SEO: The second 6 months of a SEO contract

My last post was about what you should do in the first 6 months of a SEO contract. The first 6 months is the time when you establish your rankings, you should be able to achieve some decent goals within this time and be on the 1st or second page of the SERPs. If the niche is competitive, the second 6 months is when you start taking on the big guys in the top positions, this is where you need to get creative and even more diligent.

In the first 6 months you established a routine for regular updates, blog posts and content changes. These changes are based on keyword research that you have conducted regularly and use this research to adapt the web site to search trends. You should continue to monitor trends, make blog posts and change the content throughout the second 6 months. I am also a firm believer in redesigning your web site once a year, which is solely for the users, but this is not the job of a SEO.

Quality Link Building
Now that your onsite SEO is well on track and is proving results, you need to worry about gathering quality links to the site. You will need to do a bit of research and gain links from vendors, clients, business partners, other related sites, general directories, specific directories. Write articles regularly about the business the site is in and create press releases about the site, the business and niche news, and submit them to syndication sites. These links will help you with relevancy and will generate more qualified traffic.

Quantity Link Building
Now that you have your quality links it is time to get the sheer numbers you need to stabilize your positions. Quantity links are less reliable because many of them will be temporary, but they will establish the sites rankings once you get the ball rolling.

Social Media Sites: Use sites like Digg and StumbleUpon to develop a large basis of social media links. Submit everything you write to them and become active in their communities, this activity will create more links than anything as long as you work the groups and contribute to things other than your particular niche.
RSS: Develop a strong writing style and stay on top of blog posts to gain subscribers and make sure to syndicate your RSS.
Reciprocal Links: Find a simple reciprocal link code and put it on your site, these can draw links from many different markets, but we are just worried about numbers at this point.
Comment Tags: Become active on other blogs and forums within the nice and put a link to the site in your comments. Remember not to make spammy posts, becoming a valued contributer can lead to bigger things in the future.
Guest Posting: Become a guest poster on the blogs you read, this is your time to shine and double your traffic.

The second six months may sound much simpler than the first, but this is where all the work comes in. If you do wind up in a 6 month contract, you need to multitask an watch your analytics closely to see what is working and what is not, don't waste time on things that don't work.

Once you get the links rolling in you should be set for a stable next few months and you should have reached the positions you wanted. Always remember, don't stop, persistence is the most important aspect of SEO. This strategy should take you throughout the end of the contract and generate satisfying results for both you and your client.