SEO Offers from other companies

[achieve]

Hi,
A client of mine was called yesterday by a SEO company from UK, and I have included thier follow up email below. By all accounts the person on the other end of the phone was very plausible, but my client decided to check with me first. As things stand, this client is already on page one for their most important keyword phrases. My main question, where's the catch - how can a SEO business "guarantee" page 1 position for 7 keyword phrases in Google's natural/organic search for 12 months?

Just to confirm what we discussed on the phone earlier, XXX Company will guarantee your
website is listed on page 1 of Google in Ireland the natural listings
on the left hand side for a full 12 months.

Because this is a natural listing, as opposed to a pay-per-click system, you would be able to have
an unlimited number of clicks onto your website.

Your phrases are changeable at anytime during your years subscription, we will simply replace one of
your phrases with the new one and re-optimise your site to incorporate the new phrase, changes to
your keywords are completely free of charge.I will become your account manager, and you will be able
to make any changes through myself.

I will include a tracker for your site so that you can see which of your keywords work best for you
and where your traffic comes from, I will do this at no extra charge.
Your website will be indexed every 48 hours to maintain your high position on Google.

84% of all Internet search traffic goes through Google, the 16% remaining is shared between the
business directories and other small search engines, due to this our main focus would be on
improving your traffic from Google.

This will cost you 327 Euro, it is a one off payment and there are no monthly charges or maintenance
fees.

If you find that 7 phrases is not enough to cover all of the services that you wish to be found for you
can upgrade the main search engines, you can upgrade to 14 phrases, this will cost an extra.

I look forward to speaking to you shortly
--

 

[MOH]

I'm new to the whole SEO business, but to me it sounds like bull.
I don't believe Google's search share is anywhere near 84% - recent Nielsen figures (US only) show 66%, and I thought I saw a figure of around 70% recently somewhere else.

How can they "guarantee" the site will be indexed every 48 hours?
And not only do they guarantee #1 position for 7 phrases, but you can swap one out whenever you like and they'll just "re-optimise the site"?!
Sure why not pay the extra and go for the 14 phrases.

Also, ice of them to include a tracker showing which keywords are driving traffic "at no extra charge", very generous.

 

[Gavin]

If they were a good SEO company they wouldn't guarantee anything. Especially when it comes to ranking on Google.

As Google states:

Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a "special relationship" with Google, or advertise a "priority submit" to Google.

Warn your client away from this company. Their guarantee is enough is wave a red flag.

 

[raul]

achieve,

I can tell you that in the last 2 or 3 weeks a lot of people got this type of call from the UK ( North ? ) ...

Is a SCAM so please tell your clients to forget about it ... or to ask them who they are ...

NOBODY can guarantee what they say they do ! ( on this price too - like buying Brown Thomas stuff on Tesco prices )

Regards.

 

[Juice]

Gavin is right - steer clear of SEOs who make guarantees.

The only people who know what algorithmic changes are coming are people who work at Google. SEOs can only try our best to keep up.

 

[RedCardinal]

I'd hazard that the one-time payment will be by credit card, and the likelihood of further charges being made high.

This to me sounds like a full-out scam, where they will simply take your money and do nothing. Are they even a real company? Have you checked the UK's companies office?

 

[link8r]

We've had a lot of people come forward with calls fromt he guys. There a few - Matchmaker Marketing, Zenith Media, Storm International (in Ireland now too apparently) and someone yesterday whom I can't remember.

It is a PPC campaign. What they do is pick a set of keywords, quite often 5c ones, show them at least competitive times and charge a fixed price - e.g. £199 per month. Technically they give a top spot for some of them - but the daily budget and bid amount are all unknown. I'm guessing but I suspect only about £100 of the money is spent on the adwords. Two people I spoke to though said they were happy.

Its also sold under the following guises:
1. They are guaranteed a top spot from Google
2. They bought the top spot
3. The British Government negotiated tops spots when Google became Massiff (sales guy from Essex) and kept them for SME's
4. They are a special "Google Retailer"

I have an e-mail from a senior VP at Google stating they have no such relationships with these companies. One of the sales reps from Matchmaker posted that the reps often made up these stories themselves in order to make sales. When you talk to a manager, the whole story is toned down.

As more and more companies take this up, more and more people will use them and it could add a negative perception to SEO/Online marketing.

 

[MickyWall]

Link8r, the quote from Achieve talks about the natural listings as opposed to PPC.

I blogged about what some unscrupulous companies are offering with poor and valueless Pay Per Click campaigns The Great Google Adwords Resellers Rip-Off | Internet Marketing Belfast - Michael Wall

I wonder are there any Irish SEO companies/consultants that offer guarantees on the clients investment, should targets/rankings not be reached, like a no win no fee scenario. You could argue that this is not the same thing as guaranteeing rankings, and more a pay per performance model.

 

[Toiletroll]

Watch the amount of Scam artists increase as the economy declines. It may re-enforce your existing clients but may cause an additional hurdle (trust) for you to gain new ones...

 

[RedEvo]

SEO is already well established as an industry with many fraudsters. It makes it a difficult industry to be involved with, just like most things connected with the web.

d

 

[RedEvo]

Agreed. I think PFP is attractive for many as they see it as a cheap option, which it isn't.

If we are asked to do PFP would:

1. Estimate the effort (hours) needed to achieve the clients goals.

2. Add a bit for the risk we are taking because as you say, there are no guarantees

d

 

[RedEvo]

You've got to sell it to them on what the consequences of not doing it are. Without using underhand tactics it's not hard to show why they should be doing SEO/SEM etc. Try this.

d

 

[isaacscott111]

We cannot control the page ranking or positioning of a website in google or other search engines through SEO services. It also depends on other things such as content of the website, which is important to gravitate readers thereby increasing its traffic. SEO services will just be a tool to increase traffic and page rank. We cannot predict how long will it take for the website to be rank #1 in google. It also depends on the competition of your website.