Implementing Megalytic for Client Reporting: A Case Study with Digital Agency SEO Exposed

A Data Driven Agency

SEO Exposed is a growing agency serving B2C and B2B companies in the areas of search engine optimization (SEO), paid search marketing, and email marketing. The agency’s clients are a mix of SMBs and large, national brands.

For an agency like SEO Exposed, web analytics provides the foundation for the strategies developed and executed for clients. Everything it does for clients is backed by data. It is only natural, then, that reporting is a very important component of the agency/client relationship.

Every month SEO Exposed prepares an analytics report for each of its clients. Reports are also created for special occasions, like an important website review meeting. That’s a lot of reports, and it was a lot of time spent creating reports. Time the agency didn’t have.

Reporting Problems - Before Megalytic

In early 2015 SEO Exposed did a Survey Monkey sent to all of their clients to better understand how clients actually felt about their service and their reporting. They were shocked at the responses. Their clients gave a very favorable review of their service and their product, but almost every client specifically noted that they were eager to work with SEO Exposed to enhance reporting and tailor it to their specific needs. Some clients wanted more detail in their reports and some wanted their reports to be simplified.

SEO Exposed immediately realized that there was a great opportunity to provide additional value to their customers through enhanced reporting. The agency feels that reporting is crucial to strong communication with clients and helping them understand what you are working on as an agency and how their campaign is performing. So, they felt that their existing reporting communication had to be improved in order to better serve their client’s needs. That is why they made the shift to Megalytic in a big way, and since then they have received very favorable feedback from clients about their reporting.

Before implementing Megalytic, reporting was very labor-intensive. Staff members would export data from both Google Analytics and AdWords, and then import into Excel or PowerPoint. Sometimes, staff would copy and paste charts and graphs directly from the Google tools into the reports. But, much of the time, they needed to work with the raw data exports, and massage these to produce the metrics and KPIs needed to analyze how well each client’s strategy was performing.

It involved a lot of Excel work, summarizing data, creating pivot tables, grouping on different dimensions. And once the data was processed, charts needed to be created. 7-8 people, including project manager, were often involved, working late into the night to prepare the necessary reports before a client meeting.

The reporting burden was putting a big strain on the company and it pulled people away from executing on client strategies. The agency couldn’t afford for this to keep happening. The company was growing, so people were busy already, and the added burden of reporting was just too much. What they needed was a solution that automated reporting and made the process easier. If it could also improve the quality of their reports, that would be a bonus.

Linda Walters, the Operations Manager, was tasked with finding a tool to help the agency do just that. Linda looked at a variety of products (e.g., Raventools, Automatic Emails through Google Analytics), and, ultimately, recommended Megalytic because it was both easy to use and very powerful. Specifically, Linda found that Megalytic checked all the boxes they were looking for:

• Megalytic was easy to use.
• Reports were easy to customize to individual client needs.
• Megalytic provided report templates and let you create your own templates.
• Reports looked great whether printed in PDF format or viewed online.
• Clients could easily understand the reports.

The company decided to follow Linda’s advice and started moving monthly reporting over to Megalytic.

Reporting After Megalytic

After implementing Megalytic, SEO Exposed found it could create reports in a fraction of the time previously required. As described by COO Richard Walker, “There was a huge impact in time savings. Megalytic got us out of the weeds where we were struggling with reports, and put us back in client-focused execution mode”.

Report Templates

SEO Exposed creates reports according to a standard pattern. KPIs go on top with the detailed data further down in the report. There are sections for various types of data – traffic trends in one place, and conversions in another. Furthermore, some clients require data that others do not (e.g., AdWords).

With Megalytic’s templating features, the company has been able to define a few standard report layouts. This has created a starting point for each client report that has come after! When a new client comes onboard, the agency picks the closest template to what is needed, uses that to generate the report, and then modifies that report as needed to meet the client’s precise needs. No more starting from scratch every time a report is due.

Being able to use templates to get a jumpstart on each new report has been a huge time saver. The company not only has created its own templates for different styles of reports, but also for monthly, weekly, and quarterly versions of reports.

Report Scheduling

A majority of SEO Exposed’s reports also take advantage of Megalytic’s scheduling features. Using scheduling, a report can be set up to be automatically delivered to the client on a monthly, weekly, or even daily basis. SEO Exposed has created distribution lists for each report, so that it is delivered to all the people who need to see it.

Typically, a distribution list includes one recipient at the client, along with a project manager at SEO Exposed. By including internal staff on the distribution list, the company ensures that it is always on the same page as the client in terms of seeing the latest data; and can be prepared to answer questions and discuss opportunities whenever the client is ready.

Even Better: Clients Love the New Reports

Clients have reacted favorably to the new Megalytic-generated reports. The reports are perceived as insightful, easy to understand, and high quality. If fact, the clients often distribute the reports internally, using them as a go-to source of data at internal meetings.

Megalytic is privileged to work with great customers like SEO Exposed. The agency’s embrace of reporting and deep understanding of the role it plays in managing client relationships has helped us further develop our vision for the product. We are inspired by their rapid growth and hope to be partners in their success for a long time to come.

Ready to see how Megalytic can help your digital agency reporting? Sign up for a free 30-day trial!