The Greensboro SEO Pro Manifesto

(Originally posted on the official blog of North Carolina's top marketing company.)

We aren't the typical digital marketing agency.

We don't try to be.

Greensboro SEO Pro started out as a one man work-from-home thing.

Over the last few years it's become much more.  That will continue into the future.
It's a vital piece of a larger vision.

That larger vision requires a few things out of the GSP brand.

We lay those out as a set of principles.

The goal:

To ensure Greensboro SEO Pro has character.

Our Values

This is what is most important to us.

1.  We Serve Exceptionally. — "Do Great Work."
2.  We Keep It Real. — "The Truth Matters to Us."
3.  We Grow Together. — "Build Toward the Future."
4.  We Learn Everyday. — "Humility Over Pride."

We treat these as our North Star.

This value system is reflected both internally and externally.  Furthermore, we break these down into smaller pieces.

So yes:

Our principles have principles.

What does this mean day to day, year over year?

Let's talk about it.

Serving Exceptionally

"Do Great Work."

We Make Our Clients Money.  This almost goes without saying.  Marketing consultants are meant to increase revenue by building exposure.  At Greensboro SEO Pro we integrate marketing and sales strategy together.  We prioritize key performance indicators that lead to more revenue, not just make us look good.

We Do The Right Thing.  In the modern Internet marketing landscape, merit wins.  We aren't afraid to point you in the direction of someone else if their service is a better fit.  What's more, we steer our clients clear of risky, short-term tactics.  While quick wins are possible, we never jeopardize your long-term potential.

We Honor Our Commitments.  Delivering high quality SEO is important to us.  So is meeting deadlines.  Perhaps most important though, we take pride in making ambitious projections and exceeding them.  This is a tall order but we meet the challenge head-on, by making predictions and standing by them.

We Communicate with Grace.  We treat our clients with care.  In fact, we treat potential clients and non-clients with care as well.  Greensboro SEO Pro is a digital communications company.  It's our main expertise.  It'd be shameful not to consider the words we use carefully.  We choose to communicate as neighbors.

Keeping It Real

"The Truth Matters to Us."

We Communicate with Accuracy.  Internet marketing is full of empty claims.  Greensboro SEO Pro isn't.  We tell you the truth about your brand, your competition, and the feasibility of your goals.  We're also candid about the state of digital marketing, even when it hurts our pitch.  We strive to provide correct answers.

We Make the Internet a Better Place.  Content creation is one of our greatest strengths.  Not only are we adept at in-depth research, we spin up words that take over readers' minds.  We refuse to use those powers for evil.  Simply put: our sales copy is too good to lie for you.  To hire us, you better love your customers.

We Encourage Good Business.  An SEO expert is one of the only Internet marketers that would encourage you to take your money and spend it on a BBB or CoC membership.  Unfortunately, too few of us do.  But real SEO crosses over into the real world.  After all, Google, Alexa, and other search platforms do as well.

Growing Together

"Build Toward the Future."

We Meet Clients Where They Are.  Backed by an integrated approach, SEO has the potential to turn local brands into national ones.  The problem for most local businesses: they don't have the budget for such ambitions.  We offer flexible campaign types and formats to balance short-term needs and long-term goals.

We Build Long Term Partnerships.  Greensboro SEO Pro isn't going anywhere.  We'll work to be the best at SEO as long as it bring clients solid returns.  That's at least another decade or two.  Beyond that, we'll be marketing in virtual reality, augmented reality, outer space, or whatever comes next.  This is a life thing.

We Adapt to Industry Changes.  Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon and other huge tech brands move fast.  Digital agencies should aim to move faster.  We pride ourselves on agility.  We stay up to date.  In fact, we try to move early.  Greensboro SEO Pro will never get stuck in the mud.  Your ROI is too important to us.

Learning Everyday

"Humility Over Pride."

We Stay on the Cutting Edge.  Search engines work hard to provide great answers.  They constantly evolve to that end.  Sustainable SEO requires more than staying abreast of industry knowledge.  Being a practitioner is also crucial.  Simply put: we participate in Google's experiments so that you don't have to.

We Aren't Scared of "I Don't Know."  Digital marketing evolves too fast to know everything.  In truth, one might say the idea of an "SEO expert" is audacious.  Search engine optimization is a huge topic with enormous nuance.  We are empowered by "I don't know," not handcuffed.  It empowers us to find answers.

We Push Our Industry Forward.  Every year, "good digital marketing" lines up with "good business practices" more and more.  We use a lens of sustainability to see which strategies make the most sense.  In this way, we hope to cut through the misinformation and shady tactics that run rampant in our industry.

We Understand Business.  Greensboro SEO Pro is a foundational step for a full-service business consultancy to come.  Getting new customers is most businesses' number one problem.  But we acknowledge that your business has others.  We work to understand your model and contribute to its overall health.

Why Though?

This is more than just a list of glittering generalities.

(It took too long to write, anyway.)

Romantic, sure.  But 100% real.

You've heard about us:

"Entitled" millennials who want to feel like the work they do serves a greater purpose...
For some reason, serving others seems more gratifying that serving ourselves.

Who knew?

Hi, I'm Zach.

Greensboro SEO Pro is my thing.

It started as a way for me to work from home with my young sons.  Aside from that benefit, I found it pretty boring.  After all, SEO isn't all that interesting.  And honestly, there are a lot of tedious tasks.  It also uses a tremendous amount of brain power.  This makes burnout pretty easy.

I'm against the cliche of living a life you hate—for myself and those who work for me.
So I tie SEO to things that bring fulfillment.

I like to serve people.  I like to help people find the right information.

These were no-brainers for me from the beginning.

But over time I've made more connections.

For example, paying the people who work for me is one of my favorite things to do.  I didn't expect that.

I can't claim credit for coming up with GSP's principles.  Many of these things were shown to by my business itself.  I only had to notice them.  I also allow myself to be influenced by guys like Gary Vaynerchuk, Vishen Lakhiani, Marcus Lemonis, and others.

These and other sages of success say:

He who helps the most people, earns the most success.

(So how can we help you?)

Now I want a huge marketing machine that can serve millions of people—both our clients and their customers.  I don't feel bad about it because I will do great things with it.  We make the Internet a better place.  We do that by serving excellent businesses with excellence.

Our value system will always provide standards for both how we serve and who we serve.

Our original one went something like this:

1. Make the Internet a Better Place.
2. Make Our Clients More Money.
3. Make SEO Easier to Understand.
4. Make SEO Agencies Try Harder.

It was mostly my attempt to differentiate myself from other SEOs.  From the moment I've gotten into this industry, there have been a lot of shady SEOs.  It's not going to change anytime soon.  In fact, I throw 99% of SEO "agencies" into that bucket.  Most of their business models are too broken to provide a top-grade product to the average small business.  That's why they sell $300/month packages with fabricated metrics to justify their fee.

We will never do that.

Nor will we serve clients who take a similar attitude toward their customers.

I want clients I can be proud of.  And I want those who work for GSP to be proud that they do.
In the end:

This "manifesto" is to make sure that Greensboro SEO Pro remains something I can be proud of.

Hopefully, that means you'll be proud to work with us as well.

-Zach Bradshaw
The Greensboro SEO Pro