We’re seeing nearly all-time-high interest in add-on acquisitions due to slower deal flow and platform acquisitions demanding higher multiples.
Add-ons present an opportunity to consolidate market position and average down all-in platform multiples. To ensure successful add-on integration processes, PE firms are:
Focusing on the people side to ensure cultural alignment pre-close and drive buy-in and excitement post-close.
Helping management stand up internal teams and building out playbooks so that company leadership can natively run integration processes. The firm will stay involved at a strategic level and drop in to provide tactical support when needed.
Portfolio Value Creation
More than 80 percent of projects flowing through the BluWave ecosystem are related to portfolio value creation initiatives, an all-time high.
This reflects lighter deal flow as well as how the industry is “running toward the storm” and turning challenges into opportunities. PE firms are effectively driving portfolio value creation by:
Working with management, especially founder owners, to educate them on the PE process during the diligence phase. This helps build buy-in so that management feels it has ownership in the value creation plan post-acquisition.
Standing up a robust go-to-market strategy. Many founder-owned companies are product-focused but do not have the resources or expertise to build a true sales and marketing function. Firms are bringing in CROs or CSOs to develop strategies, set pricing and jumpstart marketing efforts.
Institutionalizing knowledge within the firm so that it doesn’t sit at one deal or portco. Firms are building playbooks across the areas of people, communication, strategy and operations so that they can take a systematized approach to value creation at each company.
Business intelligence continues to be among the most high-demand services in the Business Builders’ Network.
One aspect of BI&A that’s popular is automation.
The founding partner of one of our BluWave service providers says BI automation is essential to modernizing data analysis.
“A lot of times the process involves people pulling data into spreadsheets manually, analyzing, cleaning, doing stuff with the data and then giving it to their bosses or whoever downstream needs them,” says the partner, Mike Datus*. “That’s usually a very error-prone process because it’s done by humans.”
Business intelligence automation is the process of consolidating and streamlining your company’s data into a single warehouse that can be accessed in real-time.
Automation provides instantaneous insights that forgo manual input and data manipulation to give team members actionable, consistent information to drive their day-to-day decisions.
Put another way, it helps you automate business processes.
Companies that are older, or perhaps resource-challenged, can benefit greatly from automating their data collection and analysis.
Another data firm’s founding partner, who we’ll call Steve Holms*, puts it this way:
“Holding larger data sets and integrating more data sources to do analysis across several different places makes it a lot easier to analyze.”
It’s no surprise that business intelligence tools are in such high demand. We have seen countless PE firms and other companies streamline processes and improve real-time decision-making because of them.
Here are just a few of the reasons why you should consider implementing or upgrading your automation efforts.
Save Time
Not only will you complete key tasks sooner, but you’ll be able to make important decisions faster, too.
“You’re talking about orders of seconds instead of hours or days, right? And then that’s huge,” Datus says. “With one of our clients, we built a platform, so instead of waiting a week, the CFO now had a live dashboard in board meetings. So when he was asked a question, he didn’t have to say, ‘I’ll get back to you next week.’ He literally just popped up his dashboard, did a quick filter, and had the answer.”
Our service providers often see situations where top executives need different versions of the same report depending on who they’re working with or what meeting they’re in at a given moment.
This often meant one-off iterations of the same data sets that take might not be available the same day, or even week.
“If the analyst has to go back, they have to go back and pull the data again, do the analysis, run it through, right? That’s another runtime,” says Holms, who noted that those iterations add up.
Another time-saving scenario is if an analyst leaves the company, is on vacation or has an emergency. Data analysis doesn’t stop as soon as that key player becomes unavailable.
“You only have to program it once, and you’re done,” Holms says. “It’s all in the database, and they don’t have to email anybody in case they didn’t get the report.”
Have you ever tried to access a report so robust that you thought your computer might break down? You’re not alone.
Another benefit of business intelligence automation is the ability to scale.
“Sometimes your data’s so large, it’s hard for Excel to even open, right?” Holms says. “How does sales correlate with product performance, correlate with manufacturing, correlate with this? —putting it in one place makes things a lot easier to expand.”
Save Money
There are multiple ways BI automation can save your company money:
You may be able to reduce headcount on your analytics team and reinvest those savings elsewhere
The time you do save – as mentioned earlier – is time for which you’re no longer paying
The data itself could unveil inefficiencies in your business that are ripe for improvement
Manual intervention is expensive. By cutting out intermediaries, and empowering decision-makers more quickly, they can use expertise that no program can account for to make impactful decisions
Consistency
Humans are much more error-prone than machines. Especially well-designed and well-programmed machines.
While you wouldn’t want to automate a process so heavily that it’s no longer monitored, the correct calibration can set your team much more at ease.
“You’re building good processes to make sure it’s consistent. It’s done by computers, so once you do it once it’s pretty robust, unless the data itself changes or the business changes,” Holms says. “Sometimes you just get errors that are difficult to detect. And if you want to go back to see what were my numbers last week or two weeks ago or three months ago, you have to go into your email inbox and search for the report.”
With BI automation, you can leave the inbox behind and find everything you need in your dashboard.
“It’s all in the database,” Holms says, “and they don’t have to email anybody in case they didn’t get the report.”
Dynamic Reports
As we already hinted at above, automated dashboards and visualizations are essentially living, breathing databases.
Instead of plugging new information into a spreadsheet every time you want to update a report, it’s available instantaneously. Not only that. Since it’s connected to the source, you don’t have to input the data at all.
“Once you have it all there getting updated predictably, you can create these really rich charts and graphs, because with these tools you can get these visuals that aren’t static,” Datus says. “The real-time dashboards update as the data comes into the system. So if you want to see one chart or the set of 20 charts for last week just for finance, you can click a few things, and you can get that report.”
While automation can be valuable to a business, it doesn’t come without some potential downside. With the right help, though, we believe all of these can be overcome.
Job Loss
Automation may replace human workers and lead to job losses – at least in the short term.
A benefit of this, though, is that it frees those some people up to learn and use new skills that are equally valuable to the business. Money saved on one area of human capital can be reinvested in your talent.
System Failures
Automated systems can experience technical issues, thereby disrupting business operations. You would hope that this is the exception and not the norm, but even so, manual intervention may be required to fix the issues.
Expert service providers, however, are familiar with the most common vulnerabilities, and will know how to not only fix them, but also proactively prevent them.
Automated systems are designed to handle repetitive, routine tasks in a predetermined manner. They may lack the flexibility to adapt to unexpected situations or changes.
This is quickly changing, though, with the implementation of more and more AI tools that can often course-correct much faster than humans.
This perceived “risk” is quickly becoming a moot point in many senses.
Cost
Implementing and maintaining automated systems can be expensive. This is most likely to be an issue for very small businesses that have less to automate and can handle all their data by traditional means.
Large companies with more robust budgets will probably find that the investment is well worth it in the long run. This includes private equity firms, their portcos, and private and public companies of all shapes and sizes.
While automation involves these and other risks, it’s an increasingly valuable and in-demand facet of business intelligence. Based on the feedback we receive from our clients and expert service providers, we wouldn’t shy away from exploring how your business can benefit from automation.
Now that you have considered the pros and cons of BI Automation, it’s time to look at the tools at your disposal. While all of these can have a significant impact on your business, you want to make sure you’re using the right ones.
Let’s get familiar with a few of the high-level categories, as well as some specific business automation technologies within them. That way, when our research and operations team connects you to a tailor-made, niche-specific firm to set up your BI automation, you’ll have an idea of what you’re looking for.
Dashboards
BI automation dashboards display key performance indicators, data points and other important metrics in an easy-to-understand format. They provide a 360-degree view of performance using charts, graphs and other visuals.
They offer a quick-glance overview of your organization’s most important metrics, allowing users to quickly identify areas of strong or weak performance, spot emerging trends and gain data-driven insights. Some examples include Power BI, Tableau and Qlik Sense.
Common metrics used to evaluate business performance are cash flow, customer satisfaction and website traffic. Others include sales revenue and customer loyalty.
When you work with an experienced data analytics firm, they’ll be able to match your business needs to the right tools.
Visualizations
BI automation visualizations enable end users to execute automated workflows based on insights within a report. The workflows can be data-contextual, meaning they can change based on filters.
They are often used to connect multiple data sources, create interactive dashboards and charts, provide real-time visualizations and alerts and utilize natural language processing.
This type of BI automation tool leverages artificial intelligence and machine learning to automatically generate and apply predictive models based on data insights. Predictive models are employed to forecast what may occur in the future dependent on historical and current data.
These are often used to predict things like customer churn, sales revenue and product demand. They’re especially utilized in the healthcare, finance and marketing industries.
Data mining techniques to extract valuable insights from large data sets for making more informed decisions. It’s a branch of data science that searches for patterns, anomalies and correlations in using statistics, artificial intelligence and machine learning.
It’s often used to solve customer segmentation, fraud detection and market basket analysis. Many of the tools listed in the sections above can also be used for these tasks.
If a lot of this sounds new to you and your team, that’s OK. In fact, Holms says that even a well-composed manual report can be a great launching point for BI automation.
“I would say even if you have an Excel report and it’s a good Excel report, you’re already ahead of the game,” he says.
If you don’t know where to start, set up a scoping call with our research and operations team. We’ll connect you to world-class firms like Datus’s, Holms’, or other PE-grade service providers that can serve your exact needs for your particular industry.
*Privacy is important to us. While the source and company name have been changed, these are real quotations from a real service provider in the BluWave Business Builders’ Network.
A strong organic search presence is a great way to attract new readers, users or clients. As you rank higher on search engine results pages (SERPs), you can usually expect more traffic, conversions and revenue. But it’s important to have the right person in place to lead these efforts.
What is SEO? Search engine optimization, or SEO, is the process or strategy behind improving a website’s content so that it organically ranks well on search engines like Google or Bing. This is different from paid search ads which fall under SEM, or search engine marketing.
A search engine optimization guru (though they probably don’t call themselves that) will know that more organic traffic to your website means more potential customers.
They will know how to improve your site’s user experience and position content in a way that boosts conversions. This is especially important if people can make purchases or book business directly on your site.
While SEM requires ongoing investments, the right organic search strategy can yield long-term results that require less maintenance. That doesn’t mean it’s easy, though. A good search strategy could take months to bear fruit, depending on how competitive your market is.
That’s why SEO recruitment continues to be a hot topic for private equity firms, portfolio companies, and independent and public companies.
“SEO is an foundational component of any modern business’s digital marketing strategy,” BluWave’s Senior Content Marketing Manager Brad Gerick says. “With so much information available, it’s becoming more and more difficult to find a true expert, which is why it can be helpful to work with a specialized recruiting firm to hire the right candidate.”
Let’s dive in to what you should look for in an SEO, and how to hire someone whose talent matches your needs.
What Skills and Tools Do You Need for SEO
On-Page Skills
On-page SEO skills include optimizing your website content and technical elements to improve your rankings in search engines. Some of the more important ones include:
Conducting keyword research to determine the best keywords and phrases to target for your site and content. Choose keywords that your audience is searching for and that you can rank for.
Optimizing your page titles, meta descriptions, header tags, image alt attributes and content for your target keywords. Include keywords prominently and naturally to signal their relevance to search engines.
Improving your internal linking structure by connecting related content and categories across your site. Link to high-quality, relevant content to guide users and search engines to your most important pages.
Optimizing your URL structure with descriptive, keyword-rich page names. Well-structured URLs make your pages easier to read, navigate and rank in search engines.
Providing valuable, high-quality content that matches for what your audience is searching. (The latter part is also known as keyword intent.) For more information about this, check out Google’s E-E-A-T documentation.
Off-Page Skills
Off-page SEO skills include building relationships with other websites and influencers to earn high-quality backlinks and increase your site’s authority. Key off-page SEO skills include:
Conducting outreach to other websites and influencers for backlink opportunities like guest posts, interviews, mentions and citations. Build relationships with other industry leaders to earn high-quality backlinks over time. Be careful, though. Buying backlinks or engaging in shady link-exchange tactics can get you in trouble with the algorithms. Avoid these schemes at all costs (no pun intended).
Leveraging social media platforms to increase exposure for your content and brand. Share your blog posts, news, events and other updates on sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram to reach new potential customers and backlink partners.
Engaging with your audience and influencers through email marketing campaigns. Send a regular newsletter, promote new content, share industry news and build rapport with subscribers to earn more links and social shares.
Participating in relevant online communities and forums to establish yourself as a thought leader. Answer questions on sites like Quora, Reddit and industry-specific forums. Provide value to others while linking back to your website. (Do this with caution, though. Reddit moderators don’t like it when users hijack their subreddits simply to get more traffic.)
Technical SEO skills refer to the technical knowledge and abilities required to optimize a website for search engines like Google. Some key technical SEO skills include:
Optimizing page-load speed. Some tactics for this include reducing file sizes, minimizing redirects, optimizing images, caching content and compressing code. Fast page load speeds improve the user experience and search engine rankings. A well-structured site with logical navigation and internal links helps search engines understand your content. Google’s Core Web Vitals are a great starting point to learn more about this topic.
Ensuring your content is mobile-friendly and responsive, with a clear focus and user experience for all device types. The majority of web traffic now comes from mobile devices, so a mobile-optimized site is essential. In fact, Google uses mobile-first indexing to crawl sites.
Troubleshooting any technical SEO issues like duplicate content, broken links, crawl errors or penalties to resolve problems and avoid negative impacts on search visibility.
Content Marketing
Content marketing refers to the creation and distribution of valuable, relevant content to attract and retain customers. It is closely tied to SEO, as high-quality content helps to improve search rankings, increase traffic, build brand authority and boost lead generation. Key content marketing skills for SEO specialists include:
Conducting keyword research to identify topics and questions that your target audience is searching for. Then, create content that answers those questions and optimizes for relevant keywords.
Writing informative and engaging blog posts, articles, case studies, whitepapers and other content assets. Content should be valuable, well-researched, and optimized for both search engines and readers.
Promoting content on social media platforms to increase traffic and engagement. Share updates on sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and LinkedIn to reach new readers and earn more links and social shares.
Analyzing the performance of your content using tools like Google Analytics, Search Console and Buzzsumo. Track traffic, rankings, engagement and conversions to determine what’s working and what needs improvement.
Strategy and Planning
SEO strategy and planning refer to the high-level thinking and goal setting required to optimize a website for search. Some key SEO strategy and planning skills include:
Conducting a comprehensive SEO audit to analyze your website and marketing performance. Review on-page and off-page factors like technical issues, content gaps, link profiles and keyword rankings to determine your strengths, weaknesses and opportunities.
Developing a data-driven SEO plan that outlines your goals, key objectives, actions, timelines, resources and expected outcomes. Set specific, measurable goals for traffic, rankings, conversions and revenue that align with your business objectives. Determine the strategies and tactics you will use to achieve those goals.
Implementing and monitoring your SEO plan to ensure you stay on track. Use project management tools and best practices to organize workflows, assign responsibilities, track progress and make adjustments as needed. Regularly evaluate your results and key metrics to determine what’s working and what needs improvement.
Adjusting your plan based on feedback, insights and changes in the search landscape. Search engines frequently update their algorithms and best practices, and the needs of your audience may evolve over time as well. Review your plan regularly and make data-driven changes to optimize your efforts and results.
Commonly Used SEO Tools
Here are some of the higher level categories of search-related tools, as well as some specific recommendations within each one:
Technical SEO:Screaming Frog, Google Search Console and Ahrefs Site Audit help assess technical issues that could affect your search rankings. They crawl your site to identify errors like broken links, slow page load times, duplicate content and more. They also provide metrics on site speed, mobile-friendliness and XML sitemaps to help optimize technical SEO.
Content optimization: Content optimization tools like Yoast SEO, Grammarly and Hemingway Editor help create blog posts, articles and other content that ranks well in search engines. They analyze content for keyword usage, readability, grammar and plagiarism to ensure it is high-quality, informative and optimized for your target audience.
Link building: Tools such as Ahrefs Backlink Checker, Moz Link Explorer and BuzzSumo help build high-quality backlinks to improve your site’s authority and search rankings. They provide data on your existing link profile as well as opportunities for new links and influencers who may be interested in linking to or sharing your content.
Analytics: Analytics tools like Google Analytics 4, Looker Studio and Google Tag Manager help track the performance of your SEO and content marketing efforts. They provide insights into metrics such as traffic, rankings, engagements, conversions and revenue to determine what’s working and what needs improvement.
Artificial Intelligence: With the wide release of ChatGPT, as well as the creation of myriad other AI tools, this is quickly becoming an essential part of the content-creation process. Just make sure the SEO you hire uses these tools to complement their job, and not do all the work for them. AI can be great, but it shouldn’t be applied to an SEO strategy without thorough human refinement and vigilance.
If your SEO candidate can’t talk to you about Google Search Console in detail, don’t hire them.
Assess a Candidate’s Knowledge and Experience
This role requires a combination of both technical knowledge and strategic thinking to analyze data, identify opportunities and develop high-impact solutions.
Here are some ways to make sure they fit the bill:
Online tests: Services like Imocha, TestGorilla and Vervoe offer skills assessment tests tailored for SEO specialists. These measure a candidate’s knowledge of on-page and off-page optimization, content strategy, link building, analytics and more.
Portfolio reviews: Ask the candidate to share examples of previous SEO projects, case studies or their own website to evaluate their work. Look for clear goals, data-driven insights and measurable results and impact. They may have to anonymize some parts of the report for client confidentiality, and that’s OK. The main think you want to see is that they have experience executing successful projects.
Case studies and scenarios: Present the candidate with an SEO challenge or problem and ask them to walk through how they would approach and solve it. This helps assess their strategic thinking, decision making and problem-solving abilities. Don’t be afraid to do it live during the interview. If they don’t know some of these things off the top of their head, they’re probably too green to lead in this area.
References and testimonials: Speaking with a candidate’s past clients or employers is one of the best ways to evaluate their skills, work quality and professionalism. Look for references that can speak to their SEO experience, key accomplishments and strengths. This will also be a sign that they’re pleasant to work with if others are willing to help them.
When you use a resource from the BluWave-vetted network, they have already been vetted multiple times before we ever consider connecting you. They must also have multiple high-quality references from private equity firms and other top businesses.
Even then, we won’t just send you a list of all the candidates available. We will select from the best resources on standby to give you two or three best-fit options for your specific situation. Within one business day, you’ll have two or three SEO options that are tailored to your niche.
There are many key terms used in SEO that are important to understand. They describe concepts, strategies and metrics that specialists reference on a regular basis. Some of the top words and phrases to know include:
Basic terms:
Search engine: A website that allows users to search for information on the internet, such as Google, Bing or Baidu.
Crawler: A program that searches the web to build an index of websites and content for a search engine.. This could also be referred to as a “bot” or “spider.”
Index: A search engine’s database of websites, pages and content that have been crawled and indexed.
Query: The search terms entered by a user into a search engine. This is more commonly referred to as a “keyword” in many cases.
SERP: Search engine results page, or the page of results returned for a user’s search query. It’s pronounced just as it’s spelled.
Organic vs paid results: Organic results are earned, while paid results are advertising spots purchased by businesses. Make sure you’re not hiring an SEM expert to do SEO work. While related, these are completely different skills.
This is a search engine results page (SERP).
Technical terms:
URL: Uniform Resource Locator, or the full address of a page on the web. And a URL slug is everything that comes after .com or .net, for example. This page’s URL is https://bluwave.net/seo-recruitment/, but the slug is simply /seo-recruitment/.
Domain name: The main part of a URL, like “bluwave.net“.
HTTP status code: A number that indicates the status of a request to a web server, such as 200 for success or 404 for not found.
Robots.txt: A text file that tells search engine crawlers which parts of a website to index or avoid. If a candidate doesn’t know how to find your robots.txt file in 10 seconds or less, don’t hire them. (Hint: All they have to do is go to yoursite.com/robots.txt)
Sitemap: An XML file that lists the pages on a website to help search engines discover and crawl content.
On-page terms:
Keyword: A word or phrase that users may search for to find content on a specific topic.
Title tag: HTML element that contains the main headline for a page and is displayed in search results. In the code, this would be <title>Page Title Here</title>. This is one of the most important elements of ranking on SERPs.
Meta description: A concise summary of a page’s content that is displayed in search results. This is important, but it does not have an affect on a page’s ranking.
Heading tag: HTML elements like <h1> to <h6> that indicate the importance and structure of content on a page. A page’s headline is usually within an <h1> tag. It’s best to have only one <h1> tag per page.
Alt text: Description of an image that is displayed if the image cannot be seen by a user. This is especially important to making your site accessible for people with disabilities.
Why do you have more than one H1?
— johnmu is not a chatbot yet 🐀 (@JohnMu) June 15, 2017
Off-page terms:
Link: A hyperlink that connects one page to another.
Anchor text: The clickable text of a link.
Backlink: An incoming link to a page from another website. This is a significant factor in ranking well on Google.
Link building: The process of acquiring high-quality backlinks to improve a website’s authority and search rankings. This is best done naturally and not through paid schemes or shady exchanges.
Domain authority: A score that indicates the strength and influence of a website based on the quality and quantity of links pointing to it. Search engines like Google do not recognize domain authority. It’s a score used by platforms like Ahrefs and Semrush. Think of it as a barometer and not a thermostat.
Top KPIs in SEO
To track the success of your SEO efforts, you need to choose the right KPIs. Some of the top ones to consider are:
Business outcomes: Focus on conversions, customer lifetime value, cost per acquisition and return on investment. These show the direct impact of SEO on your business.
Traffic quality: Monitor organic visibility, organic sessions, branded vs non-branded traffic and bounce rate. This helps ensure you’re getting high-quality traffic. Google Analytics 4 is a great way to do so.
Keyword performance: Track your keyword rankings, keyword difficulty and keyword opportunity. See how you can improve your rankings and find new keywords to target.
Link profile: Evaluate your backlinks, referring domains, domain authority and link velocity. Build high-quality links to boost your rankings.
These KPIs provide actionable insights into your SEO progress and help guide your strategy. Track them regularly to maximize your search visibility and drive more traffic and conversions.
Interview Questions for an SEO Candidate
Interview questions help evaluate if a candidate has the necessary skills and experience for an SEO role. They reveal how well they understand SEO concepts, strategies and best practices.
Here are some sample questions you can use:
General questions:
What is your approach to SEO and how do you stay up-to-date with trends?
What are your top priorities for SEO and how do you determine key performance indicators (KPIs)?
How would you integrate SEO with our overall digital marketing strategy?
Technical questions:
How would you evaluate our website’s technical SEO health? What issues should we fix?
How can we improve site speed and mobile-friendliness? What tools would you use?
Here are some of the things you would want to see from a candidate’s past work. While no one will have expertise in all these areas, having at least some of them is essential.
SEO Projects:
Types of projects, such as technical audits, content optimization, link building.
Scope and complexity of projects, including the number of web pages, amount of content, types of keywords.
The candidate’s level of responsibility and involvement e.g. executing tasks, managing projects, leading SEO teams.
SEO Results:
Improvements in search rankings, organic traffic, conversions.
Growth in key metrics like impressions, clicks, dwell time.
Awards, case studies or other recognition of their results and impact
SEO Tools:
SEO software, analytics platforms, rank tracking tools, etc. that the candidate has expertise in using.
Technical skills with HTML, CSS, PHP, JavaScript. Even if the candidate isn’t a “coder” or programmer, they should have knowledge of some of these languages.
SEO Skills:
Strong research, analysis, problem-solving and critical thinking.
The ability to optimize content for both search engines and users.
Proficiency in link building, outreach, content promotion and other SEO strategies.
Excellent communication skills for educating clients and coworkers about SEO.
Keep Up with SEO Trends and Best Practices
There are many great resources these days to keep up with the latest SEO trends and best practices. Sometimes, though, it can be hard to tell which are legitimate. Here are a few recommendations both for your benefit, as well as what you might like to hear from how a candidate stays informed:
Blogs: Follow reputable SEO blogs like Moz, Ahrefs, Search Engine Roundtable and Search Engine Journal. They frequently publish articles on the latest trends, updates from search engines and expert opinions.
Podcasts: Listen to SEO podcasts such as Search Off the Record (Google’s official show) and Search Engine Journal Show. Experts are often interviewed to discuss trending topics, share their insights and debate controversial issues.
Webinars: Attend webinars from platforms like Ahrefs, Clearscope and BrightEdge. They frequently host live sessions with SEO professionals talking about trending strategies, new opportunities and ways to overcome challenges. The Q&A portions of these webinars also provide useful discussions on recent changes in search rankings and algorithms.
Online courses: Take online courses on SEO and related topics from Udemy, Thinkific, Kajabi and LinkedIn Learning. These courses teach the latest techniques and best practices from industry experts. While some cover SEO fundamentals, many focus on trending areas like technical SEO, content optimization, link building and keyword research. Though often paid, the courses help gain a deeper understanding of current SEO methods.
Conferences: Join online or in-person SEO conferences to hear from industry leaders, learn from case studies and network with other professionals. Major conferences like SearchLove, Friends of Search Fest, Brighton SEO, MozCon and Mn Search Summit feature keynote speeches, panel discussions, and presentations on the newest trends, innovations, and issues in SEO. Attending these conferences is a great way to stay ahead of competitors and meet like-minded SEO practitioners.
MozCon is one of the more popular and well-known search-based conferences.
Do you need a digital content maven to give your website(s) a deep audit? Or perhaps this is something you never considered and don’t know where to start. A proven SEO expert is just what you want.
The BluWave network of highly vetted service providers has search engine optimization resources on standby, no matter your organization, website size or industry.
When you get on a scoping call with our research and operations team, they’ll perform a quick but detailed evaluation of your situation and provide two to three best-fit SEO resources within a single business day.
With so much opportunity in organic search, you don’t want to waste another day with a website that isn’t optimized for growing your business. Contact us today to get started.
Whether going through an M&A, an internal crisis, a reorg or other situations that require a talent expert, here are some reasons private equity firms should consider temporary HR leaders.
Increase Efficiency and Effectiveness
A human capital leader has the opportunity to improve company operations for the short time they’ll be in their role. (Usually three to nine months.) Here are some ways they can do so.
Streamlining HR Processes
They can evaluate existing HR processes at a portfolio company, identify areas for improvement and implement changes to increase effectiveness. This may include automating repetitive tasks and standardizing processes across the organization.
For example: expediting a labor-intensive employee onboarding process with new software. They could also implement a standardized performance management system so that everyone understands how they’re evaluated.
Temporary CHROs can also collaborate with the tech team to improve data collection, storage and analysis. This makes it easier for management to make educated decisions.
One way they could do this is by creating dashboards accessible to managers. These, and other tools can streamline analysis relevant to growing the business.
Aligning HR with Business Goals
The human resources department’s objectives must also align with the portco’s goals.
Identifying and tracking KPIs – employee turnover rate, time to fill, employee engagement, DEI initiatives – is one way to do this.
The interim CHRO interview process is a great time to determine whether the person you want to hire works well across departments.
Exit interviews help managers understand why employees leave and identify what contributes to a high turnover rate. This information can be used to develop retention strategies and improve employee engagement.
Here are some of the questions an interim CHRO might ask a portco employee during an exit interview:
What made you decide to leave the company?
Is there anything you disliked about working here?
Do you have any suggestions for how we can improve?
How was your experience with your manager?
Creating Employee Retention Programs
Retention programs address the specific needs of employees, such as recognition programs, professional development and the ability to work from home, even in a hybrid situation.
Employees may also be more likely to stay if they have access to department-specific job training.
HR leaders can also use engagement surveys and focus groups to identify problems ahead of time.
Identifying Key Drivers of Employee Satisfaction
Speaking of surveys and focus groups, they not only tell HR leaders what’s going wrong but also tell them what employees like about a company. This information can help create targeted retention strategies and improve employee engagement.
Here are some of the top areas of employee satisfaction an interim chief human resources officer will want to pay attention to:
Clear communication and transparency
Opportunities for growth and development
Work-life balance
Recognition and rewards
Building a Positive Company Culture
Creating a positive company culture is no easy task, especially in the midst of a transition. That’s why it’s important to work with an interim CHRO experienced with tumultuous situations.
Besides paying attention to employee satisfaction, this person should be able to build consensus across teams.
“In a strong culture, employees feel valued,” according to Great Place To Work. “They enjoy at least some control over their jobs, instead of feeling powerless. Whether it’s by working from home, choosing their projects or trying out a new role, employees that feel valued and can make decisions achieve a higher level of performance.”
Providing Regular Feedback and Recognition
An interim CHRO can help managers to provide regular feedback and recognition to employees.
They can standardize feedback loops through surveys, one-on-one meetings, focus groups and other tactics. They should then be transparent about how they will use that information to improve the company.
It’s important to do this on a regular basis, and not as a one-off exercise.
Since this person will only be in their role for a few months, having monthly, bi-weekly or even weekly evaluations may make sense. Especially if they can develop a system that can be inherited by the person who will take on their role full-time.
An interim CHRO with experience in your industry can hit the ground running. Every business has a unique set of legal challenges, and you don’t want someone in the C-suite who has to learn on the job.
Here are some specific areas where a temporary CHRO can help with legal hurdles.
Reviewing and Updating Company Policies and Procedures
This ensures a company is compliant with all relevant laws and regulations, such as those related to labor, anti-discrimination and data privacy.
This should be done in collaboration with other executive team members as well as the legal team.
Conducting Compliance Audits
Compliance audits help identify areas of legal risk and recommend corrective actions.
The head of people can do this by developing an audit plan with a clear scope. They’ll then determine risks, gather evidence and analyze the information. In the end, they should prepare a report based on their findings.
They’ll also need to implement the plan quickly to minimize risks to the company.
Providing Training and Education
Another way to protect the company as well as equip employees is to educate them on compliance and labor laws.
Here are some resources an HR executive might use for this:
A comprehensive communication strategy informs employees about the transaction and its implications.
The head of HR may do this with a dedicated website, by holding town hall meetings or providing regular updates. They may also work with management to develop a Q&A document and establish an employee hotline.
Managing Cultural Integration
A seasoned executive will improve cross-company integration by addressing differences in culture, values and internal practices.
They do this with shared vision and values, aligning policies and procedures and promoting cross-functional collaboration.
Mary Anne Elliott, CHRO at Marsh, talked with HBR about the importance of working with other top executives on this.
“[These] meetings are a pragmatic activity. When you’re sitting with the CEO and CFO, there’s no place for academic HR,” she says. “It’s all about understanding what the organization needs to do to drive business performance and how to align those key variables.”
Assessing and Managing HR Risks
Some typical risks associated with a merger or acquisition are employee retention, legal compliance and benefits integration.
A capable temporary people leader will know how to do each of these things efficiently.
Coordinating Benefits and Compensation
Coordinating the integration of benefits and compensation packages for employees is also important.
Health insurance, retirement plans and stock options are just a few examples.
Reviewing existing benefits packages can help them identify gaps or redundancies.
Integrating HR Systems and Processes
Finally, an interim chief human resources officer can manage the integration of HR systems and processes such as payroll, performance management and employee data management.
The new, combined organization’s HR processes must be aligned with the needs of the business.
The IT department can help in this area by ensuring a smooth transition of data and systems.
Some roles are more crucial to a company’s success. The interim CHRO should identify these and devise a strategy to make sure the right talent is in place if someone leaves.
They can also identify potential leaders within the company who lack professional development.
Conducting Talent Assessments
Internal assessments help identify high performers. Since these are the people most likely to leave for another opportunity, it’s worth investing time in their development.
By aligning these evaluations with company goals and leadership needs, the employees will be better equipped for a new role.
This will open the door for them to be promoted sooner as they grow within the company.
Creating Development Programs
An interim CHRO can design development programs to help high-potential employees acquire the skills and experience needed to take on leadership roles.
These are some ways they might do that:
Rotational assignments
Mentorship programs
Professional development courses
Cross-functional team assignments
Building a Talent Pipeline
While it’s important to foster talent internally, an interim CHRO can also establish an external talent pool. Outside hires often help the company by bringing a fresh perspective to a challenging situation.
Having a group of qualified candidates on standby also saves time in the hiring process.
At BluWave, we have a highly vetted group of candidates for private equity, portco and privately owned company needs on standby. That way, we can provide you with two or three exact-fit resources within a single business day.
A comprehensive succession plan will not only focus on identifying, developing and retaining key talent, but also contingencies for unexpected departures.
Along with mentoring and coaching programs, regular performance reviews ensure that employees are ready to take on new roles when needed.
If your private equity firm or portco leader needs a human capital expert, BluWave has the world’s best temporary chief human resources officers on standby. And if you’re already in a talent role, we have tailor-made solutions to support you, too.
Everyone in our network has been rigorously evaluated while also receiving multiple recommendations from other leading PE firms.
Reach out to set up your initial scoping call with our research and operations team, and we’ll provide you with two or three exact-fit candidates, no matter how urgent your need, within one business day.
As part of an ongoing series, we’re sharing real-time trending topics we are hearing from our 500+ PE firm clients. In our most recent installment, Jeremy Yoder, a BluWave Strategic Account Executive, shares how to action BI & Analytics experts, detailing the different use cases firms and other proactive companies have for bringing in data & analytics experts. Learn more by watching the video below.
In our increasingly digital world, business intelligence and analytics is a growing input factor for companies to measure their level of growth and for private equity firms to evaluate the success of their portcos. PE firms come to BluWave with needs for data and analytics specialists who can help drive effectiveness and efficiency within their portfolio companies. Here are just a few of the most common use cases we see for why a firm brings in data and analytics specialists.
Number one, developing more measurable metrics at the portco level. The first step to making data-driven decisions is having the right metrics and reporting measures in place. Many companies are lacking this when their first PE sponsor comes into the picture, so our clients equip their new portcos with specialists who can help companies build a solid metrics and reporting foundation. This gives the PE firm visibility into how their portcos are tracking against those set goals.
Number two, data diligence. For companies with large sets of data on products and customers like companies in the B2C sector, there is often hidden value hiding within these datasets if they aren’t being analyzed. When companies aren’t actioning the data available to them, leading PE firms bring in specialists to uncover what stones are being left unturned and help glean risks and actionable opportunities from the data that already exists.
Number three, cleaning and assessing data. The most forward-thinking PE firms are using specialists to clean and assess their portcos data so that they can improve the precision of their evaluations and more deeply inform the health of their organizations. We have a deep bench of business intelligence and analytics providers at the ready for a variety of niche needs. To get connected to the PE-grade,exact-fit provider you need, contact us at info@bluwave.net.
Consumer products portcoin critical need ofdata consolidation and analysis
A portfolio company came to us with a critical need for a business intelligence and analytics provider to consolidate data for their consumer products business. With sales data coming in from their distributors in different manners, they had a critical need to gather and interpret the information they received into usable insights on consumer behavior, sales conversions, and product success. The portfolio company required a business analytics expert to outsource this task to that could quickly consolidate, analyze, and help them visualize their data into information they could action.
BluWave identifies two exact-fit business analytics providers
Leveraging our founder’s 20 years in private equity, we have extensive frameworks for assessing PE-grade business intelligence and analytic needs for proactive companies. BluWave utilizes technology, data, and human ingenuity to pre-map, assess, monitor, and maintain deep pools of business analytics providers that uniquely meet the private equity standard. We interviewed the portfolio company to understand their specific key criteria, and then connected the client with two select pre-vetted business intelligence providers from our invitation-only Intelligent Network that fit their exacting needs.
Company confidently engages both PE-Grade providers
Within 24 hours of the initial scoping call, the portfolio company were introduced to two PE-grade business intelligence providers that specialized in consumer goods. The client engaged both providers to help with two different aspects of the data project at hand. The portfolio company was able to confidently engage the pre-vetted providers and quickly move towards their goal of value creation through data consolidation and insights.
We’re sharing real-time trending topics we are hearing from our 500+ PE firm clients as we combat ongoing recessionary and inflationary pressures. One of our Private Equity Strategic Account Executives, Cydney Dicken, talks about why and how leading PE firms are taking action to increase their portfolio’s equity value during these uncertain times.
Learn more about what PE firms are doing as they prepare to run towards the storm by watching the video below.
Interested in addressing competitive opportunities, optimizing profitability, or recruiting and retaining the right talent? Contact us here. You can also learn more about the specific ways we drive value for PE firms by connecting them to the exact-fit resources they need by reading our case studies.
Cyber breach led to urgent need for cybersecurity expert for portco
A private equity-backed ecommerce company suffered a cyber breach shutting down all operations. They urgently needed a cybersecurity expert that could assess the situation and remediate the breach in order to restart operations. At the time of outreach, the company did not know how or why the breach occurred, or the scope of the problem, but needed to restart operations immediately to serve their customers.
BluWave identified pre-vetted experts that met the client’s specific needs
The client reached out to BluWave on Friday afternoon shortly after the breach was discovered indicating their urgent need for assessment and action. BluWave has a deep network of cybersecurity specialists. We quickly interviewed the client to understand their specific needs and identified the select few cybersecurity providers that met their exacting requirements.
Client was connected to top expert within minutes
Within 15 minutes of scoping the client’s needs, BluWave put the company in contact with a best-in-class cybersecurity firm. The cybersecurity firm immediately sprung into action and began supporting the company on the same day that the breach occurred.
Critical need for pricing strategy expert for B2C company
A PE-backed B2C company came to us with a critical need for a pricing strategy expert to maximize revenue. Since competing against big-box retailers, the company realized their need to set pricing that clearly conveyed the value of their offerings to their price-conscious and value-driven consumers. They set this objective as a top priority and urgently needed a PE-grade pricing strategy expert that had experience in the consumer products industry and could set a pricing and promotion strategy to maximize response rates and demand.
BluWave has in-network experts to connect with client
The client reached out to BluWave and within several hours, we interviewed the company to understand the details & nuances of their need. BluWave utilizes technology, data, and human ingenuity to pre-map assess, monitor, and maintain deep pools of best-in-class pricing strategy experts. Mapping the specifics of the company’s need to our marketplace of third-party resources, we identified two exact-fit pricing strategy experts for the client.
Company engages expert to maximize revenue
Quickly after the initial scoping call, the company was introduced to two PE-grade pricing strategy experts that specialized in the consumer products industry. The client selected their ideal choice. The B2C company was able to confidently drive an excellent outcome without wasting time and the client was able to quickly achieve its objective of maximizing response rates and demand through strategic pricing and an aggressive seasonal promotional schedule.
