Published by Sue Johns-Chapman
Published Date 23.03.2022 
Founded during the COVID-19 pandemic, our Hove-based business SEOMG! was awarded ‘Best Small SEO Agency’at the UK Search Awards in 2021, less than 2 years after being formed. Judges loved the fact that not only were we established at the start of a global pandemic, but that we managed to grow both our client base and internal team at the same time – all whilst operating an innovative four-day week that enables staff to do their best work for us.
So how did we do it?
A different way of doing things
We’re all about SEO – be it technical, content, site migrations, strategy, international…you name it. Our team has gained experience in some of the biggest and best agency and in-house teams out there, working on award-winning SEO campaigns for some of the world’s most renowned companies.
After so many years spent cutting our collective teeth in senior positions both agency side and in-house, we got a pretty good idea as to what works well, and what doesn’t work so well. So we decided to go it alone. And thus, SEOMG! was born.
Our mission statement was simple – to make marketers look good in front of colleagues and superiors, to be an SEO agency that had our clients’ backs.
We were awarded Best Small SEO Agency, all of a year after being formed, because we are able to think big, not to mention the innovative approach we take to our staff’s wellbeing.
The UK Search Award judges commended us for our innovative, people-driven approach, whereby we operate a four-day work week with each member of the team off on a different day, allowing for an ‘always-on’ service for clients. What’s more, we do this with no loss of pay for our staff. It’s in effect a part-time job, but with a full-time salary, something seldom seen in the world of work.
And rather than recruiting from an ever-narrowing pool of senior SEOs, we instead developed our own comprehensive training programme, taking on and training four junior members of staff from scratch. These team members have now successfully been moved to permanent contracts and kickstarted their careers in SEO with us.
It’s the results that count
But for all the talk of an innovative workplace, awards aren’t won unless the numbers are exceptional. And exceptional they are.
Whether it was more than doubling organic year-on-year site visits to the website of a fledgling destination wedding provider, or almost trebling overall US SEO visibility (according to Searchmetrics) for one of the world’s best known cloud storage corporations, the exceptional has quickly become the norm here at SEOMG!
How winning this award has helped us take that next step
The best thing about being awarded the UK’s Best Small SEO Agency in 2021 was that the resulting press coverage helped put us on people’s radars. And that wasn’t just prospective clients either (having gathered several new leads off the back of the win), but potential new talent too. Step forward Ilona, our wonderful SEO project manager. After reading about our award win, she got in touch and we created a new role from scratch for her.
“I found out about SEOMG! winning this award through a local news publication,” Ilona says.
“I loved their approach to clients and staff, their ways of working, plus the fact that they were formed at the start of the pandemic. Thankfully the skills I could offer aligned with where they wanted to take the company next…and the rest is history!”
A centralised point of both contact and escalation for all our clients, Ilona helps us to effectively plan and prioritise our work. Since she has come onboard, our entire project management system has been revitalised, and improved no end. An often complex and time-consuming process is now something that is managed collaboratively and well in advance, easing pressures on our team and putting clients’ minds at ease.
It’s fair to say that without this award win we wouldn’t have found Ilona, and without Ilona we wouldn’t be able to take our planning, delivery and growth to the next level.
We are so proud of everything that our team has done, and continues to do. Watch this space 2022!
