Finding reputable SEO providers? Long rant

[Redsand187]

How do you find a company or a person that actually knows what they are doing. I have spoken with companies ranging from a few hundred a month to thousands of dollars a month. Every damn one of them has the exact same presentation. They never have a real plan. They just say, "oh, we'll get you good quality links through good content." No one says what that is, how they'll do it, how long it will take ect...

It makes me wonder, why is SEO even charged on a monthly basis? That's the cycle of the moon, what does it have to do with anything. I've asked just about every provider to give me a basic timeline of what to expect. All I'd like to see is them to actually analyze the site, point out the weaknesses on-page, what they will do to fix that, how long it will take. Then plans for creating content, distributing it in terms of campaigns, blog posts, videos, infographics whatever.

Is it too much to ask for someone to tell me what they are going to do and why? In any other industry in the world, an expert charging hundreds of dollars an hour, should have enough grasp on their field to be able to have a plan, why that plan is the best option, and what kind of results to expect from it. Even if the plan was fully implemented and was a complete flop, I'd understand. But just writing big check each month and being told that it might take a year for there to be any real progress seems like a great fleece.

Also, is it wrong to think that slow link building that takes months to gain any momentum probably have no real value today or in the future. In my mind, it's obvious google is pushing fresh new content to the first page. The boston marathon is a good example of this: Monday morning, if you searched for boston marathon, you would have got all kinds of info on the race. Yet, Monday afternoon, the front page is full of discussions and news articles only an hour or two old. While I don't expect an SEO company to launch me to the first page overnight, doesn't it make sense that if google doesn't see value in your link/content the first day it's published, then they likely aren't going to see it valuable a month from now, a year from now, etc?

I'd love to be able to do it myself, but my business is already too big for me to handle on my own, and dedicating even more time to SEO work isn't going to be possible. So how can I find someone who is actually capable of running an SEO/IM campaign in a manner that would be somewhat accountable for the money spent?

 

[crazedspyker]

A lot of big seo agencies don't really know what they are doing. I'm not saying they are all bad but most of them overcharge and can't even rank their own sites. There are plenty of exceptions to this and you'll be able to separate the good from the bad once you've learned the value of what they're doing. A lot of it is just overpriced fluff.

You will find much better results if you learn a bit about how SEO works and then go out and put the pieces together yourself (most of the "building blocks" you need are offered here in the BST). You just need to know what to buy, when to buy it, and how much of it to buy.

You will still be paying for services, but you will know exactly what you are getting and have control over it. The actual cost of the services you receive is surprisingly low compared to what big agencies charge. If I charge a local client 1 grand a month, I usually buy my services and tools here for a few hundred bucks. Since you know about BHW, why not just buy directly yourself?

EDIT: Also, the reason a lot of seo companies won't reveal every little detail is because if they told you how to do it, you could do it on your own for a fraction of the price (without them). I do agree thought that they should provide more analysis and details on what you can expect. At least enough so you don't feel like you're in the dark.

 

[KraftyKyle]

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but it sounds to me like you are confused as to why SEO companies don't give out more information to their clients. I'm with crazed on this one in saying most SEO companies are overpriced and frankly BS, but I will also say that you should be getting reports of the work they are doing (in any situation in which "work" is being provided to you).

 

[txhepoker]

1) Why would a company give out the recipe that keeps them in business?... They wouldn't so stop asking...

2) Nobody can give an estimate worth a damn about how long it will take to rank. What works today may not work tomorrow!! Additionally, when you get to the top 4 of a niche the odds are very likely you are going up against another seo professional. So in essence, you are asking how much time will it you (company A) to outrank (Company B).. There is NO way someone can actually answer that...

In my experience getting to page 1 isn't shit for most niches.. It's busting the top 4 bubble is where you get the cash.. So if you are results oriented, and most people are.. Then ask for a "pay per performance" rate.... This is the closest guarantee to satisfying your seo needs you will get...

I hope this helps brother...

Good luck to you!!

 

[Redsand187]

My thing is I want real content, I want stuff that is evergreen. The site/business I own is a brand with international distribution in a competitive niche, not far from grossing 6 figures a month.

 

[Redsand187]

1) Why would a company give out the recipe that keeps them in business?... They wouldn't so stop asking...

2) Nobody can give an estimate worth a damn about how long it will take to rank. What works today may not work tomorrow!! Additionally, when you get to the top 4 of a niche the odds are very likely you are going up against another seo professional. So in essence, you are asking how much time will it you (company A) to outrank (Company B).. There is NO way someone can actually answer that...

In my experience getting to page 1 isn't shit for most niches.. It's busting the top 4 bubble is where you get the cash.. So if you are results oriented, and most people are.. Then ask for a "pay per performance" rate.... This is the closest guarantee to satisfying your seo needs you will get...

I hope this helps brother...

Good luck to you!!

I'm not looking for #1. I'm looking for traffic. There are a million ways to the same end. When a plan looks like: Pay $10,000 up front, and $7,000 a month afterwards, and in 6-12 months you might see improvements, it's hard to put faith in that. I'm not marketing generic viagra, I have a legitimate business that is on a broad scale. I get the impression most SEO providers have no experience in anything but local SEO, because frankly that is simple. But competing in a multi-billion dollar industry on an international level, I think that requires some real talent. If a company tells me they have that talent, I need more then just their word. This is a higher stake game them most are used to.

 

[jstover77]

How do you find a company or a person that actually knows what they are doing. I have spoken with companies ranging from a few hundred a month to thousands of dollars a month. Every damn one of them has the exact same presentation. They never have a real plan. They just say, "oh, we'll get you good quality links through good content." No one says what that is, how they'll do it, how long it will take ect...

It makes me wonder, why is SEO even charged on a monthly basis? That's the cycle of the moon, what does it have to do with anything. I've asked just about every provider to give me a basic timeline of what to expect. All I'd like to see is them to actually analyze the site, point out the weaknesses on-page, what they will do to fix that, how long it will take. Then plans for creating content, distributing it in terms of campaigns, blog posts, videos, infographics whatever.

Is it too much to ask for someone to tell me what they are going to do and why? In any other industry in the world, an expert charging hundreds of dollars an hour, should have enough grasp on their field to be able to have a plan, why that plan is the best option, and what kind of results to expect from it. Even if the plan was fully implemented and was a complete flop, I'd understand. But just writing big check each month and being told that it might take a year for there to be any real progress seems like a great fleece.

Also, is it wrong to think that slow link building that takes months to gain any momentum probably have no real value today or in the future. In my mind, it's obvious google is pushing fresh new content to the first page. The boston marathon is a good example of this: Monday morning, if you searched for boston marathon, you would have got all kinds of info on the race. Yet, Monday afternoon, the front page is full of discussions and news articles only an hour or two old. While I don't expect an SEO company to launch me to the first page overnight, doesn't it make sense that if google doesn't see value in your link/content the first day it's published, then they likely aren't going to see it valuable a month from now, a year from now, etc?

I'd love to be able to do it myself, but my business is already too big for me to handle on my own, and dedicating even more time to SEO work isn't going to be possible. So how can I find someone who is actually capable of running an SEO/IM campaign in a manner that would be somewhat accountable for the money spent?

You already spent 20 minutes bitching about the industry. You could've spent that time educating yourself about SEO. So when companies pitch you, you can see through the bullshit.

 

[Redsand187]

You already spent 20 minutes bitching about the industry. You could've spent that time educating yourself about SEO. So when companies pitch you, you can see through the bullshit.

I can see through the bullshit, that's the problem. How do I find an SEO that pitches something other then bullshit.

 

[jstover77]

I can see through the bullshit, that's the problem. How do I find an SEO that pitches something other then bullshit.

Just do it yourself. Seriously. It isn't brain surgery. The amount of time you will spend finding an outsourcer, then worrying about it...you could be doing it yourself.

 

[Duffers5000]

I dont think you are really looking for an SEO expert as your primary need. You could do with an SEO expert to to analyse your site/business. Identify strengths/weakness/opportunities/threats. Optimise your on page campaign and tell you keywords and long tails to target. That should be a straight forward job and if someone cant give you a straight estimate and detailed report then keep looking.

Sounds like you are more trying to build a brand in the long term. This can be classified as SEO but strictly speaking its a Marketing/PR Job. I would employ my own guy to write a company blog , do press releases, Guest posting/blogging, running my social media etc.

 

[50cent]

i always thought finding an seo company would be easy enough...See their previous work, check what they've ranked for and how competitive the terms are and see if the rankings still stick. If any company pussy foots around providing this evidence of work by bringing in "customer confidentiality" crap and not wanting to show previous rankings then simply tell them where to go.

Strength of previous achievements is the key. I say this because i used to get calls from strangers calling me asking for me to optimise their site when they noticed that i had ranked some sites in their niche. People tracked me down (without me advertising anything anywhere) called me just on the strength of seeing previous results. The funny thing is that they were my own sites and i wasn't even offering seo services to anyone. So if a company can prove that they have strong track record then that should tell you most of the story. Any dressed up seo service without proof should be taken with a pinch of salt.

 

[Kimi]

From your latests posts I understand you need a guarantee from the SEO company for that 'high stake'. Well guess what - It won't happen because especially when doing white hat SEO with unique content you as a SEO Company you will need to invest at least 50% of the money you get from the client.

It doesn't needs actually to be a long term link building campaign (not an year, not 6 months but 2 or 3 months it's considered long enough) but that gives you an extra of 'guarantee' for your rankings. And for the boston marathon, in 2 weeks discussions will stop and I'm going to ask you to double check the rankings and you tell us what kind of pages are ranking there again.

When comes to SEO for a business (that's called white hat SEO for long term) you need 1. good keyword research to find the most profitable targeted keywords and 2. backlinks from unique content. And that's it, now you need someone to do that and you will rank.

 

[cocococo]

I don't mind giving my clients the course of plan on their campaign, the improvement their sites needs, however what your asking is a little too much for anyone to give you full explanation, like how long it will take? and no one is going to give you their full recipe, I don't care how much you paying monthly, but to be honest if I come across a clients like you, I would be more than happy to decline you.

 

[DHSellerUK]

SO many of my current clients have been ripped off by cowboy SEO scum, it makes our jobs harder to acquire a good ranking for them after they've had their site blasted by 10k backlinks a month whilst we have to find and disavow all these f&^%ing backlinks and optimize pages that have been completely spammed to death by cloaked linked to the old companies site as well as the fact we have to wait 6 months to build trust with them rather then them having the trust to jump straight into a big budget so both they and us loose business from them not having the faith in investing what they'd like to.

 

[theRanker]

I would stay away from those who claim to be "experts", and stay away from SEO company sites with all their fake reviews. Those reviews could have been faked all the time.

I'd say BHW is a good place to find a very good SEO for your needs, look in the services for sale section. I mean scammers won't last long there and if a seller has a ton of positive feedback most of the times it's because it works, period. And most of them don't self claim themselves SEO experts.

 

[Redsand187]

I would stay away from those who claim to be "experts", and stay away from SEO company sites with all their fake reviews. Those reviews could have been faked all the time.

I'd say BHW is a good place to find a very good SEO for your needs, look in the services for sale section. I mean scammers won't last long there and if a seller has a ton of positive feedback most of the times it's because it works, period. And most of them don't self claim themselves SEO experts.

I'm not apposed to gigs here and there, but I would like a lot of quality content as well. (2-3 quality items/articles a week) Ideally, I'd find a "project manager," as there is too much stuff I deal with already. But it's one of those things where I know I'd be better off handling it myself, but that is just not possible with the other aspects I handle.

 

[goodseoman]

You must be a seo expert and outsource someone to do backlinks. In this case you would know everything they do, because you tell them what to do. Backlink package is about link building report guarantee, they would give you report to prove that your sites already have backlinks somewhere. That's all.
Or you should hire seo experts to do whole seo work monthly (including onpage and offpage). If you want to know how they do it, the you should learn SEO by yourself.
Halfway seoing will lead to failure for sure.
In your case (businessman), why dont you find SEO services that guarantee your site on page #1 within specific amount of time or all your money back. You can pay some setup fee or deposit....in advance.
SEO services dont guarantee traffic, they guarantee ranking. But they must advise you which keywords to have good traffic, then push your site up to page #1 for those keywords. It's their job and you pay them to do that simple thing. If they are not capable to push your site up to page#1 then they really do not deserve your hard-earned money.
No page#1 ranking - no paying. that's it.
As for monthly payment, it's a must for maintaining your ranking. Your site could not run on it own, couldn't it?

 

[Redsand187]

I'm not wanting a guarantee of traffic or rank. I just want to know what is being done.

In any other industry for a project, you'd create a plan, implement the plan, and assess the results.

Not say "give me a bunch of money, and I'll do some voodoo and you may or may not see any results."

 

[cocococo]

You must be a seo expert and outsource someone to do backlinks. In this case you would know everything they do, because you tell them what to do. Backlink package is about link building report guarantee, they would give you report to prove that your sites already have backlinks somewhere. That's all.
Or you should hire seo experts to do whole seo work monthly (including onpage and offpage). If you want to know how they do it, the you should learn SEO by yourself.
Halfway seoing will lead to failure for sure.
In your case (businessman), why dont you find SEO services that guarantee your site on page #1 within specific amount of time or all your money back. You can pay some setup fee or deposit....in advance.
SEO services dont guarantee traffic, they guarantee ranking. But they must advise you which keywords to have good traffic, then push your site up to page #1 for those keywords. It's their job and you pay them to do that simple thing. If they are not capable to push your site up to page#1 then they really do not deserve your hard-earned money.
No page#1 ranking - no paying. that's it.
As for monthly payment, it's a must for maintaining your ranking. Your site could not run on it own, couldn't it?

Where do I sign up for no page 1 ranking no paying, and my keyword will be weight loss that okay sir?. :mod:

 

[goodseoman]

everything can be bought with enough money. the small problem is the agreement between both sides