Beware of SEO Service Wannabies

**willcode4beer** · 07:05 PM

How to detect if an SEO provider is just a wannabe instead of an expert:

Often, the most obvious indicator is vocabulary used.

The SEO wannabe will use terms like dofollow. (ex. "You need dofollow backlinks")
A real expert knows, that there is no such thing as a dofollow link. Many try to use this to distinguish from nofollow links (rel="nofollow"). The reality is, those are just plain links.

SEO wannabies will tell you that you need "off page optimization".
Again, there is no such thing. You can't optimize what isn't on your site. Anything that happens off of your site: links, ads, etc, are marketing and advertising (not optimization).

The use of made up terminology just serves to confuse the customer and to make themselves appear more knowledgeable. If you know the truth about such terms, you can minimize your chances of getting scammed.

The next thing to be wary of is lack of focus on an overall marketing strategy.
Is there a focus on PR (page rank) over quality traffic?
Is there a focus on traffic quantity instead of quality?
Is there a focus on keywords unrelated to your business?
Is there a greater focus on SERP instead of click through?
Is there a greater focus on backlinks for search engines instead of backlinks for people? (ie.. directory submission)

A "yes" to any of those should trigger warning bells.

**bigcat1967** · 06-29-2009, 06:22 PM

I agree. Especially w/ the "DoFollow Links" - no such thing. Good pointers.

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**Feydakin** · 06-29-2009, 06:47 PM

The only reason dofollow even entered our collective language is because the wonderful people at WP dev decided to make WP 100% nofollow without an option built in to the admin interface to enable / disable it.. Hence the 'dofollow' plugin..

It could have just as easily been named the fred plugin and we would be dealing with people talking about Fred links are important for ranking..

**blue-dreamer** · 06-29-2009, 07:02 PM

You missed one Paul - submission to a gazillion PRx "niche" directories?

**thefandango** · 06-29-2009, 07:48 PM

Yeah that Aaron Wall is a right wannabie....

http://training.seobook.com/site-seo

**Custom Cars** · 06-30-2009, 05:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thefandango

Yeah that Aaron Wall is a right wannabie....

http://training.seobook.com/site-seo

LOL, I was wondering when someone would pick that up.

dofollow and off-page optimization are just phrases to make distinctions in SEO; whether they exist or not is irrelevant. The only thing that is relevant is if it works or not.

**edgray** · 06-30-2009, 06:09 AM

oh no! you're talking about me!

I do say OffPage Optimisation... how embarrassing... I just think it sounds nice :P

**Earnest** · 06-30-2009, 06:23 AM

The dofollow and offpage points are valid, but sometimes they are used for the sake of simplicity, so the warning sing is when a person does not make a reservation for that.

To me, the thing to immediately put one off is "cheap seo services with guaranteed results" - a condensed epitome of how it should not sound.

**aartig** · 06-30-2009, 07:06 AM

The post is truly informative and the things elaborated in this post is even true with the regards as well.. since these kinda services offer the quantity sort of works rather than quality.. which focuses more.. One should be very careful regarding this services that what actually these service provides..

Nice post.. thanks a lot.

**jayguy** · 06-30-2009, 10:44 AM

Thanks for the above post, you are right everyone and their sister seems to be offering SEO services and for the uninitiated it is almost impossible to differentiate between experts and novices.

Do you have any more examples of how you can identify someone who will potentially do you more harm that good in terms of SEO.

**Custom Cars** · 12:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jayguy

Do you have any more examples of how you can identify someone who will potentially do you more harm that good in terms of SEO.

For me the three give aways are when they talk about:

keyword density
putting nofollow on internal links
reducing outbound links to retain page rank

**__internet__** · 06-30-2009, 12:44 PM

Most seo companies are inexperienced anyway whether they use the term "dofollow links" or not. The good companies cost a lot of money. If you're smart and want to succeed with search engine optimization, you should learn how to do it yourself.

**jamestl2** · 06-30-2009, 02:18 PM

Darn It! I really need to spread some more TP around, Paul (this one deserves some more

).

Unfortunately, SEO's who have absolutely zero knowledge of HTML or any other form of site coding should NOT be in the SEO business, IMO.

**blue-dreamer** · 07-01-2009, 12:42 AM

Got another one... " we will write keyword optimised text for your site...blah blah"

...and stick 500 words of guff on your home page

Code:

<div style="height: 100px; overflow: auto">
Guff keyword blah blah...
</div>

**apostle23** · 07-01-2009, 12:49 AM

Most of them if not all of them are completely worthless. I would say that all of the so called CEO companies that I have ran in to did not even have remotely decent ranking for even their own website.

On one of the official Google help pages, it says that "no one can guarantee a position on search engine"

Most of what SEO companies do is submit your site to bunch of worthless directories and write some spam articles and post them on article sites.

**impactwebdesign** · 07-01-2009, 04:39 AM

As per my knowledge google is considering dofollow links only.
If you have backlink from nofollow sites than may be you can get the search result for it but you don't get any other benefits from it.
Dofollow attribute passes PR juice to other site where nofollow is not any kind of PR juice to other site.

**gringo** · 07-01-2009, 04:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by impactwebdesign

As per my knowledge google is considering dofollow links only.

Congratulations, you've just qualified:

Quote:

Originally Posted by willcode4beer

The SEO wannabe will use terms like dofollow. (ex. "You need dofollow backlinks")

**edgray** · 07-01-2009, 06:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Custom Cars

For me the three give aways are when they talk about:

keyword density
putting nofollow on internal links
reducing outbound links to retain page rank

I think that these are the best indications to spot an SEO fraudster. I know of lots of SEO companies in my area that only talk about those things... they really don't know what they're on about.

**John LA** · 07-01-2009, 09:37 AM

In short, the SEO wannabees are those who can't do thing but pretends they can do it. 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.

**willcode4beer** · 07-01-2009, 02:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by impactwebdesign

....Dofollow attribute passes PR juice to other site where nofollow is not any kind of PR juice to other site.

here to prove a point? there is no such thing as a "dofollow attribute" there isn't even a "nofollow attribute".