How I get quality SEO clients with cold email 2024
Summary
TLDRIn this video, Sergio, founder of Axel Leads, explains how his agency helps SEO clients book qualified sales meetings through outbound strategies. He discusses the challenges of using SEO for lead generation, such as market saturation, commoditized offers, and low urgency. Sergio highlights the importance of differentiating your offer by creating unique value, using case studies, and offering guarantees. He also shares how custom videos showcasing specific SEO opportunities can create demand, build trust, and drive revenue. By scaling this approach, agencies can fill their sales pipelines with ideal prospects.
Takeaways
- 🚀 SEO agencies face stiff competition, making it difficult to stand out by ranking through their own services.
- 🎯 Referrals can work but are unreliable for consistent lead generation; paid ads and outbound outreach are better options.
- 📧 Outbound email marketing for SEO faces challenges: it's a saturated market, SEO is seen as a commodity, and the audience is already aware of SEO's benefits.
- 🔑 SEO agencies often struggle because their offer gets lost in the noise or lacks urgency for prospects.
- 💡 Two main approaches for outbound: either hope prospects are currently looking for SEO or create demand where it doesn’t exist.
- 👥 Customizing outreach by focusing on specific outcomes (e.g., revenue, brand awareness) relevant to the prospect increases engagement.
- 🎥 Offering a lead magnet, like a custom video audit, adds value and helps differentiate from competitors.
- 🏆 Case studies, testimonials, and industry-specific success stories can build trust and authority with potential clients.
- 💼 Offering a guarantee can mitigate risk for skeptical prospects, potentially increasing trust and conversions.
- 📊 SEO should be framed as a revenue-driving solution rather than just a technical service, making it more compelling for decision-makers.
Q & A
What is the main objective of the video?
-The main objective of the video is to explain how the speaker helps SEO clients book qualified sales meetings and the strategies used to achieve this, particularly using outbound lead generation.
Why is it difficult for SEO agencies to generate leads using their own SEO services?
-It's difficult because SEO agencies are competing against the top agencies globally, making it hard to outrank established players with more resources. This pushes smaller agencies toward referrals, paid ads, or outbound strategies.
What are the three main challenges in pitching SEO via cold email?
-The three challenges are: 1) SEO is a saturated offer, 2) SEO is a commoditized offer, and 3) the market is already aware of SEO services, making it harder to stand out.
What are the two major problems that result from these challenges?
-The two problems are: 1) Getting lost in the noise, as many companies are pitching SEO, and 2) SEO is seen as a low urgency offer because it's considered a 'nice-to-have' rather than a 'must-have' solution for businesses.
What are the two approaches SEO agencies can take when doing cold outreach?
-The two approaches are: 1) Reaching out to people who are already open to SEO services and hoping to catch their interest, or 2) Creating demand where it didn’t previously exist by educating potential clients and offering value.
How can SEO agencies create demand that didn’t already exist?
-Agencies can create demand by framing SEO as a solution to business problems like increasing revenue, improving brand awareness, and reducing the cost of lead acquisition. By doing this, they educate potential clients and position SEO as a strategic business tool.
What role does offering a guarantee play in cold outreach for SEO services?
-Offering a guarantee helps build trust with potential clients, especially those who have been burned by SEO in the past. It reduces their perceived risk and increases the likelihood of them considering the service.
How does targeting specific roles within a company improve the effectiveness of cold outreach?
-By targeting specific roles, such as a VP of Sales or Head of Brand Marketing, and framing the offer in terms of the KPIs they care about (e.g., more inbound leads, increased brand awareness), the agency can make the outreach more relevant and appealing to the recipient.
What is the importance of using lead magnets in cold email outreach?
-Lead magnets, such as a custom video audit, are important because they provide value upfront, demonstrating how SEO can help the prospect. This engages the prospect, builds trust, and encourages them to consider the services being offered.
Why is scalability important when conducting cold email outreach?
-Scalability is important because not every prospect will have the budget, interest, or availability to respond. Sending personalized outreach at scale (to hundreds or thousands of prospects daily) increases the chances of filling the sales pipeline with qualified leads.
Outlines
🚀 Introduction to Qualified SEO Sales Meetings
In this introduction, Sergio, the founder of Axel Leads, explains how his company helps SEO clients fill their calendars with qualified sales meetings. He highlights their recent success of scheduling 14 calls for an SEO client in one month. Sergio acknowledges that using one's own SEO services can be challenging, especially for smaller agencies competing against larger ones. He emphasizes the importance of alternatives like outbound marketing, which he personally uses, and sets the stage for the video by explaining that it will cover strategies to overcome common SEO lead generation challenges.
📈 Key Challenges in SEO Lead Generation via Cold Email
Sergio outlines the three main challenges of pitching SEO services through cold email: saturation, commoditization, and market awareness. The SEO market is crowded, with many agencies offering similar services like free audits and full-service SEO packages. This commoditization makes it difficult to stand out, and prospects often choose the lowest-priced option. Additionally, SEO is not a new concept, so many recipients are already familiar with it, making it harder to capture attention and urgency. Sergio frames these as significant barriers that need creative approaches to overcome.
💡 Two Approaches to Overcoming SEO Sales Challenges
Sergio introduces two main approaches for dealing with SEO sales challenges. The first is reaching out to prospects who are already open to SEO services, though this is a limited pool. The second approach involves creating demand where it didn’t exist by providing value and education, positioning yourself as a trusted advisor. He emphasizes that generating demand requires more effort but can be highly effective in building a unique position in the market. The goal is to make prospects realize the value of SEO, even if they weren’t initially interested.
🧠 Framing Your SEO Pitch to Stand Out
Sergio discusses how to craft an SEO pitch that resonates with potential clients. He explores scenarios where prospects may already have SEO covered or are actively seeking SEO services, stressing the importance of differentiating from competitors. He suggests leveraging case studies, testimonials, and authority by referencing past success with similar clients or well-known companies. For prospects who have tried SEO before but didn’t see results, he recommends offering guarantees to build trust, while ensuring that your service can deliver consistent outcomes.
🔄 Addressing Prospects’ Skepticism and Offering Guarantees
In this section, Sergio focuses on prospects who have been burned by SEO in the past and are now skeptical. He advises offering a results-backed guarantee to ease their concerns, explaining that guarantees provide peace of mind and reassurance without a high risk of refund requests, as long as the service is solid. This strategy aims to reverse the risk for prospects, making them more willing to engage with an SEO agency. He reiterates that prospects will only trust SEO again if they are convinced of its potential through credible, proven results.
🔍 Understanding the Desired Outcomes of SEO
Sergio elaborates on why SEO is important by reframing it as a solution for specific business outcomes like increased revenue, brand awareness, and lower lead acquisition costs. He provides an example of targeting a VP of Sales by explaining how SEO can drive more inbound leads, which are easier to close than outbound leads. He also emphasizes the importance of tailoring the message to the recipient’s role within a company, whether it's sales, marketing, or another department. This personalized approach can turn a cold pitch into a more compelling offer.
🎯 The Power of Custom Videos and Lead Magnets
Sergio introduces the idea of using personalized lead magnets, particularly custom videos, to capture prospects’ attention. He explains how these videos can showcase specific SEO opportunities for the prospect’s website, demonstrating how targeted keywords can increase traffic and lead to higher revenue. By providing data on search volume, keyword difficulty, and potential results, these videos help prospects understand how SEO can directly impact their business. This strategy builds trust by providing valuable insights before the prospect has even engaged with the company.
📊 Scaling SEO Outreach for Maximum Impact
In the conclusion, Sergio stresses the importance of scaling these personalized outreach efforts to maximize results. He recommends sending hundreds or thousands of custom videos and ensuring they land in the recipient's primary inbox to avoid being marked as spam. By doing this at scale while maintaining personalization and delivering value, Sergio assures that sales pipelines will remain full of qualified prospects. He closes by highlighting that even with the right approach, persistence and volume are key to achieving consistent results in SEO lead generation.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Qualified Sales Meetings
💡SEO Saturation
💡Cold Email
💡Commoditized Offer
💡Demand Creation
💡Lead Magnet
💡Case Studies
💡Risk Reversal
💡Inbound Leads
💡Personalization
Highlights
Helping SEO clients secure qualified sales meetings.
Put 14 calls into the calendar of an SEO client in one month.
SEO agencies face tough competition when using their own SEO for lead generation.
Referrals are valuable but unreliable for consistent lead generation.
Outbound email is a viable strategy when paid ads are not affordable or effective.
Challenges of cold pitching SEO services: saturated, commoditized offer, and market awareness.
SEO is often perceived as a low-urgency, 'nice-to-have' service.
Cold email strategy should either capitalize on existing demand or create new demand.
Use relevant case studies and testimonials to build authority and trust.
Offering guarantees can help overcome skepticism, especially for clients who’ve had poor experiences with SEO.
Focus on outcomes that matter to the prospect’s role, such as increased inbound leads for VPs of Sales.
Reframe SEO as a revenue-driving solution rather than a generic service.
Use custom videos as lead magnets, showcasing specific SEO opportunities for prospects.
Scale outreach by reaching hundreds or thousands of prospects daily while ensuring proper inbox delivery.
Personalization and consistency in outreach help build excitement and trust in your SEO solution.
Transcripts
hey I'm Sergio uh the founder at Axel
leads and I just wanted to make a quick
video going over what I do to help SEO
clients uh put sales meetings into their
calendar not just any kind of sales
meetings but qualified sales meetings uh
meaning basically the kind of people or
prospects that our clients want to work
with this last month we put 14 calls
into the calendar of just one of our SEO
clients um and you know this is
basically what I'm going to be going
over in this video is exactly what we
did for them and what we do for all of
our SEO clients so let me get right into
that now let's be honest um if you are
going to generate leads for yourself as
an SEO agency the best possible way of
doing this is by using your own SEO
services for your own you know business
the problem with this is that in the
particular case of doing SEO for an SEO
agency you are competing with literally
the people in the entire world at this
one particular practice so even if you
are you know an All-Star at this if you
don't have the resources of someone like
a web FM or like an ignite visibility or
you know one of these huge SEO agencies
out there then you're probably not going
to be able to you know outrank them um
so then you're kind of stuck with
referrals which of course referrals can
be amazing but they are unreliable so
that leaves us with either using paid
ads which which again if you don't have
the resources of other agencies out
there then you're just kind of sending
money out into the void or um outbound
and that's what I use um and that's what
of course if you are watching this video
you might have already considered this
maybe you've already done this yourself
or attempted it maybe you've worked with
another agency in the past and you're
probably watching this because you
didn't get the results that you were
looking for and there are a few reasons
why that may not have happened so I'm
going to be getting into exactly what I
do to get around those reasons um
specifically talking about the
challenges when it comes to pitching SEO
using cold email and trying to generate
leads using cold email um the problems
that those challenges create and what
all the solutions there are out there
that you can use to attack these
specific problems the the first
challenge is that SEO is a saturated
offer you know a lot of people are
pitching SEO Services there's not much
more to it that's the first challenge
the Second Challenge is that this is
also a commoditized offer so what I mean
by that is that you can package your SEO
Services however you want but at the end
of the day just for my experience
everybody is offering some sort of free
audit you know up front and also you
know they all kind of label themselves
as a full service SEO you know to
whatever degree that they mean that is
one is another thing but everybody
offers a free audit and they offer full
service holistic approach SEO so that
means that when whenever you are
pitching this believing that you are
offering something of unique value while
you may understand that this is really
valuable and you are putting a ton of
work into getting them results they are
see seeing this pitch over and over
again so they are commoditizing your
offer meaning that you are just in a
position now where if somebody is
interested in SEO Services then um
they're going to just go with whoever is
pitching them the lowest price because
you know it all looks the same to them
and the third challenge that is specific
to pitching SEO with email is that the
market is already aware right and what I
mean by that is that you aren't pitching
anything that anybody hasn't heard of
unless it's like in the local space but
you know other than that you are
pitching SEO Services which is something
that everybody's already heard of it's
on everybody's radar they've either
tried it they've considered it they
decided it wasn't for them whatever it
is but it makes it more difficult to opt
in for an offer that you are already
very aware of what the benefits are for
that so those are the three unique
challenges trying to pitch SEO using
cold email it's a saturated offer it's a
commoditized offer and the market is
already aware of what you're pitching so
these three challenges create two
problems that make your offer
uncompelling and the first problem is
that you get lost in the noise so
basically since people are getting
pitched this really often then it's
really likely that you're not going to
get results or good results from your
Outreach um because either people are
uninterested in your offer in the first
place or they are interested but if they
are interested then they probably
already said yes to the a offer that
came in you know a couple days but years
so that's one problem the other problem
is that it's a low urgency offer so
basically with SEO it's a nice to have
it's a vitamin solution it's not a
painkiller solution CEOs business people
are putting out fires every single day
and that's where their focus is with
their business and SEO almost never puts
out a fire right and if it does put out
a fire then they are going on Google and
searching for a solution there anyway or
they're asking for a friend and that's
how they're you know solving this
problem they're not necessarily waiting
for a stranger to send them an email
okay so now that puts us in a position
of you have really having two different
approaches that you can take one of the
approaches is to reach out to people and
just really hope that they happen to be
open to SEO services and don't get me
wrong that actually does happen that's
how we get some of our leads but it's
obviously not a great majority of our
leads because of everything I just
mentioned uh before this but the second
option that you have is to create demand
that didn't already exist this is a lot
more work but it does put you in a
unique position to be like in an blue
ocean where your prospects become more
informed they are more bought into the
idea of SEO and they are grateful to you
for providing um you know additional
value and I'll get into what I mean by
that in a second so now that we have you
know full context of the challenges and
the problems that are involved with
trying to generate leads using cold
outbound for SEO Services then to think
about the solution you have to think
about it in the frame of you know okay
all of that is true so what do I have to
say to these people to opt into my
services when they ignored everybody
else before me so with that frame you
have to think about what are all the
possible scenarios you know scenario one
um they have SEO covered they have this
in-house they are paying somebody to do
this and they're getting good results in
this case they don't need you move on
another possible scenario is that they
can benefit from SEO and they're out
there looking for providers maybe
they're hiring some somebody maybe they
are entertaining um you know cold
outbound um emails that they're getting
in this case you still have to make sure
you figure out how to make yourself
stand out from the competition that's
out there what can you say that other
people possibly or probably cannot say
too now again just as a reminder
everybody's offering some version of a
free audit and they're all doing full
service SEO but there are still things
that you can say that are unique to you
that maybe others can't say so for
example when you're thinking about one
Prospect have you gotten results for a
similar company to that prospect that
was in a similar situation you know case
studies can really show that you have
relevant experience or maybe you've
worked with really well-known companies
especially ones that were in their
specific industry stating this can give
you Authority or do you have any
evidence that you've made other clients
really rich and really happy then
testimonials will earn their trust you
have to remember that whenever we're
talking about cold outbound you are a
complete stranger to these people so you
have to do whatever you can do to show
them that you have relevant Authority
and trust a third possible scenario of
where a prospect might be is that they
have maybe tried SEO in the past but
they didn't see results and they can
still benefit from SEO but they just
don't feel like that's the case anymore
and in this case of course everything I
mentioned before um is still the case
you know if if you can show them case
studies if you can show them
testimonials if you can um show them
well-known companies that they would be
familiar with that you have worked with
and provided results for then all of
those things can help make the case for
you but these are people who have been
burned in the past so they don't really
trust SEO as much anymore in this case
what you can do is offer a guarantee now
of course this requires you to be sure
that you can deliver consistent results
and of course the immediate thought
whenever somebody says you know you
should offer a guarantee
is that like um you're going to have to
end up paying all these refunds and like
you know there's going to be a big
problem on the other end but you know if
you don't think about the negatives but
only think about the positives in that
you in this way you are able to let
somebody know that they have no risk in
working with you but you can deliver
them the results that you're talking
about then this reframes everything and
it works so much more in your favor than
against you I mean there are stats out
there that you can probably look up
where it shows that like 95% of
guarantees never get you know you never
have to refund you know as long as you
actually deliver on the service so it's
not so much about the fact that you're
going to have to be refunding people
it's just more about giving them the
peace of mind that the likelihood that
you're going to be able to deliver the
results that you're saying that you're
going to deliver um is a lot higher and
and it's backed up by this risk reversal
but what I like to focus on is the
fourth possibility of where a prospect
might be and it's that SEO can benefit
them but it's not really a priority for
them at the time from my experience I've
noticed that like 80% of prospects are
in this exact situation this is where
the possibility to generate demand that
didn't already exist before is this is
where you know you have to take a step
back and think about what is SEO for you
know at the end like what is the desired
outcome of SEO you know nobody is buying
SEO because they want to feel really
good about their website coming up you
know at first whenever they look
something up on Google they're doing SEO
because maybe they want more Revenue
maybe they want more brand awareness
maybe they want to reduce the cost of
acquisition of a new lead maybe they
want more um inbound leads because
they're easier to close so you know with
that in mind let's just say you're
reaching out to the VP of sales at a
company right do you think it's possible
that the VP of sales at a company is
probably going to be really happy for
there to be a larger influx of inel
leads coming in through their website
somebody who's the the VP of cells
understands that inbound leads are so
much easier to close because
psychologically people want to work with
somebody that they chose to work with
you know with outbound it's a lot harder
because with outbound you have to
convince somebody that you are
approaching them for their best interest
but with inbound leads they are coming
to you so a VP of cells knows that
somebody who is coming to you is going
to be so much easier to close so if
we're reaching out to a VP of cell
saying hey we can increase the number of
Inbal leads that are coming into your
pipeline by targeting these specific
keywords then you know obviously a VP of
Sals they aren't necessarily the
decision maker when it comes to
marketing services or you know
Contracting marketing services or
vendors but because they see the benefit
of how it's going to affect their
performance and and the metrics that
they care about now they are part of the
people on the inside of that company who
are advocating for working with you you
know that's just one example you know
like that's the VP of Sals you know
somebody who is the head of brand
marketing then you talk about brand
awareness and how SEO can help with that
you know like there are so many desired
outcomes in different parts of different
companies and if you can reach the
person that you are reaching out to with
the specific thing that matters to them
then you are much more likely to get
much better results with your Outreach
now saying everything I just said in a
cold email especially the first cold
email is a lot of words and nobody's
going to give you the time of day to
read a 600 word essay about how your
specific SEO Services can be reframed to
help them meet the kpis that they care
about you know so what we do instead is
offering a lead magnet basically the
point of this lead magnet basically with
this lead magnet it doesn't have to be
anything crazy I so all I do is I'll let
them know you know hey can I make you a
custom video then I make them a custom
video by you know I go to their website
I try to identify opportunities on their
website that would um you know like
certain key wordss that they could
potentially be ranking for that maybe
they're not ranking for right now um I
show them the opportunity that's out
there how many how how what's a search
volume um what's the keyword difficulty
what is their current context in terms
of like domain Authority and how the
services of the company that I'm talking
about can help them you know with their
Authority and and and everything that
needs to happen for them to rank for the
specific keyword that's going to be
bringing people who are looking for
their specific solutions to their
website and by the these being the very
specific people who are looking for
their very specific Solutions so let's
say um you are offering a asset
management solution for manufacturing
companies so if there are people out
there who are looking for you know
searching for Asset Management solution
for manufacturing then of course the
company is going to want to be in front
of these people as often as possible so
by showing them how they can rank for
this specific keyword and how this is
going to bring potentially hundreds of
people who are looking for their
specific solution to their website um
you know then they can obviously make
the connection that bringing these
people who are actively looking for
their solution to their website is going
to lead to more people on their website
that are looking for their solution and
and and that's going to lead to more
people clicking on that get a demo
button or or um book a call button or
whatever it is and that's going to lead
to more people hopping on sales calls
with them and that's going to lead to
more people who are going to become
clients for them and that's going to
lead to more people who are going to
bring in Revenue to their company right
so they can make that connection when
you explain to them how there are people
out there that are looking for their
specific Solutions and that is something
that SEO accomplishes so once they have
that frame of mind that SEO is a revenue
driving solution not just by telling
them hey I can boost your Revenue by
$600,000 like I did for this company you
know like that's just like so abstract
but you know by showing them in a video
how specifically your services are going
to lead to revenue then not only can
they make that connection but also they
just spent 5 minutes entertaining your
services so they have your familiar face
or somebody who is representing your
company's familiar face and now they
have your trust now they are more
informed of um your services now they
are more excited about the prospect of
working with an SEO agency and since you
know now that this is the moment that
they've been most excited about SEO then
this is the moment that they're going to
be most likely to want to find an SEO um
solution out there and you're the one
who's reaching out to them so this is
exactly what I do to generate leads for
our clients I actually make these videos
myself for them and this is something
that you can do as well to bring in
clients and and keep your pipeline full
but you have to make sure that when
you're doing this that you're doing this
at scale because even if you can make
that connection for people sometimes
people just don't have the the budget
for this sometimes people are really
skeptical whatever the case may be maybe
they're just out of office whatever it
is so you have to be able to do this at
scale and I'm talking about sending this
to hundreds or even thousands of people
on a daily basis and you have to make
sure that you're lending in the primary
inbox because there are dozens of things
out there that can send you to spam and
if you don't know what you're doing then
you're going to be lending and spam so
you have to make sure you're doing those
things right and providing all of this
additional value and if you get all of
that done then I promise you your sales
pipeline is going to be full of the
prospects that you want to work with
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