compare SEO Archives - Page 4 of 7 by Mark Murnahan

Why Do SEO Lie? Their Customers Demand It!

You can often catch me defending the importance of search engine optimization, but I am just as likely to criticize the industry. Actually, I tend to be more critical than defensive, but today I am defending the industry honor. This is because although there are a lot of slimy, no good, low-life, bottom feeding, liars, cheats, and rip-off search engine optimizers on the fringe of my industry, there are also many SEO with integrity. These are the men and women in the SEO field who work hard and uphold good business values and deliver on their promises. These are people who take pride in their work and are as excited to see their clients succeed as the clients themselves. So the question must be asked, “Why do SEO lie?” and we should also question the reasons it has become an expected norm in the field. It turns out that a lot of people simply cannot handle the truth and the market started demanding lies. The truth is that it takes more time, knowledge, and expense than most SEO will be willing to tell you. The lies are a whole lot easier for most people to take.

I have done a lot of thinking about why SEO lie and I think I have some good insight to the matter. I have been in the Internet business since about the time graphical browsers came into existence and I have earned millions of dollars for myself and my clients as a search engine optimizer. This is nothing new to me, and I have watched the evolution from beginning through today. I want to share a bit of that with you, and I hope you will understand this from the point of view of a guy with no reason or intent to lie to you. Note that although I may say I am “for hire”, I am extremely selective about who I will work with, and it is statistically unlikely that you will be one of them. That said, if I bullshit you once, just stop reading and move on.

SEO was once a field in which the biggest challenge was to help people understand the value and the need to be listed at the top of search engine results. Being listed as number one in search results delivers many times the return of being listed lower. If you want to learn more about the math, just read the article “Improve SEO Return on Investment (ROI) With Simple Math“.

A Reason to Perform SEO

I will tell you why I entered the industry of search engine optimization for hire, and fell in love with it. Once upon a time, I merged two companies and created a monster. When I say a monster, I mean something big and with teeth that could bite the head off the competitors. We were in the field of website development, web hosting, Internet access and many other things Internet-related. We quickly found that marketing online was really effective, and we made a stand in the wholesale end of the Internet as the geeks behind the geeks. We found ourselves providing Internet access and web hosting services to over 2,000 Internet service providers and web hosts. It soon got to a point when we made calculated efforts to avoid the retail customer. We were doing so well at wholesale services that I often found myself saying “business is great if it wasn’t for all these damn customers!” What we knew was that it had everything to do with our reach in search engines, and so that was obviously an important service offering. What this means is that I joined the industry because I was already successful at it for my own services. I did not enter the SEO field to earn money, I entered it because it was already earning me money.

By providing SEO services to our customers, our customers can sell more, and in the wholesale end of the industry, that is great. Making customers successful means that they sell more, and since the service our customers sell comes from us, it is an obvious formula for success.

Where SEO Lies Began … The Money

Because SEO was such a lucrative field for top performers, it only made sense that there would eventually be an ugly turn in the market. When money flows fast and easy, it is very alluring for every con artist with a computer and a modem. Don’t tell me you have not seen this sort of greed online unless you have never received an unsolicited email for pharmaceuticals. SEO took on an ugly face as it was flooded with people making false claims and unrealistic promises. This was bolstered with extremely high demand for quality search engine optimization that could not be met by the relatively small number of good SEO vs. bad SEO, and due to the huge growth of the Internet.

High demand created a challenge for many SEO, because the industry not only had to explain the needs and benefits of search engine optimization, but also to defend themselves against a growing public perception that was created by the fringe of our industry trying to cash in on the latest craze. This created a market where legitimate SEO had to compete with liars with nothing to lose. On the surface, it put us at a disadvantage, because we planned to be there for the long haul, while the SEO who lie are just there to collect their money and move on and change their company name as needed. In many instances it caused the skilled to stand out, but many SEO took a stance that “If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”

SEO is Flooded In Recent Years

SEO has taken some obvious directional changes over the past couple years as companies desperately seek cost-effective answers to their marketing needs. The most sensible answers are usually not the easiest or most comfortable for businesses, and this paved the way for an even larger majority of fringe SEO willing to lie to get their business. Many dirty SEO have preyed on notions that if it is cheaper, it must be lower risk, and that search engine optimization is something way over the customer’s head.

The Internet has grown at an astonishing rate, and along with that, there is a huge population of website owners who know so little about the Internet that they are very easy to cheat out of their money by offering them false hopes. Just consider how easy it would be to lie and cheat somebody who knows little to nothing about an industry, and has little patience to learn enough to make good decisions. Then add in the desperation of a recession and you have a formula for disaster.

Many people launching a new website are of the mindset that it will be a quick and easy way to rake in a ton of business and that SEO must be pretty much the same everywhere. This is a huge open door to fraud and misrepresentation of the industry as something confusing and technical. Just imagine how easy it would be to make up a few catchy lines to confuse the public and haul in the money.

What really hurt the industry over time is that as more of the professional SEO who really do know the industry and do a good job for their clients are asked to justify the cost of SEO, more of them lowered their standards to become affordable. It made it likely for honest SEO to take on projects without the resources they needed and only deliver a fraction of what they otherwise could. It started going downhill from there, and it began to blur the lines between the skilled and the unskilled. It caused many of the good SEO to tell seemingly innocent lies of the hard work and long hours it really takes to do the job well. It lowered the good just a little closer to the level of the liars. This also drove many of the good search engine optimizers out of the SEO-for-hire market to focus on their own SEO projects.

Why Would a Good SEO Need You?

It is important to consider that good search engine optimizers who know the job can choose their products and choose their clients. Any time you hire a good SEO, you are buying their time away from other projects, and that creates a cost to them in the way of lost opportunities elsewhere. The best results often come from the SEO who chooses to work for hire because they love it. All the same, they will expect to be compensated well to achieve your success, and often in the form of “pay for performance“.

On that note, I will say that the continued decline of the SEO-for-hire industry is the reason I have recently been blogging less frequently than usual. I am working on my own projects and taking less time to share my talent with others. After all, for the good SEO with integrity and knowledge, we will always earn more by doing the job for ourselves than to do it for our clients. I hope that you will consider this fact when you seek a search engine optimization provider.

I know, my picture says “For Hire”, but the truth is that it is only for those rare few who are not fooled by the lies. It would take a couple sticks of dynamite and a bulldozer to fully drag me away from some of the projects I am working on. Either that or a client with a real understanding of the job at hand and willing to realize that much of what they hear about SEO is a lie. Especially the notion that it is cheap, easy, or the same everywhere.

Search engine optimization done well is worth the effort and the challenges. It is what makes companies more successful than their competition, and it has an important place in nearly any business. I have no reason to lie to you about that.

Good search engine optimizers will agree with the decline of integrity in the industry, while others will prefer to sweep this bit of ugliness under the rug and keep on lying. There will always be those with integrity to defend. In my case, I feel like I can defend SEO for hire more effectively from the outside looking in, and separating myself from what I see as a good market gone in a bad direction.

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7 SEO Lies: How to Know When the SEO is Lying

I was taught that it is not nice to call somebody a liar, but if you hear these things from a search engine optimizer, there is a good chance they are lying to you. They are either lying about the facts, or lying that they know the job of SEO. In either case, it is unreliable information that can cost companies a lot of money and can have some disastrous results.

Let’s have some fun and review these common lies told by SEO. If you have stories to tell, please add your experience in the comments of this blog post.

SEO Lie Number One: Meta Tags

One of the most common lies I have ever heard is when the SEO says, “You just need some keyword meta tags to improve your ranking.” The truth is that meta descriptions are important, but the keywords tag is mostly meaningless. Meta tags are a minor part of SEO and if somebody tells you that adding meta tags is your answer, they are lying to you. Here is some more information on the topic: “SEO Meta Tags: Oh, You Must Be Another SEO Expert!”

SEO Lie Number Two: Search Engine Submissions

Here is one of my favorite SEO lies. The SEO says something like “We will submit your website to 40,000 search engines and directories.” This is not only an ineffective thing to do, it can also be very damaging when your website links are in a bunch of penalized websites called “link farms”. The same thing goes for other methods of reciprocal link exchange.

If you just must submit your website somewhere to make you feel productive, submit it to DMOZ. Otherwise, leave it to the search engines. They will find you if you have something that other people believe is worth linking to.

Never trust the SEO who sells directory submissions and pink ponies. REF: SEO Directory Submissions and Pink Ponies For Sale

SEO Lie Number Three: Guaranteed Search Engine Ranking

Here is a lie I see a lot, and I often wonder how many people actually fall for it. The SEO lie sounds like this: “We guarantee number one results in Google.” The big problems here are often twofold. First, the “top ranking” they offer is for weak search phrases which do not convert to more business. Secondly, the guarantee is worthless because it came from a liar.

If you want to know about reasonable guarantees the SEO can make, read “7 SEO Guarantees: Yes, Guaranteed SEO Can Be Legitimate!”

SEO Lie Number Four: It Will Be Cheap

Inexperienced search engine optimizers will often tell this lie: “Sure, we can get you ranked high in search engines for under $300.” This one is absurd, because if it was true, don’t you think every one of your competitors would have done it, too? This is a sign of the SEO who really does not want a long-term relationship with you, but rather prefers to just agree with you and take your $300 instead of telling you the truth.

SEO Lie Number Five: Technology vs. Marketing

One of the worst lies is when the SEO will lead you to believe that SEO is mostly about a bunch of high-tech stuff that you would not understand. Yes, there are a lot of technical and mathematical aspects to SEO, but that is far from the whole truth. The truth is that if you give people what they are looking for, you will be found. Delivering something awesome is what really matters. You must stop trying to sell jumbo jets to jelly bean customers. Good SEO requires good marketing, and not just good technology. If they told you otherwise, I strongly suggest reading “Search Engine Optimization is Not a Technology Job!”

SEO Lie Number Six: The SEO Doesn’t Rank

Any SEO who does not have a highly ranked website of their very own is almost surely lying. There is no good excuse that a qualified SEO can provide that their own website is not ranked highly and receives a substantial amount of traffic. I have heard them try to lie their way around this and say, “Oh, but we have a whole bunch of websites, and our traffic does not all just come from one or two websites.” My question is this: With all of those websites, why are none of them ranking in search engines? The answer is that they actually do not know how to do the job without being penalized in search engines. Count on it!

There are some reliable ways to know the difference between a good SEO and a bad SEO. Their website is a big indicator. I suggest reading this article: “Good SEO vs. Bad SEO: How to Tell the Difference”

SEO Lie Number Seven: Cold Calling / Emailing SEO

If the SEO is cold calling you on the phone or emailing you offers to provide you with top listings, look out for the worst. Doesn’t it make sense that if the SEO was good at what they do, they would catch your eye in the same way they propose to help people find you? I do not mean to knock every SEO who ever called a prospect for business, but if they are doing their job well, plenty of people are finding them every day. I wrote more about this in the article titled “Find Good SEO: Why Good SEO Don’t Seek Your Business”

Note: If you want to avoid the lies of an SEO, you should spend some time reading and researching. I’ll give you a good head start on your higher education. If you think I’m lying, just search Google for “SEO lessons” and see where you find the link I just gave you about avoiding lies. 😉

For your enjoyment, I have included a video to better understand the SEO liar.

What do you think? Have you heard any interesting lies from search engine optimizers / Internet marketers?

Outsource SEO or Hire In-House SEO: An Unbiased Perspective

This SEO Has Opinions — This SEO / CEO Has Opinions

Many companies will face the question of whether to outsource SEO (search engine optimization) or to hire in-house SEO professionals to improve, manage, and monitor search engine optimization and other Internet marketing efforts. Of course, some companies will overlook the need for search engine optimization, branding, and online reputation management altogether, but don’t worry about them. They will not likely steal away any of your market share, so whichever of these options works best for your company, it is better than overlooking the question.

I have witnessed many arguments on each side of this topic, but most do not give fair and unbiased consideration to each viewpoint. I intend for this to be useful to companies seeking to hire SEO services, freelance and agency search engine optimizers, and in-house SEO who may not be getting what they are worth. My goal is to remain as objective as possible and to discuss something of a potential trend in the online marketing industry.

First Consideration: Who Needs SEO, and How Much?

I want to address one very important consideration right upfront, and that is the question of “who needs search engine optimization?” I do not want to carry on with this part too long, because it should be obvious, and otherwise you would probably not be reading this. There is scarcely a company in existence that will not benefit from proper search engine optimization and Internet marketing. The benefits are measurable, and the factual data proves the importance. A challenging part of the question is in how the SEO efforts you put forth will most greatly increase the bottom line of your company. You would probably not pay a sales representative more money than they return for the company, and SEO is not so different in this respect. You should expect more profit.

In an unbiased fashion, I want to make it really clear that success mostly depends on the skill level implemented and dedication to the campaign. Even very small companies can benefit from either a full-time in-house SEO (search engine optimizer) or outsourced SEO if it is a skilled effort with the company’s interests at task. Believe me or don’t, but the real numbers bear it out that a well executed long-term online marketing campaign has the potential to make nearly any size or type of company very successful. The list of case studies and stories of success is longer than you will ever be able to read, because the list grows each day. I have witnessed it in my own corporation, and we turned a tiny company into a phenomenal multi-million dollar industry success. Proper online marketing should not be viewed as wasted cost, but rather as an investment. It is a very important investment which should not be taken lightly, because the list of failures grows even faster than the list of successes.

Why This SEO View is Unbiased

I have a sincere cause to pose questions about outsourcing SEO vs. hiring in-house SEO and base it on minimal bias. First, I will explain why my comparison is unbiased, and I hope you can see that it is provided for maximum value and not serving the agenda of one side over the other.

I have been a company president and/or CEO for a long time (over 20 years), and not just a CEO. For over a decade, I have been the CEO of a successful Internet company which offers SEO services. I look at this from the perspective of a corporate executive who seeks SEO talent, and also as somebody who has regularly been approached by “headhunters” seeking to bring me into their in-house staff. I was approached recently, and it was enticing enough to really make me consider the two sides of this topic and try to weigh them carefully.

I want to address the topic of hiring internal SEO versus outsourcing freelance or agency SEO consultants in a way that is as cost-aware and benefit-aware as I can determine from my viewpoint. I would also appreciate any input you may provide on the topic, because although I may wish to know everything, I still need people to help me prove it.

I will focus on eight segments plus a summary, and address the company needs and the employee or outsourced search engine optimizer (SEO) independently because I want to make a purposeful case for each. This format should help me to make these high-level pros and cons of each option as unbiased as possible. I will not touch on every point, because this could get very long, but I will address some of the top advantages and disadvantages. My arguments for and against outsourced SEO or in-house SEO will be categorized as follows:

Outsource SEO: Advantage to Company
Outsource SEO: Disadvantage to Company
In-House SEO: Advantage to Company
In-House SEO: Disadvantage to Company
Outsource SEO: Advantage to SEO
Outsource SEO: Disadvantage to SEO
In-House SEO: Advantage to SEO
In-House SEO: Disadvantage to SEO
Summary

So let’s begin to look at this from the standpoint of a company who wants to be more visible in the Internet marketplace, with a more effective message, increased profits … and to do this with the highest effectiveness and the least amount of failure.

Outsource SEO: Advantage to Company

The most advantageous aspect of outsourcing SEO is not what most people may think. It is not a way to save money, because let’s face it, the outsourced SEO has to eat just as much as an in-house SEO. The good ones eat much better. In fact, the expense to outsource comparable results is generally significantly higher than in-house SEO. I see what in-house SEO people are paid by many companies and I wonder how they can do it for more than a couple months without seeking a different field. Then I remember that the lower pay scale usually equates to experience, regardless of the level of talent. Fair or not, that is often the way it is. The underpaid SEO with significant talent should always be seeking more opportunity, because they deserve it. You cannot expect them to earn success for a company without enjoying some success of their own. It just doesn’t work that way.

The greater advantage of outsourcing is that companies can pull from a greater talent base of people who are more highly specialized in the field of marketing and SEO. They are often people who were previously in-house SEO and developed enough talent to fire their boss and go freelance or with an agency. With greater specialization, experience, and overall industry skill, it should be no surprise that the cost is higher (although it actually is a surprise to some). More skill equals more cost … just like it should be. When hunting success, it is best to seek success where it lives. If the SEO has a success record, they are not likely to put themselves in the pool of eligible employees to work for small earnings and punch a time clock. The real benefit here is in the selection, and being able to purchase talent that a company cannot otherwise afford. They may even be able to afford it, but they lack the means to justify SEO to other decision makers.

Another advantage to companies by outsourcing is the typically obvious concerns surrounding human resources issues (payroll, benefits, liability, and etcetera). However, it is quite clear from everything I have read and witnessed that those considerations, especially where they relate to a scale of cost for talent still leave the company with a higher expenditure for outsourcing SEO … but also a higher return on their investment.

Outsource SEO: Disadvantage to Company

Aside from the common disadvantage of budgetary concerns and how very hard it is to free up necessary marketing capital, the company has less perceived control. Much is perception rather than reality, but there is some basis to this. For a marketing director or business owner with a need for immediate action and accountability, an in-house SEO is an easier neck to strangle when something is urgent or if goals are falling short. Most outsourced SEO, if vetted properly and found to be reputable, will care very much to serve their clients. However, they also have their own company interests to address. In instances where resources are pooled and the top-level resources are shifted to another project or otherwise short-handed, a client may not have the level of immediate recourse they like, as they may have with an employee. This often comes down to the level of client you have placed yourself as, and if another client is more profitable and needs urgent attention, it should be no surprise how business decisions are made.

In-House SEO: Advantage to Company

I have not been an employee in decades. I have always been the employer, so I can see the advantages of outsourcing SEO from the company standpoint. A commonly perceived advantage to the company focuses on greater control over the SEO and their marketing message.

This is generally more a myth than reality, but many companies will see an employment contract as more enforceable than an independent contractor agreement. The greater control is not in the enforceability but rather the requirements. If somebody is your employee, you can require them to be in a specific place at a specific time. This can make it easier for some companies to feel relatively secure that their SEO is working a specific amount of hours per day, and help to assure that they are working hard on the company’s projects. To my notion, the most valued benefit of in-house SEO to the company is far more human in nature, and it includes pride in a job done well.

The greatest benefit of in-house SEO to a company will really rely on a much more human aspect of business. If employees are happy with their job and they have a passion for making the company successful, many other obstacles are averted. When they can share in a feeling of pride, their effectiveness is likely to reflect that pride. I saw this most profoundly when I was recently contacted to meet with a company in Chicago. I felt a real connection with the company objectives and I can say for certain that I would accept a much smaller contract with that company than I would accept from other companies which have reached out to me. This is not to say that I would work for any company without dramatically stretching out their SEO budget. What I can say is that the right company could offer me $100,000 lower salary than the wrong one and still capture much more of my interest. I know, some people will think it is crazy that I would take $100,000 less to do something I love and work with people I enjoy. This is far less than the huge number of prospective clients I turn away each year because I would rather choke them than make them successful. Oh yes, SEO with a heart and soul … that must seem silly, right? Having a passion for something always makes a difference in success. Overlooking or doubting this fact is a huge mistake! If you doubt it, read this article: “Where Does Marketing Talent Come From and What is the Cost?”

In-House SEO: Disadvantage to Company

The biggest disadvantage that I can see to a company with in-house SEO is if the well eventually runs dry. Creativity can diminish over time if the in-house SEO does not discover new challenges to meet. This can be assisted with maintaining good relationships and keeping open communication with others in the SEO field, but it is often well-augmented by an outside consultant. For companies unwilling or unprepared to provide their SEO staff with the necessary resources, they can often find a dead-end of sorts. It is mitigated by finding the best SEO for the job, but on limited budgets, companies are frequently required to settle for what they can afford. That can mean having an in-house SEO that is a shallower well, and that well may require a refill from time to time. The tragic disadvantage to many companies is that rather than to bring in additional inspiration, they will assume that their in-house SEO has just run out of value. This is often not the case, but rather that they have just not been granted enough resource. Hiring replacement talent is a tragic end to this scenario, which can set a company back a lot of time and money. I guess the disadvantage here is how to properly discover and provide the degree of trust and artistic freedom which will benefit their SEO staff and the company at the optimal level.

Outsource SEO: Advantage to SEO

This should be no surprise that the biggest gain to the outsourced SEO is financial. Although there are a lot of starving people calling themselves search engine optimizers, the big reward comes in the form of money. Most freelance SEO will have multiple business interests, and have multiple income streams. A good SEO knows how to be more visible with a better marketing message. They do not reserve this only for their clients. I like the way Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz described why good SEO is expensive as relating to the cost of the search engine optimizer’s lost opportunities elsewhere. I have said this before, and it is very true that if I spend more of my time working on clients’ projects, it means less time I am spending on my own.

Outsource SEO: Disadvantage to SEO

I described what I see as the greatest disadvantage of being an outsourced SEO in a recent article, and I think this sums it up pretty well. The article is titled “When I Go to Hell, They Will Have Me Selling SEO” and it discusses the challenges we face from people simply not understanding that there is a huge difference between good and bad SEO. When people see marketing as a commodity, it is hard to help them, even when you have factual data to make a good case.

I see a potential shift in corporate thinking about SEO as the market is flooded by bad SEO. The cream rises to the top, and the best SEO are in even higher demand. Before that happens, a lot of people are hurt by the fringe of the SEO industry bastardizing the market and causing confusion among companies in need of the service. This makes it more acceptable than ever for the higher level SEO to consider leaving the rat race and doing what they love on behalf of an employer. Battling for scraps in a market that people strongly want to believe is a commodity and can be bought cheap is not appealing to me in the least. As that trend continues, search engine optimizers who really do know their work and can achieve results have every reason to be frustrated. Good SEO can compete just fine, but there is a point when it is just not fun to explain something to people only to have them learn it the hard way by hiring a cheap SEO and then come back to repair the mess it caused them.

In-House SEO: Advantage to SEO

I think most good search engine optimizers love their work. That is what makes them good at it. An advantage to the in-house SEO which also benefits the company is that they get to do the job they love and develop a full-scale marketing effort rather than the bits and pieces that many clients will opt for. Instead of working on projects that are shaved down by clients trying to save money, the SEO can do more of the work they know works. It allows for a better focus on both long-term and short-term objectives. Any SEO should love that.

In-House SEO: Disadvantage to SEO

An obvious downside to working in-house is that companies often only budget for low-level SEO positions. Yes, the money is a big disadvantage, but there is one thing perhaps even worse. A battle for many in-house search engine optimizers is that they receive friction from multiple departments. This can happen to the outsourced SEO as well, but the in-house employee is often caught in the middle. SEO involves marketing, information technology, and other departments who often do not see eye-to-eye. Depending on the company’s receptiveness and understood importance of online marketing, it can require extreme patience.

If a company wants the best from their online marketing efforts, they must listen to the SEO and be open to good ideas. When this is not the case, the SEO may have to take on a role which is not just SEO, but also office politician. Such is the life of the underrepresented in-house SEO.

Summary of Outsourced or In-House SEO

In summary, I must say that the worst answer is to look away and ignore the importance of the role of SEO in any company. In many instances, it is most logical and effective to make use of both outsourced and in-house SEO as a united effort.

I believe that as online competition for business increases among hiring companies, the importance of the in-house SEO will cause companies to increase their budgets and bring in higher level SEO talent to achieve their goals. This will provide opportunities for independent SEO, agencies, and employment alike.

For the freelance SEO, I see a continued battle of smaller and “uninitiated” companies viewing SEO as a commodity. This is a common challenge. With more people offering ineffective services it is not likely to fade soon, but it will. Companies who want to remain competitive will see greater value for highly skilled professional SEO in both capacities.

The most pronounced trend I see coming is that high-quality SEO has an ever-increasing demand, including all areas of the field. Filtering out the good and the bad SEO has become more challenging for many companies, but when they find good marketing talent, I expect them to take it more seriously than ever.

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When I Go to Hell, They Will Have Me Selling SEO

When I think about the worst things in the whole world, I have this mental list of things like cruel people, wars, child abuse, murder, and all of that awful stuff. Ranking right up there is selling SEO and Internet marketing services. That is why I say that when I go to hell, they will probably strap me down to a flaming chair in front of a smoldering desk to answer a fire telephone and respond to burning questions about SEO services. Really, I have nightmares about this!

How Selling SEO is Like Hell on Earth

I said that Hell would have me selling SEO, but probably because it is the one thing I despise more than almost any other thing on Earth. I will explain this to you, but first, you must wonder how I can possibly love my job? I love my work as a search engine optimizer, probably more than what you would consider “natural”. If all jobs paid the same, I would have two jobs … SEO and racing cars. There are only a few things I love more than my work as SEO, and those are my family, racing cars, and riding motorcycles. So, it may seem strange that I hate to sell SEO, but I will tell you why.

Most People Only Know Enough About SEO to Be Annoying

It seems common that when people will set out to find good SEO, they have no concept that the best SEO have something more than basic geeky programming skills. I hear things all the time which make me believe that people view SEO and Internet marketing services as commodities. People often think what the SEO does is all about things like properly SEO’d meta tags, page titles, h1 tags and other things that really are a miniscule piece of the overall objective.

Something too many people fail to understand is that SEO is not a technology job! Too many people also struggle painfully to understand that there is a vast difference between good SEO and bad SEO. The difference is huge!

The objective is to earn the highest return on investment for the client. Technical issues, high search engine rankings, and even more website traffic will not achieve the objective without the rest of the assets a good SEO brings. These are the things the client often does not care to hear nor understand.

Good SEO (search engine optimizers) also have marketing talent that goes far beyond what the client is prepared to recognize (or pay for). They mostly just have a handful of common SEO questions that somebody who knew nothing of SEO suggested that they ask. Then they are shocked when the search engine optimizer will give an honest answer instead of just what they wanted to hear. It is almost as if the truth offends them, and they will keep shopping until they find somebody willing to tell them the right lie. Good for them. The one who will lie to them will also show them the lowest upfront price. So as long as they just want to live for today and not consider lost profit tomorrow, that will work great for them.

A lot of people come to me each day hoping to optimize their websites for particular search keywords. They usually don’t have a clue which search words will actually bring them results, and they think it is just some basic tasks that an SEO can do to optimize the existing terrible website content they already have that is already not working.

This kind of shopper does not want to hear that their brand image sucks, or that their website marketing reflects a company that cares more about shortcuts than doing something well. They think of only their landing pages, instead of factors like whether those people actually care what they have to say. They don’t look at whether people spend a lot of time on their site, click on the links in their text, and follow their call to action. They think of more in terms of more clicks equating to more money, but remain clueless how the two things actually relate. To tell you the truth about why I consider selling SEO to be hell, it is because this is the norm, and not the exception. This is the way the majority of SEO shoppers see the SEO industry, and it is why most companies fail to reach their online marketing objectives. I have plenty of numbers to back up this statement, and I live in it every day.

Just yesterday, a man asked me for any keywords that I am particularly proud of for ranking well. I guess that should not shock me too much, because a few prized words ranking well on search engines is what a lot of people think will bring success. I told him that I was proud to have each of the hundreds of thousands of search terms people use to find my work, and to narrow it down meant to narrow down my success in this industry. I gave him a few words, but there is not a small list of prized keywords that make up my big nest egg.

Drag Me to SEO Hell

I guess perhaps it is my attitude alone that makes it feel like Hell to explain things that people do not care to really understand. They set out to compare SEO without realizing that there is no apples-to-apples comparison. SEO is an art and a science, and no two minds will produce identical results.

Too many people come to me with a set of questions, but they already have the wrong answers strongly embedded in their head. If you want to ask me questions about how and why SEO and better Internet marketing works, you must first dismiss all of your previous false conceptions.

The fact is that I am probably the worst guy in the world to sell SEO, but I sure as hell can rank for the term.

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Hiring SEO Tip: The Wizard Mutual Fund Management Cannot Bullshit Me!

I just got off the phone with a guy who purportedly spent over a million dollars developing his quasi-e*trade competitor service that will supposedly bring the whole world of finance back into check and fix the struggles of anybody afraid to lose their money in a mutual fund or other stock market failure. Before I get too far, I want to make it very clear that I do not earn my living writing this blog. People find me here, but it is absolutely not how I earn money. I earn money when somebody comes to me to make their business successful and can push their marketing go button. When they come to me to feed me more crap, I feed it right back to them. Sometimes I feel compelled to tell my readers about it. I often do that with a scorching opinion of mediocrity.

The Wizard guy called me a couple days ago after finding me online. Yes, he found me in a search and I was not seeking him. I don’t seek people, and I don’t do fluffy sales pitches and free market research. I am the SEO (search engine optimizer) after all, and my job is for people to find me, but mostly to help people find my clients. I answer questions and I help people to understand what I do, but I would rather choke them than explain the importance of being visible in search engines with a magnificent marketing message … or that I know how to do it. Seriously, if you find me, don’t ask me if I can help people find you. That is clearly grounds for choking. People discover me many times per hour, and some of them think they understand the whole idea of what I provide, but most of them have it all wrong. I mean, sometimes they get it extremely wrong!

I am not here to sell you stuff or to take your money. Do not ask me for a price tag for a subjective interpretation of success, because I will only tell you that if you want “success”, you better bring your lunch money and expect me to hang you up by your ankles to shake the coins from your pockets. You are not going to get success for free. I already have a wife, and she is the only person who can rip my shirt off and get my talent for free. Success does not come with a set price, and it is not defined the same for you as it is for that other person over there. That is why, if you want success, my standard price begins at 438 squillion dollars. Now just how much success do you want to buy?

I am here to improve my clients’ profits by improving their marketing message and its reach. That is what I am paid to do. I do not care who you are or how much you can pay me … or try to impress me with, because you cannot buy my reputation or integrity. Not at all, and I have foregone millions of dollars in the past to prove that money cannot buy my integrity. Don’t even make a bid, because it is not going to happen.

The Wizard Impressed Me … At First

The Wizard guy gave me a great demonstration of his service and I was impressed. In fact, I was impressed enough to ring “The Wizard” on the phone tonight as a follow-up call to our previous conversation. He was beaming with delight at the prospect of my interest in marketing his service, and we shared some great ideas about what his marketing plan should entail.

The Wizard guy has the brilliance to suggest that his service may be best served as a pyramid scheme. Sure, it could go that way (in a bad movie), but I told him that if he made that decision without the foresight of market research that it could kill a lot of other possibilities he had also hoped for, including potential for selling the company. He had mixed ideas on how to market his service, and I told him that what would benefit him the most before his product launch is some solid market research. He liked that, but thought that should be free. He had the impression that properly extensive market research was something we would just provide free of charge and then send him a proposal for the implementation. It is too common for people to think that marketing is just about the implementation and that the research is just pulled out of our undershorts. It is not that way, and good research with solid projections does not come free … for me, you, The Wizard, or anybody else.

In my opinion, this guy expressed no better clue about marketing the product than an arrogant idea of who should buy “The Wizard” and why the whole stock market and mutual fund industry should believe in him and his flashy but convincing Wizard service. He only explained who he was and who he thought he should sell it to. He seemed to know or care little about who it would actually benefit the most, how to reach them, or the proper message they would respond to. Market research to him seemed to mean I would go and gather all of the magic bullets and put them into a canned proposal, and that to pay me meant I would send him a loaded gun to shoot at his target.

There is a whole lot more potential for The Wizard than he seemed to grasp, but it was only after I gave him a big enough dose of my marketing experience in a “reality pill” that he finally said “this is sounding kind of expensive.” What completely failed to sink in was that in order to bring a product to a position of massive market success in an industry already clouded with distrust and crooks is that you cannot do it with a tin cup full of pencils and a pair of dark glasses begging for nickels on a street corner. When you create a self-proclaimed brilliant product and have the audacity to call it “The Wizard” and brand it as some sort of financial savior, you better be ready to market it and prove that you have more than a mythical profit-solving stock market idea. Marketing takes research, and that means more than a kid next door saying “we can put it on Craig’s List.”

The Wizard Mutual Fund Management Tool Wants Contingency SEO

If you ever happen to Google the term “contingency SEO” I am what you get. Yes, numero uno … I am the guy. I love working for pay based on my performance. That is where I make money, and that is all great. I just hate it when people think that it means they have no cost involved and that I trust them just because … well, just because they called me on the telephone to pitch me their line like a squillion other cheapskates. For my candid take on this, take some time and see the video of Wimpy from Popeye here (if you are reading by RSS, see video on the original blog post).

If you want to know how contingency SEO works, read about it. It does not mean free marketing. It means partnering up with your marketing people and working together for more profit. I know that may get confusing for some people, but the reality is that you cannot shit on your best asset and expect the best results. No … that is not how this works. That kind of illusion only happens in fairy tales and movies … like The Wizard of OZ.

Peeking Inside The Wizard’s Mind (My Speculation)

OK, I get it … if I create a market for this unknown service called “The Wizard” and give my gracious SEO talent and market research on contingency, the wizard will gladly pay me on Tuesday, like that jackass Wimpy from the Popeye cartoons who always owed people for last Tuesday’s burger. Sorry, but no dice. When I market something, I bring more than my good looks and a pocket of arcade tokens. I use my industry reputation, and I use a long list of marketing resources and talents which are not free. I put a lot of money and work into the launch of a product which can cost dearly if I start launching marketing plans like “The Wizard” only to piss off all of my business relations when some Wizard guy does not pay the bill and I am on the hook to pay the people I brought in to help market it with me.

The Wizard Stock Market Service Has No Stock

Before I jump into bed with a client for a contingency SEO contract, they had better be ready to put some skin in the game. I mean, if this guy has a million dollars wrapped up in development of a service, how can he seemingly care so little to recoup the cost and bring it to market the right way. How much can you trust the wizard who did not seem to understand that creating a solution is only a tiny part of a business? What kind of financial wizard is that?

Do you want to do business, or do you want to feed bullshit to somebody choking on a mouth full of bullshit?

Success and earning trust from consumers should require that you can do what you say you can do. You have to be a business person and that means more than having a great idea. You must have money … yes … m-o-n-e-y, because although it may look easy, what I do requires people … full-time people with kids to feed and bills to pay. Without money, it is hard to promote some scheme that deals with people’s finances and retirement futures. I am not about to become another Bernie Madoff jerk by promoting some plan to solve the world’s mutual fund and stock market troubles. No … not for free, and not if I view you as a bad businessman or somebody summing me up as a sucker.

I may be an asshole, but I am not an asshole that you can scam, or pay enough to scam others.

Do Not Act Like The Wizard

If you have a product to bring to market, do not act like The Wizard. Are you seriously so delusional that you think product development is where an idea will make money? No … the money comes after you bring it to market, and sometimes not even then.

If you come to find a need for serious marketing and you reach out to a serious marketing person … I mean one with some marketing talent, don’t come to us with an attitude that we are here to sell you something. If the marketer is good, and if it is any search engine optimizer with a little experience, he or she hears from people like you all day, every day. We get sick of it, and it forces our gag reflex into overdrive. Then we end up waving a bullshit flag all over you and may turn you into the next Suture Express. Go Google to see what happens with companies like Suture Express when they irritate the SEO by not paying. Don’t take my word for it … go and ask Google!

If you want the best marketing, it is better to treat it as if you are going to the bank seeking a loan. You want what we have to offer (money), that means you need to give us a reason to approve you. This is especially true if you are seeking contingency / performance-based SEO. I am not your momma, and I have no obligation to feed you. Let’s get that straight right now. I have three words for cheapskates wanting a free lunch and those are “rub a lamp”.

If you think I make my money here … writing this blog, you really got it all wrong. I make money when non-bullshitters reach up under their sack and bring something to the table that I can market for them. Hitting me up for a bunch of free ideas and then insulting me is a good way to get said sack on an Internet chopping block.

So there is my rant. Do you want to do business, or do you want to feed bullshit to somebody choking on a mouth full of bullshit?

That is my opinion. Take it or leave it, but don’t act like you didn’t see it.

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