalized gifts and experiences to surprise and delight clients: from monogrammed mugs to celebrate a client’s wedding, to baseball tickets for a Client’s family, we take care of our clients.
- Most of our clients are investing over $3,000/month with the agency, which means you have more time to take care of and establish a relationship with each client.
- There is substantial room for growth into the position of Lead CSA, and Chief Operating Officer, should the agency continue to grow.
- You have the opportunity to create systems and processes that will contribute to the growth of the agency.
- You’ll also be able to contribute to the planning of our quarterly and annual retreats, if that is your cup of tea.
The Worst Parts of a CSA’s Job
It is only fair that we also talk about what makes this job difficult:
- There is a lot of weight on one’s shoulders. Clients count on you; the agency counts on you; you count on you. When things are rough, it can be hard to sleep if you truly care about delivering the best-of-the-best to our clients. We’ve all been there, and, as long as you are mindful of this, and you ask for help in one of our daily huddles, you will get it.
- As the key contact for clients, when you are out of the office, the rest of the agency can, at times, look like chickens running around headless (how’s that for some imagery, haha). When you are on vacation, there won’t be anyone to take over for you. Instead of checking out completely during your vacation, you may need to log into the project management system once or twice per day to make sure all of the tasks are being allocated to the appropriate team members.
- Since we base our retainers off of number of hours spent on projects, you will need to track your time to the project you are working on throughout the day. This is made less cumbersome by the fact that our time tracker is built into our project management system, but it can take some time to get a hang of.
- With such a small team, every action you take can greatly impact the culture of the agency. It is vital that you work to live the values of transparency, education, and accountability both at work and at home.
If you are still on-board after that, you may just have what it takes to join the Propellic family! And we’d be honored to have you –
A Propellic Team Member’s Profile
We are looking for the best of the best to join our family. That means, without question, that the following qualities are required of all incoming team members:
- Every team member must be independently motivated to conduct disciplined thought, and take disciplined action on that thought. – If you would like to learn more about what we mean when we say “Disciplined,” I encourage you to read the passage linked below, and then click on the video in the sidebar with the title “Creativity is Natural, Discipline is Not.” http://bit.ly/pcl-discipline
- Follow through. 100% of the time. – There are no excuses for dropping the ball on a commitment we made to a team member, a client, or our friends and family, for that matter. We are people who do what we say we will do. Simple.
- Live our values: Transparency, Education, and Accountability. Every day. Everywhere.
Qualification Recommendations
If you do not have one (or multiple) of these qualifications under your belt, we still encourage you to apply if you align with everything else you’ve read. As we mentioned before, a skill can be acquired, culture fit can not:
- Two or more years of managing at least 10 clients in a marketing agency setting
- One or more year(s) of experience in the SEO industry
- One or more year(s) working on improving eCommerce websites
Additionally, please let us know if you have experience with any of the tools mentioned in the section above.
We Care for Our People
Propellic was founded in 2014, hired its first Full-time team member in 2018, then the second in 2019, with a plan to add 3-4 more full-time team members in 2020. We don’t have the big budgets, nor the large group negotiating power of bigger agencies, so we make up for it in creative ways, with the understanding that our most valuable asset is having the right people in the right seats. Here are the benefits we currently offer:
- Roth & Traditional 401(k) with matching and a large selection of low-fee mutual & index funds.
- A membership at an open-format coworking space on West Anderson Lane
- Monthly planned one-on-one reviews & growth coaching
- We always look for creative ways to support our team, from paying for a team member’s driving lessons to sending NyQuil, chicken soup, and cough drops by 1-hour delivery when a team member is sick. It’s the very least we can do for the people who make our vision a reality.
More Insight: Recommended Reading
In order to make the most of your position here at Propellic, we recommend the following books that will directly influence the way you work:
- Giftology, John Ruhlin – We use the Giftology philosophy to surprise and delight clients.
- The One Thing, Keller & Papasan – We ask the following question of every team member in every morning huddle: “What is the one thing, such that by doing so, everything else will either become easier or even unnecessary?” This book will teach you how to answer that question, both for your work life, and your personal life.
- The Total Money Makeover, Dave Ramsey – While not core to the job, handling your money and chopping off your debt will remove stress from your life. Regardless of whether you end up at Propellic, this is a 5-star read that may change your life.
