I have been an accountant/economist for about 46 years and have started this import/export website last year. Trying to create jobs through export if US products to mainland China. You would not believe (probably) the BS I encounter when I try to find a legitimate, i.e. honest SEO type. I need two, one for the US (Google?) and one for China (Baidoo). All these “experts” are looking to Get Rich Quick off my small income. I am really tired of GWP, a/ka
“Greedy White People”. Home in Maine, we express pique as “I’m going to kick’em with a frozen boot!”. We paid good money for our current website, which stinks. I am rewriting it and adding new suppliers and will relaunch, probably by January 2012.
Right now I have a company telling me it will cost $80/month to get good positioning on Google. I do not know what is true, what is normal. Baidoo is still unknown but we are researching that cost too.
Any ideas from anyone? Do not want to good things illegal or not kosher.
Regards to you all…Guy Gray

Like Lorraine, I too hired a company who preyed on my ignorance – a month was all it took and I am still paying for the “help”.

Even though I thought I did do my due diligence – they did not explain everything (and I don’t think my rep even knew) they (the techies in the background) were going to do and I ended up with non-existent 800 numbers on a mirrored copy of my website. They took over my free listings and changed the numbers and website on them as well and one by one I have to find them and fight to get them “re-claimed” – what a mess!

Now I do it myself, a little at a time, each day with help from you!

To David Anders, I like what you said about how your focus is on one aspect of marketing. You’re not trying to be all things to all people. I love that! I am the same way.

It’s very hard to determine what being an expert is. I have way more background in technology than many of my clients but that to me doesn’t make me an expert. Even in industries that have training, certification and degrees, that does guarantee an expert.

We all get ranked by our ability to meet our clients needs best we can. SEO is tough because it changes so much. I don’t even know if Google can count themselves as experts.

In past years, we saw Expert Desktop Publishers, Expert Web Developers, and now Expert SEO people. And yes there are scammers…many of them.

I feel potential clients need to do more research themselves and structure any SEO work they do on a temporary basis or ask for more details on what is being done. The legit SEO companies need to look at maybe better educating people. If a scammer says, I can get you in #1 or #2 spot in Google….well they are lying. Buyer beware.

In the SEO work that I do, I find that if you play by the rules and follow the guidelines from Google and other search engines, you can be successful. But you have to be honest with people. And they can’t be distracted by advertising from scammer SEO people. Some of the onus is on the business consumer I hate to say.

Lastly, I am finding that SEO is so much more tied to good content, active social media work and clean/clear coding. Submit a great website with proper information and content and you will rise to the top. Thats where in my opinion alot of people fall down…they don’t do the above and then rely on SEO to make magic happen.

My 2 cents! :+))

Gordon

Great article, as always. Everybody wants to claim to be an SEO expert, just like they want to claim they are a video producer because they’ve owned a flip cam for 3 months now!

Also, anytime you have a service that is not well understood by the customer, it is SO EASY for some smooth talker to convince a customer that they know it all! As you know, I hired a company that preyed upon that ignorance. I firmly believe that they were convinced that as long as they kept the BS flowing, then I, as an ill-informed customer, would believe they were doing all this work when in fact they were not doing squat. That was their business model! sigh….I am still paying for that.

Keep up the good work!

LG

Great post, living in Malaysia, they are lot of guys claiming to be Gurus of the internet. One such Guru met up with me and couldn’t answer the basics of web marketing. I appreciate your point. I wouldn’t consider myself an expert in the class of people like Rand Fiskin and yourself. Thanks for the post.

There is also another contributing factor in that most businesses think a web person, is a web person is an IT person. We are all the same .. right ?

I look at it as opportunity .. so many bad SEO agencies, creating so many opportunities for the good guys. Its easy to show potential clients where their current provider is missing the mark. What other profession can you do that? You cant apply for a job as an accountant and show a company how their books are currently being cooked ?

As always .. good article Nick !

In each case, the quality of the content was dismal, and the SEO scammer used black hat techniques to promote it.

I’ve emphasized this point to potential clients, and it has worked well for differentiating my work from the Black Hats. The ethical members of the SEO industry are easy to spot, the content they promote themselves with will be well written.

As an ethical SEO/Content Manager, I emphasize the quality of content as the foundation of any SEO effort. In each situation where I’ve been brought in to “fix” bad SEO, I have focused on improving the quality of the content as the first step.

If a potential client is not interested in improving the quality of their content, I will walk away. There is no ethical way to promote bad content. This is why I firmly believe that the ethical SEO industry must promote quality of content as a significant differentiating factor between White Hat & Black Hat SEO.

As an SEO, a degree doesn’t have anything to do with the quality of your work. It is the content that you use to promote your effort which speaks volumes about the quality of the work you do.

Nearly every credential/non-credentialed industry/profession is rife with false prophets. (It strikes one as interesting as how this affect precisely mirrors the US governments which are dysfunctional at every level.)

Education, more education, and more degrees means only one is proficient at taking tests and regurgitating (frequently with undesired fluids). Few can think for themselves.

Like every other skill, digital or otherwise, working-learning, learning-working, hands-on, measured results, and first hand experience with success are more important than credentials, or huge numbers of sites/clients/cases.

Watch out for those who tell you “WP is nowhere”, “let us run your site”, “let us host your site”, or “let us build your site” … They are only salesmen in SEO glasses. The SEO person you want/need doesn’t do those things.

Truly good professionals are hard to find–they are not out of their offices knocking on doors or sending mountains of email; they are busy doing that which makes them professional. Hint: SEO. That is, you must search them out in person, not Google keywords of relevant terms and pursue the top ranked hit.

As there is no free hot lunch, there are no quick, easy or free solutions to success with SEO, or any other phases of life.

It is a reputation that I wish I could stop and help these people before it is too late.