The blind leading the fucking blind!

Seems to be exactly what the offline SEO business has become.

I was once told by a good friend, If someone was THAT good at SEO they would be creating the sites and selling you the leads / ad space or they would be brought up by a big multi national never to be heard of again.

This sub forum especially seems to be people selling the earth to get contracts and they don't have a clue! They get contracts they outsource it all out to apparent experts, the algos change and they come crying for help that they cant deliver what they have promised.

Gives the rest of us a bad name, I'm pretty sure SEO "experts" will be despised as much as double glazing salesmen within the next few years.

I know this comment wont make people alter what they do but when you cock up you make the rest of the industry look like cowboys.

I know for one I stay away from SEO for precisely this reason, yes I will advise clients on seo but I wont offer it and I'll damn well warn them about what the people in this industry are like.

Offline marketing is incredibly lucrative, Its pretty much all I do (well hybridized) but I very rarely work with small business, (other than friends businesses).

Doing SEO and reputation management is getting a seriously bad name from the get rich quick brigade who don't know what their doing and are just following a few guides on the internet!

Thanks for the rant

Agreed. That all its caused by:

peoples without fantasy to offer some unique service/what they're truly good at.

due to that it ruins a good part of the industry. That is happening from ages in Website building, especially due to shitty pre-made sites likely Blogger, Weebly, Web, Yahoo.

But that is normal, I guess it happens in almost evry service in the world, tho aslong you're smart to do something others don't do, and do it nicely there shouldn't be any problem at all!

yeah i dont wanna be that way.id rather learn everything i need then the money will come.too many people just throwing themselves head first in and its gonna come back and bite them in the bum sooner or later

If you are capable of doing good SEO
Then you are depriving your clients of a very cheap and effective market strategy.

By rubbishing SEO companies to your clients, you are actually promoting your own business and justifying
high charges, at the same time misinforming your clients, of what is potentially there best opportunity
for making money.

While you may think of yourself as the good guy, protecting your clients from scammers,
The real truth is, You are protecting your own business model. and preventing your clients
going to a cheaper method of Marketing

effective seo stopped being cheap along time ago (niche dependent).

I work with large multinationals with lead generation, think private medical insurance, care homes, insurance brokers etc etc, I never offer them seo services just seo advice.

That is, never go with a company you've heard of blind, aka they sent you a letter, they phoned you etc. better to ask around and find out what other local businesses (you can trust aka who aren't competing with you recommend). And to rule out the ones who recommend them because they are a friend of a nephew or what not.

Paizon at least with a bad website design it wont cause any lasting damage, bad seo can!

effective seo stopped being cheap along time ago (niche dependent).

Click to expand...

Yes for large Multinationals copeting with each other,
But for local businesses in medium and small town,
there are 100s of businesses ranking 1st with little or no SEO.

Depending on the business a client can be worth anything from 100O bucks to $20,000 an up.

I've ranked sites for as little as $2000 and the clients have seen their business increase by 10 times
that in 3 months,
Maintaining their position only costs them $100 a month and they keep getting $20,000 and up in new clents every month
not to mention the word of mouth recomendations and returning business is all free

I am not talking about multinationals with millions to spend on marketing, I,m talking about small family biusinesses
who where struggling to get new business in this recession,.

SEO is not just for the big guys, in fact, its for the small local bsuinesses. that it is most effective.

Yes there are bad SEO companies out there, but do you think how a small company that is barely surviving
can afford to hire you , Not in a million years,

While those who do their research and ask the guys sitting on top on different businesses who they hired
can actually get great value for their buck.

I agree with what you said in your OP, however the same can also be said about almost every other business sector.

Any business or person who puts their trust and money into anything without first doing any research, is almost certain to fall foul of the 'cowboys' of any industry.

The thing that really peeves me off, are those that go around installing wordpress sites/themes and call themselves 'web designers'.