My wife and I got in a bit of a tiff the other day, and strangely enough a blog post came of it. Not a blog post about the tiff itself, but from something we discussed. At the end of our discussion I got to thinking about some of the things she said and realized how much what she was saying about babies is similar to SEO clients.

As babies we are unable to truly communicate what it is we are feeling; instead we cry or fuss because we are unable to tell our parents if something hurts or if we’re uncomfortable. As parents we often forget this about our kids and instead feel overwhelmed and get frustrated with them. We don’t think about the fact that our babies don’t fully understand or comprehend what’s going on and have no real way of telling us exactly what they need or what it is that is bothering them. This inability to fully understand one another and quickly resolve the situation often leads to frustration or anger from us as parents, which in the end only makes the situation worse.

Much like babies, our SEO clients often don’t speak our language and know how to communicate their frustrations or what it is they are experiencing to us. They sign up for our services in hopes of better rankings, which in their eyes in most cases, means number one. We as SEO’s understand that good SEO and better rankings take time, but they feel for their money they should receive nearly instant gratification. Like the babies they often cry, and fuss, and throw tantrums and in the end as their SEO expert we feel overwhelmed or frustrated with them. Again like the babies our frustrations can make the situation worse and often anger or upset the client even more.

Most businesses we work for are like babies and new to this world; the world of SEO and the internet that is. They don’t understand it, it’s big and overwhelming and outside of their comfort zone. In addition to our services, which in most cases they still don’t fully understand, they have “SEO experts” calling them, e-mailing them, and even speaking to them in person tossing terms at them like SERPs, PageRank, meta tags or bounce rate and often telling them their current search marketing efforts are wrong or inadequate.

In most situations they don’t grasp much of what is said to them and are left feeling confused and uncomfortable about their investment with us as their SEO, and because of this have trouble coming back to us as their expert and properly communicating what they are feeling or what they need.

As search marketing professionals we sometimes need to take a step back and remember this about our clients. The next time a client calls you and is flustered because they don’t feel you are giving them the results they are paying for think of them as babies. Keep a level head and try your best to comfort them like a parent would a child. They’re confused, uncomfortable, and expect you to be the one to make sure they DON’T feel this way. After all, you are their expert. By keeping a level head and making sure they understand where you are at in your search marketing efforts you’ll continue to establish yourself as their expert and hopefully show them that you are in fact their to take care of their needs.

We’ve all had a client or two that is like this, who is constantly on the verge of breakdown because they just don’t get it. How do you deal with these kinds of clients and do you find your tactic betters your client relationship?