Blogs

How Alba SEO Services Adapted to the Coronavirus Crisis

Published

4 years ago

03/30/2021

Kossi Adzo

Caroline Phillips, founder of Alba SEO Services tells us about web optimization.

Table of Contents

First of all, how are you and your family doing in these COVID-19 times?

Caroline Phillips: Yes we are all coping well. Waiting for our turn to get the vaccine.

Tell us about you, your career, and how you founded Alba SEO Services.

Caroline Phillips: After being made redundant from an IT job in 2011 following the financial crash, I initially started an online business in 2011 based on an idea I had. I knew that it needed to gain traffic to be successful. So I self-taught myself SEO and was successful in getting my first business to the top of Google. I decided to use this knowledge by offering it to other businesses as a service. And so Alba SEO Services was born. I continued running both businesses up until 2019 when I sold the first business to a competitor.

How does Alba SEO Services innovate?

Caroline Phillips: We listen to our clients’ needs and innovate where we need to. We believe communication is very important so we created a new reporting system to help our customers understand their marketing campaign. That’s just one example.

How does the coronavirus pandemic affect your business finances?

Caroline Phillips: The Coronavirus pandemic has meant that we have had to be flexible and accommodating to our clients and by doing so we have retained our client base during these difficult times.

Did you have to make difficult choices regarding human resources and what are the lessons learned?

Caroline Phillips: No, fortunately, we never had to make any hard decisions and our team is working hard and has been throughout the pandemic.

How did your customer relationship management evolve? Do you use any specific tools to be efficient?

Caroline Phillips: Having meetings over Zoom has been a revelation to us. It is much more efficient in time for us and our clients and we will probably continue with this post-pandemic.

Did you benefit from any government grants, and did that help keep your business afloat?

Caroline Phillips: No we didn’t benefit from any grants as fortunately, our business was able to keep functioning at near enough the same level as before.

Your final thoughts?

Caroline Phillips: Businesses have to adapt and be flexible in order to be successful. The pandemic has shown that businesses that can adapt quickly will survive. For some industries like tourism, this isn’t possible of course. We hope 2021 is a much better year for all.