I get calls every week of another SEO company promising placement.

For myself, having been so aware of the scammers and the fraudsters offering guranteed placement for X amount of dollars- I have just avoided SEO altogether, because I didn't want to include my name in their list rip-off artists.

But very recently, after realizing exactly how essential SEO is (or can be) I am starting to take to it from a more serious place- realizing that there are people out there who are genuinely good at this, and while looking to get paid for the expertise: aren't trying to promise their potential clients the world, or blatantly lie to them for profit.

Good thread. Another giveaway is poor English.
I am finding that the web is becoming full of expert wannabies on every topic !
This is cased by Google Adsense - everyone wants to make money by setting up a website and getting some content and hoping people will click on their ads.
This just makes it harder for genuine companies.

Eg I have been trying to find some good affiliates and on line stores that will drop ship. There are many directories, but they are all either too highly priced or if they are free, there are no responses !
So I guess it goes to prove that you get what you pay for.

Originally Posted by Digmen1

Good thread. Another giveaway is poor English.

Because, as we all know, all SEOs are native English speakers? That's an interesting generalisation.

Originally Posted by gringo

Because, as we all know, all SEOs are native English speakers? That's an interesting generalisation.

No. But, we'd generally expect professionals to ensure their grammar is correct when advertising on their own sites (regardless of language).

I speak pretty good Spanish but, if I were advertising a service in Spanish, I'd probably hire a native to write my copy.

Lamentablemente, muchos indígenas también son incapaces de escribir bien. Es triste, pero que casi siempre necesita un escritor profesional.

The ultimate SEO is a site owner who cares about his or her own site.

SEO is simple and very open. It's just a matter of self discipline and persistence to do things the right way in terms of quality and quantity.

Yawn....I see a million posts like this all the time from people that own websites that get 39 hits a month from Gooogle.

If an SEO company charges for or includes in their sales pitch that they submit to search engines, then run for your life.

Typically you get what you pay for and I saw a good quote on DP - There is a reason Rand gets $1,000 an hour for SEO and there is a reason that overseas folks charge you $1.25 an hour.

Another giveaway is poor English.

I agree with this if you are optimizing for an English site, I think the SEO should speak the native language they are optimizing for. I am sure there are good French, Spanish and other SEO's when they optimize sites in their own native languages.

The ultimate SEO is a site owner who cares about his or her own site.

A smart and successful site owner or any business owner for that fact is one that knows when to delagate and manage their time properly. Spending 10 hours a day learning/doing SEO might be counter productive if you are the best (or only) salesperson on staff.

Originally Posted by wayfarer07

The ultimate SEO is a site owner who cares about his or her own site.

The truest statement there is

Originally Posted by wayfarer07

The ultimate SEO is a site owner who cares about his or her own site.

Couldn't have said it better myself Wayfarer.

Originally Posted by willcode4beer

No. But, we'd generally expect professionals to ensure their grammar is correct when advertising on their own sites (regardless of language).

Good point. Injustice radar stuck on maximum

I can think of an exception, though. Popular kiddies sites (gross generalisation) rife with txt talk and rap/street talk whose owners nonetheless know what they're doing and get their sites ranking well. L8ters.

It is important to use the term do-follow links as there is a huge difference between no-follow and do-follow. How can one neglect this difference?

Originally Posted by Extreme-Seo

It is important to use the term do-follow links as there is a huge difference between no-follow and do-follow. How can one neglect this difference?

I suppose you just don't refer to it. There are just links, and nofollow links... I did see a talk by Matt Cutts stating the declining importance of the nofollow tag anyway...

But, if you're selling SEO services, would you even need to talk about nofollow? I can see it being used as jargon just to make SEO services sound impressively complicated to the layperson...

Originally Posted by Extreme-Seo

It is important to use the term do-follow links as there is a huge difference between no-follow and do-follow. How can one neglect this difference?

BUT the absence of this limiting value does NOT mean that the link will be followed and/or pass value on for Internet search engines to use in their ranking calculation.

From <link type="selfpromo">Don't follow that! dofollow this instead.</link>

A lot of people get so confused about dofollow and nofollow simply because I think they really don't get the meaning of nofollow in the first place. That it is only to prevent spider bots from crawling. Which makes them not to see the fact that "dofollow" is actually what happens to any working link.

Nice explainaton paul, its just that there are still some who don't get it.lol