on our first call with socialseo...
BJ, their VP of Enterprise Accounts, told us this:
"Last night at 10pm I was writing a blog post for one of our nutraceutical clients about the best skincare products for women in their forties."
Wait…what?
SocialSEO
Agency Case Study | Digital Marketing Agency
THE
PROBLEM
“We’ve lost money on content creation every single quarter for the last four years.”
BJ Enoch, VP of Enterprise Accounts, SocialSEO
As VP of Enterprise Accounts, BJ is the agency's lead enterprise sales guy, in-house SEO guru, and face of SocialSEO at speaking engagements across the country. And he was up late writing about skincare?
This story is even more quirky because BJ is a six-foot-six, cowboy-boots-wearing, pickup-truck-driving native of rural Colorado.
For BJ, content creation had become a necessary evil—integral to the SEO process—but no other SEO shops wanted to do it. Still, his belief that content creation was a critical driver of results for clients kept the agency creating content, even as a loss leader.
THE
SOLUTION
“I’m in love with your service. I added another topic the other day and got a post back in less than 10 hours that felt like the writer read my mind.”
BJ ENOCH, VP of Enterprise Accounts
When they met us, SocialSEO's content writing was being done by:
- Two FT in-house writers
- An ever-changing network of individual freelancers
Subject-matter expertise was hard to come by.
Which created scenarios like this:
“We needed an article about Section 105 of the IRS tax code as it applies to Health Reimbursement Arrangements. I don’t want to learn about this—it sounds really boring. And I don’t want to pay one of my in-house writers to research it.”
BJ ENOCH, VP of Enterprise Accounts, SocialSEO
BJ had tried outsourced content writing before, and told us:
“I still have PTSD from using other content writing services.”
So while he was skeptical of Verblio, BJ signed up one of SocialSEO's smaller clients as a test.
The next day he called to say he'd gotten a submission back, and the piece was really good.
But the writer hadn’t quite followed directions and so it wasn’t the content BJ needed. We told him to just hang on for a few days and he’d likely get another submission from a different writer.
The next day after that, we received the following email...
We obviously love comments like this, but it’s also a good lesson
You shouldn’t expect every submission you get from a Verblio writer to be perfect. But through the process of:
Only accepting posts you like
Declining those you don’t
Leaving feedback
Our writers will learn what you, and your clients, are looking for.
Another key benefit for SocialSEO is speed. Like most agencies, their clients want things fast, and deadlines aren’t always reasonable. A few weeks later, BJ said this:
“I’m in love with your service. I added another topic the other day and got a post back in less than 10 hours that felt like the writer read my mind.”
THE
IMPACT
“When we’re fully ramped up, I expect to use Verblio to create between 60 and 70 percent of all of our content.”
BJ ENOCH, VP of Enterprise Accounts, SocialSEO
Verblio now creates content for over 25 of SocialSEO clients, and their spend with us is in the thousands of dollars per month range. SocialSEO also uses Verblio to create additional content types, including:
Product descriptions
Website content
Press releases
Says BJ, "When we’re fully ramped up, I expect to use Verblio to create between 60 and 70 percent of all of our content."
With Verblio, SocialSEO is achieving two goals simultaneously:
Increasing the quality of their content with multiple subject-matter-expert writers
Changing their content operations from a loss-leader to a profit center
Which means BJ has to do less of this:
“This week I’m finishing up a 2,500-word article on the major types of tea. And I don’t even like tea.”
And this:
“I’ve written over 250 pieces of content about proctology.”
And more of his first love: digging deep with his suite of SEO tools and leading technical SEO projects for SocialSEO‘s enterprise clients. And being a cowboy.
Ready to write less about proctology?
About SocialSEO
AGENCY Case Study, Digital Marketing Agency
SocialSEO is a 100+ person, full-service digital marketing agency based in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with a presence in Denver and Phoenix.