I think many of my colleagues, and people in our industry, would agree with me when I say that client expectations are one of the most vital aspects to consider when planning a campaign and initiating a new partnership. I would say there usually are three types of expectation levels: unrealistic expectations, realistic expectations and neutral expectations. This blog post will focus on the unrealistic ones.

Unrealistic expectations

The cause of unrealistic expectations can be traced back both to the service company as well as the client. Many times the problem arises during the initial discussion. The consultant might lack insight in the clients business, and therefore base the results that can be expected on previous campaigns in different industries. It can also be the case that the client has misunderstood the service, and has expectations on the service company that are outside of their control. Let’s illustrate this with a couple of examples:

Situation 1: A client needs increased volumes of traffic to their new Poker room. The consultant suggests a search engine optimization, in order to get the top placements on Google, Yahoo, MSN and other search engines. The consultant shows the client how many searches are made each month on various search engines, and creates a very positive image of how SEO could help this client to generate more traffic.

So where lies the problem?

Well, the consultant is right, there are many searches made every month for Poker, but obviously he lacks the knowledge that Poker is one of the most saturated and competitive industries in the SEO business. By telling the client that there are high search volumes and promising high rankings, the consultant has probably planted a seed that will grow into a very nasty partnership within six months or so.  The client will probably not gain much traffic from poker related searches, because the service company will probably not be able to bring a brand new poker room to a top position, unless they have an enormous spending budget and vast resources.

This is a situation where the consultant instead should have recommended a Banner Campaign on PPC basis. This would have given the client both branding for their new poker room, as well as the traffic.

Situation 2: We’ll use the same scenario as situation one; the same client, industry and needs, but with a different suggestion from the consultant. This time, the consultant does suggest a banner campaign on PPC basis. He tells the client that they can run a network campaign where the client only pays for each click they receive during the whole campaign life time. The consultant also mentions that many other poker companies have had successful campaigns under same premises. He asks the client how many clicks they would like, and over which period, and then confirms whether or not this is possible to deliver or not. So let’s say that the client places an order for 5 000 clicks over one month. Everything is agreed on and the campaign is launched.

A month has passed and the campaign is over. The consultant has not heard anything from the client during this period, and therefore contacts them to see if they’re pleased with the results. The client replies that they have traced very little conversions and are very unhappy with the results; they blame the consultant for the poor results.

Where lies the problem?

In this case, the most likely problem – I would say – is that the client has not fully understood what they have ordered. When you run a click campaign, you will get clicks. This is what the service company has promised to generate, and what the client should expect. If the clicks do not convert it is more likely that the problem is located at the clients side; perhaps the banners weren’t good at all, the promotions was poor, competitors ran campaigns simultaneously that had much better offers or the clients website was very hard to navigate for visitors. One could perhaps argue that the quality of the traffic was very bad. However, if the consultant actually has statistics that shows previous successful campaigns with companies in the same industry, it is more likely that the problem stems from the client.

This could also have been prevented if the client would have tracked their campaign in real time, and informed the service company of the poor performance. This way the campaign could have been paused and the right measures could have been carried out in order to optimize results.

Communication and knowledge prevents mishaps

The best way to prevent these situations from occurring is by making sure that you as a consultant has a good knowledge of your industry, and that the client fully understands the service. This way the partnership will be built upon realistic expectations and solid knowledge on how to maximize the clients return on investment.