Subscribe Feed (RSS)How to Quickly Screen an SEO Company in Less than a Minute
September 21st, 2008 by Joshua Dorkin | Filed under Advertising, SEO, Search Engine Optimization.What does a SEO Company Do?
I know, it sounds like a simple question, but someone who doesn’t know what an SEO professional does is likely to get screwed by some con man looking to rip him off. Most people will do a few minutes of research and find out that people who help others with SEO exist to help others climb in the search results of the search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN, Ask, etc.
Last year, I wrote an article about how to work with SEO consulting companies, but after the events of today, I wanted to riff a bit more.
Last night I was contacted by the representative of an SEO company who was looking to help another company with their site’s optimization. He wanted to advertise on one of my sites and I quoted him the price. In response, he told me that the budget was tight and offered me a price that was 11% of our rate. I told him that I couldn’t do it, and got the following response:
If you really don’t want to accept $200 for the couple of minutes of work it takes to put up a[n advertisement], then that’s your decision.
Well no, I don’t want to take $200 for an ad position that is worth $1800. Does he expect to buy an $100,000 Porsche for $11k? It was simply a ridiculous request, and as someone who works consulting people on website optimization, he knows full well the value of advertising; it is not about the time it takes to place the ad, but about the value of the ad itself. The NY times could place a full-page ad on page 2 that I design, which would take 5 minutes of their time, but that position would probably be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. People simply AMAZE me!
What to Look for in an SEO Company?
Start by looking at their website. This is usually the fastest way to write off an SEO company. After getting an email from the guy, I decided to swing by his website to check it out. He was smart enough to never mention the URL of the company that he was trying to advertise, because I would have shared the following with them.
His website consisted of 3 pages: Home, Services, and Contact Us
The “Contact us” page didn’t work. The other pages were missing meta tags for keywords and description. By spending less than a minute on the website, I would have told anyone interested in hiring them for SEO to RUN! If the company you’re looking to hire isn’t fully search engine optimized themseves, why would they know how to help you any better? There is of course, more to SEO than simply adding META tags, however, on almost every occasion, when I find that there is some SEO that is doing a poor job, it turns out that they skip their own tags. It is a good screen to use to cut out the crap.
How do you Check Someone’s META Tags?
This is very simple, even if you know NOTHING about making websites or HTML. Just go to the menu bar of your browser and enter the VIEW dropdown — you’ll find either “Source” or “View Source”. When the source page opens up, you’re going to want to look for the HEAD tag, which is simply the word Head surrounded by brackets. Somewhere after the head tag and before the BODY tag, you’re looking for tags that start with META NAME.
Here’s an example of what the Meta Tags look like:
<META NAME=”KEYWORDS” CONTENT=”SEO, META TAGS, search engine optimization”>
<META NAME=”DESCRIPTION” CONTENT=”This is a description of the page using keywords”>
If you don’t see anything resembling the code above on their pages, then you know it is time to run.
Summary:
Had the customer of the company that contacted me, done the above before hiring the firm, they would have seen that they were not cut out to consult on SEO. If you don’t practice what you’re slated to preach, then you shouldn’t be charging folks for your services. Additionally, you don’t want to insult potential partners by offering them 11% of their going rate, because that might lead to a blog post about your nonsense . . . luckily for them I’m a nice guy and never mentioned them by name.
Tags: Keywords, meta tags, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, website optimization
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Nice article, and very true!
Great post Josh.
It is amazing how people who will contact you about advertising will then berate you for charging too much. It is not like you cold called him!
Hey Tom! Thanks for the comment. I’d love to find out what they are charging their customers for their top quality service. I’ll bet it is not cheap!
SEO companies all seem to be a little bit “smoke and mirrors” to me, so this is a good post.
I tend to go with the rule that if a SEO company contacts YOU, then they are possibly not that good.
A good SEO company will have plenty of clients reaching them through good results and word of mouth advertising.
I agree with you completely, Essex. In this case, the company contacted me because they were trying to sell a link on one of my sites, but if they are out cold-calling to get work . . . RUN!
An SEO company without seo in their META NAME=”KEYWORDS”… lol
wow, that is unbelievable, I actually think that you are being too nice for not publishing their name. It may help others to know who to avoid (even though you gave great tips on how to avoid!)
But yeah, wow, they are ridiculous. . .
Cheers!
Liam
[...] Joshua Dorkin presents How to Screen an SEO Company in Less than a Minute. [...]
Very true, If you want your keyword to rank in SERP, Start doing SEO..
SEO is a very in demand jobs now a days. If you want to get more traffic and be no.1 in search engine, try SEO..
I hear ya, Liam . . . I guess they didn’t piss me off enough!
Wow. i think the SEO companies should read the post more then the client.
I know, it sounds like a simple question, but someone who doesn’t know what an SEO professional does is likely to get screwed by some con man looking to rip him off. Most people will do a few minutes of research and find out that people who help others with SEO exist to help others climb in the search results of the search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN, Ask, etc.
It is high time that we have a seo review site that is a site where clients can post about the seo consultants.
This is something what you can really rely on…! Since long time I look here at regular intervals and read the interesting and well written contributions. Its really appreciating.
The article has a great insight. I greatly enjoyed looking through the topic and found it very informative one for people like me.
I Would like to know more on these topics.
It is a terrific eye-opener.
Finding meta tags is good strategy to hit the competitors. nice post!
[...] Dorkin presents How to Quickly Screen an SEO Company in Less than a Minute posted at Time For [...]
Hi,
The blog is interesting and also helpful, you have given a good idea on hoe to choose a best SEO company. It can help people on what parameters should they select a SEO compant.
Great tips on choosing an SEO service. I have to laugh every time I see a Web Design company offering SEO services as an “added” bonus. Their catch line is usually something like “We’ll submit your website to hundreds of search engines”
Wow, where do I sign up!
Don
i can totally see where you are ocming from with regards to the price and relating it to the Porsche scenario!! sooo true, I have been ‘upset’ shall we say by my previous SEO company as they promised this that and the other blah blah blah, no results at all!! and hardly any communication, I have now found another one which I am happy with (so far) but this should be for the SEO co’s to read not the customers!!
I have received 3 proposals in the last week from SEO firms. When I pressed further and asked further questions about their own websites, none have replied. I absolutely agree that a SEO must demonstrate its ability with its own site. Too often proposals are too vague about the services that will be delivered
good tips and trick about seo service. more interesting all bonuses if i submited my sites. but where i can find all site to submit just than google, yahoo and msn?
I shall always try to follow your advice.
great post, a little hard to read with some of the weird characters that didn’t transfer well, but other then that I enjoyed the brief quotes form the interview.
This is something what you can really rely on…! Since long time I look here at regular intervals and read the interesting and well written contributions. Its really appreciating.
I completely agree with you if the site of an seo company is not properly optimized then how can they help the client.
Solid point to watch for seo company
very interesting article ..
I always tried to find using popularity
Andrew
Always ask an seo company what exactly it is going to do and in how much time.
Ask questions on which keyword they are going to optimize and what is their budget.
Asking these kind of questions will determine the status of an seo company.
Should be an eye-opener for such persons. Nice of you not to have revealed the names but that would have helped others to be cautious!!
SEO is most advance job now a days. we can say that it is the most demanding job now a days… how site will rank, how site will be optimized are very interesting things to learn…
I tend to go with the rule that if a SEO company contacts YOU, then they are possibly not that good. A good SEO company will have plenty of clients reaching them through good results and word of mouth advertising.
Wow! Excellent blog, this post is very good is my first visit, congratulations.
Most SEO experts only squeez money from people with offline business that aren’t webmasters and just want some promotion through their webs.
But there are still some SEO experts which bring You significant traffic and money spend on SEO brings some serious traffic effect.
It is amazing how people who will contact you about advertising will then berate you for charging too much. It is not like you cold called him!
Quite an informative post! i must appreciate you for this well written content
That’s what I usually do for SEO companies who offer SEO consulting services - check their own meta-tags.
Honestly, freelance SEO are more effective that SEO companies because the former tends to spread out his work whereas SEO consulting companies mostly focus on two strategies: link exchange and directory submission.
The lesson here is you should know your stuff before offering it. Nowadays, there are people who are so desperate to get clients and they almost say or do anything just to get one.
I’d love to find out what they are charging their customers for their top quality service. I’ll bet it is not cheap!
ya me too I’d love to find out what they are charging their customers for their top quality service. I’ll bet it is not cheap!
I have found, with increasing rates, that many of the ‘SEO’ firms are actually outsourcing 99.9% of the leg work to off shore workers that have little to no knowledge or experience.
when approached for ad spots i like to see if i can sniff out country of origin….sometimes for curiosity…sometimes cuz i want to know where i might get that little extra bit out of my expense budget
I have to agree that most of SEO firms hires other personnel to the works.
I work in an outsourcing company that lends skilled workers to SEO firms.
I’m glad I do my own SEO. I can’t imagine how you would hire someone to do something that you don’t understand, and therefore can’t check up on. I have been subscribing to Planet Ocean for a long time, and it has helped a lot. Most of the time when SEO people call, they want to submit me to search engines and direct new links to me. But it’s always some sales person calling who doesn’t even understand SEO, so you can’t really ask them any questions. I think the best thing to do is learn it yourself, BEFORE you have your website designed. Most sites can’t be optimized because they were designed wrong in the first place. For instance, your files names have to be right. If your designer calls you product page “products.htm” instead of truck-tires-for-sale.htm, you can’t easily change that later.
In a sea of thousand competitors trying to get on the top list, a new light is shinning forth. It’s called SEO.
There are so many people out there trying to rip off people. You’re right if you have a horrible site that is not SEO than what can you do for others? Thanks for the tips to help me in my search for a real SEO company!
Honestly, I keep coming across blogs that talk about SEO’s and I really didn’t understand what they were talking about until I came to this one. Thanks for going over the basics again for people like me.
I agree with you completely, Essex. In this case, the company contacted me because they were trying to sell a link on one of my sites, but if they are out cold-calling to get work.
SEO companies all seem to be a little bit “smoke and mirrors” to me, so this is a good post. I tend to go with the rule that if a SEO company contacts YOU, then they are possibly not that good. A good SEO company will have plenty of clients reaching them through good results and word of mouth advertising.
That was one of the clearest and straight forward posts about SEO companies i have ever read. I have been burned a couple of times from NOT following your steps
Whoa, total whammy. I just feel so bad for people who don’t know any better and hire those shady SEO companies.
No more mr. nice guy. You should have just exposed them.
Excellent post, helps to know more information about SEO company,congratulations.
Those points are good but not the only system. There should be something else.
Thanks for great post
Too many amateurs SEO among the web!
you have seo articles, good!
I think this is awesome tips on choosing an SEO service. I have to laugh every time I see a Web Design company offering SEO services as an “added” bonus. Their catch line is usually something like “We’ll submit your website to hundreds of search engines” helps to know more information about SEO company,
Excellent post! I really enjoyed reading it.
I will be back for more!
Really good guidance on SEO.Thanks for providing the information which i am looking for.I just want to try it out as per the knowledge i gained here.
There is good information to provide SEO instruction in the post very nice!
I have received 3 proposals in the last week from SEO firms. When I pressed further and asked further questions about their own websites, none have replied. I absolutely agree that a SEO must demonstrate its ability with its own site. Too often proposals are too vague about the services that will be delivered
thanks for the good tips
nice picture.
It is shameful how some individuals and companies conduct themselves online. His request to post your ad reminds me of real estate. He wasn’t offering you $200 for your time. It was the website real estate that he wished to purchase.
Thanks for this post.It is very interesting.
all so very true. thanks!
Wow, that is unbelievable, I actually think that you are being too nice for not publishing their name. It may help others to know who to avoid. But yeah, wow, they are ridiculous. .
Great post! I will certainly print this for everyone at work to review. Keep them coming!
l
Great blog.All posts have something to learn although i am new on internet but your work is very good and i appreciate your work and hopping for some more informative posts . Thanks
Good one, i read your article “how to work with SEO consulting companies” and that one is very informative many new things to be learned. But one thing i want to ask if there is any relevancy of meta tags(now) for search engines especially GOOGLE, i ve read somewhere that google doesn’t give more weightage to Meta Tags, whatever the thing is i don’t feel this is true for me meta’s are always important.
You made the right decision. Perez Hilton has his page’s ad prices on a back page and they’re insane. He definitely knows his page’s worth and he would never let anyone undercut him and none of us should either! Good move…
What I think is funny is SEO providers that really promote themselves as being the best yet they have no PR ranking and are nowhere to be seen on google because they only have a few pages indexed and maybe a couple hundred inbound links. LOL .. those guys are everywhere too
As i would like to increase knowledge over SEO it helps me a lot..SEO technology is very important and with proper use, you can rocket your online business success level..
I think there is alack of awareness especially among smaller bsuinesses on what is actually involved with SEO. Anyone involved with it at some level can easily tell you the hard work involved in getting a page 1 position for a keyword. The costs involved as such will be reflective of the effort involved. With regards to hiring an SEO firm, in addition to tags, which anyone can do quite easily; one should also see how well their own website ranks for some of the related keyphrases. Whilst I Do not expect every SEO firm’s website to rank on first page of Google for the word ‘SEO’, I would certainly hope to see some first page rankings at least for some long tail kwyword phrases.