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“Save your Money”

written by on 24/04/2012

In general I hesitate to give any SEO company money. In fact it is a very notorious industry - no one knows anything really, and there is always an excuse why the results of the campaign didn't turn out as initially planned / promised.

The only campaign I will ever sign up to is a SEO company who does the WORK FIRST and if the results match as what has been promised - THEN I will pay. In fact this is the ONLY business model for an SEO company that makes them serious and trustworthy. Everything else is not acceptable.

In case of SMART TRAFFIC, they are even worse. They called me up and I was given the opportunity of a trial campaign for £1,500 or something. Oh, wait - the final price will be £1,800 as they will add VAT. Tricky, isn't it ?
So you get a few links per month and you HAVE to sign up for 3 month. Now since you only get a few links per month that makes 1 link worth £20 !

Yes, that equals a nice lunch - and make sure you go for the lunch instead of wasting your money on the links posted. As

A) those are their servers with no PR
B) The links will disappear after a year (as per terms & conditions)
C) For a link costing you £20 - they post the keyword and link it to your page (there will be no comment, article, or what-so-ever. NO EFFORT AT ALL) - please DIY and save the money!
D) It does not help at all - after 3 month you will be told a different story i.e. Sign up for a real campaign, then it will work OR well, it just takes longer.

Oh, in case they promise you at the beginning of the campaign that you will rank on the first page on google for a specific keyword, bear in mind they preserve the right to ALTER the keyword slightly (from a short tail - that counts - to an absolute useless long tail keyword) -

Example: you want to rank number 1 in google if anyone in the UK types in "Car Dealership London" - well they will optimize it that you rank number 1 in google for "Kars inLondon", "LondoninCars", "CarDearlership in Northfolk". And then say that this has been agreed. In fact, keep records of conversation and everything must be written down in case you wish to deal with them.

I am afraid this wasn't for me and a big waste of money - nothing has been achieved, completely misguided and waste of resources. I am not sure how they can sleep at night.

Really - do it yourself.

Keep posting in directories relevant to you, forums, write a blog, use social networking, spread the word ...

And most importantly - come up with an idea people want to know about / or want to buy - and your website will eventually appear on top of google for the right keywords! There is no need to spend money on SEO at all!

When we stopped spending money on SEO and focus on the business and our products and optimized our website (without anyones help) and spread the word ourselves we suddenly appeared on top and problem was solved.
Bear in mind - Google cares about information and what is relevant to the users - not amount of meaningless links on servers in thailand pointing to your website! Well, it surely counts - but bear in mind with £20 for a link you might have to spend £100k+ before it makes a difference.

Hope this helps, K.