US Excavation Company: SEO/Virtual Assistant Needed

I own Carolina Dozer, an established excavation, grading, land-clearing and site-work company in Western North Carolina, USA.

I’m looking for a long-term virtual assistant who is very good at research, local SEO, business listings, citations, backlinks, review management and online business visibility.

This is NOT a job where I want somebody to run an automated program and submit us to 500 junk websites.

I want somebody resourceful who can find legitimate places around the internet where our company should appear and then systematically build and maintain our online presence.

Examples of the work

You will be responsible for things like:

* Finding existing Carolina Dozer listings online
* Claiming and improving legitimate business profiles
* Correcting inconsistent company name/address/phone information
* Google Business Profile optimization and maintenance
* Bing Places
* Apple Maps / Apple Business Connect
* BuildZoom
* BBB
* Angi / HomeAdvisor
* Houzz
* Yelp
* YellowPages
* Manta
* ChamberOfCommerce.com
* Nextdoor
* Pinterest
* LinkedIn
* Foursquare
* Data Axle
* Relevant contractor/construction directories
* Local business directories
* Trade associations
* Chambers of Commerce
* Homebuilder associations
* Supplier/dealer directories
* Realtor/property-management vendor directories
* Finding legitimate backlink opportunities
* Finding local organizations Carolina Dozer should join
* Finding competitor backlinks/listings that we don’t currently have
* Uploading project photographs to relevant profiles
* Distributing completed projects across appropriate websites
* Helping manage legitimate customer review requests
* Responding to reviews after approval
* Maintaining a spreadsheet of every listing, backlink and account
* Monitoring Google Search Console
* Finding new SEO opportunities every week

We do a large volume of excavation projects and have hundreds of real project photos, before/after pictures, videos and customer relationships that can be used to build a very strong legitimate online footprint.

REVIEW POLICY — IMPORTANT

You will NOT create fake customer reviews.

You will not create fake customer accounts or impersonate customers.

Part of your job will be organizing our REAL previous customers and helping us request legitimate reviews on appropriate websites.

I want long-term legitimate SEO and reputation growth.

WHAT I REALLY WANT

I’m looking for somebody who thinks outside the box.

For example, don’t just tell me:

“Submit to Google, Yelp and Facebook.”

I already know that.

I want you thinking:

* What local Chamber of Commerce directories can Carolina Dozer join?
* What construction associations have member directories?
* What homebuilder associations could link to us?
* What equipment manufacturers might feature a customer project?
* What suppliers have contractor directories?
* What Realtors have preferred contractor pages?
* What local publications could feature one of our projects?
* What directories are our top competitors listed on?
* What websites rank when someone searches “Carolina Dozer”?
* What authoritative websites should Carolina Dozer appear on but currently doesn’t?
* How can one completed excavation project turn into 5–10 legitimate pieces of searchable content?

I value creativity and research ability more than doing repetitive data entry.

WEEKLY EXPECTATIONS

Initially approximately 5 hours per week.

If you are good, this can turn into an ongoing position with additional hours.

Each week I want a short report showing:

* Listings created or corrected
* Review requests organized
* New reviews received
* New backlinks acquired
* Backlink outreach completed
* Project content distributed
* Profiles updated
* SEO issues found
* New opportunities discovered
* What you plan to work on next

Everything must also be tracked in a shared spreadsheet.

FIRST PROJECT

Your first assignment will be to research Carolina Dozer’s current online footprint.

Website:

CarolinaDozer.com

Search the company online before submitting your proposal.

I want you to identify what we already have, what’s wrong, what’s missing and where you think the biggest opportunities are.

IMPORTANT — READ BEFORE BIDDING

I receive a lot of automated Freelancer proposals.

Start the first line of your proposal with the word: DOZER

If DOZER is not the first word, I will assume you did not read the project and I will not consider the proposal.

Then answer these four questions:

1. After searching Carolina Dozer online, name THREE specific websites/directories where you think we should improve, create or correct our presence.

2. Name ONE specific issue or opportunity you found with Carolina Dozer’s current online presence.

3. Give me ONE unusual/outside-the-box backlink or SEO idea for an excavation company in Western North Carolina.

4. Tell me your hourly rate and how many years of local SEO experience you have.

Do not send me a generic 10-paragraph SEO proposal.

I would much rather see that you actually spent 10 minutes researching my company.

WHO I WILL HIRE

Preference for someone who:

* Has excellent written English
* Understands US local SEO
* Understands citations/NAP consistency
* Understands Google Business Profile
* Has experience with contractor/home-service companies
* Can research independently
* Can document their work
* Doesn’t need constant instructions
* Is comfortable working 5–8 hours per week long-term
* Understands the difference between legitimate backlinks and spam
* Can show examples of previous local SEO work

This will begin as a paid trial.

If you’re extremely good at finding opportunities and executing them, I am interested in keeping the same person working on Carolina Dozer’s online presence long-term.