How to Avoid SEO & Digital Marketing Scams

As a business owner or a potential patron of search marketing services you may have found yourself victim of fast-talking sales pitches or emails on ways to “increase your rankings” on Google. Here is a small list of things to look out for before you sign ANY contract with any Digital Marketing or SEO firm.

Tip 1: SIZE & AGE: The size and age of the company does not equate to quality. There are several multi-million dollar companies that still produce low-quality products and services. Just because a company has been around for years could mean that they are very successful at their shell-game. You don’t have to discount longevity completely but don’t put a whole lot of faith in it either.

Tip 2: AWARDS: Legitimate awards can be representative of quality but there are many awards / certifications / badges that can literally be purchased. They actually aren’t “awarded” at all. Sites like TopTenReviews SELL the top spots. They are not earned.

Lists like the Inc 500 and Inc 5000 can be prestigious, but the criteria is based on the percentage of growth of gross revenue not profitability, and certainly has absolutely nothing to do with the quality of work or ethical behavior.

“Fastest Growing” type designations are again based on revenue growth. There are so many bogus awards around that some companies even set up fake award sites and hand them out to whomever they want (including themselves).

Check to see if these awards are reputable and given within the last 2 years. There are many companies that tend to rehash the same old awards from years earlier before their reputation and service took a dive.

Tip 3: CLIENTS: Anyone can list a bunch of logos of clients that they say they have worked with. Ask to speak with a reference at several of the large companies and ask about the specific nature of the work that was performed. Have them point to the results THEY achieved with that big name client. If there is no testimonial ask them why if they were so successful and proud of that relationship.

Typically what happens is that some companies get a small contract from a sub-division or a subsidiary business of a larger company and pass it off as if they have a portfolio of large clients. The idea is to siphon the reputation of a respected brand and trick you into thinking that they TOO are respected by association. Other times they even do work for free (whether or not it is good work) just so that they can say they worked with those companies.

In some cases these firms use outsourced vendors (more on that in a moment) and it is those vendors that HAVE worked with these larger organizations so the agency literally piggy-backs on the success of another company. You’ll see some companies that literally list the vendors of the products they use but present it in such a way that makes it appear as if they have worked with those companies. For example, if you have an Adobe developer account does that mean Adobe is a “strategic partner”? It can be very misleading.

Finally, there are those that just outright lie knowing that you’ll never check the reference. Even if 1 in 100 prospects tried to confirm the references it doesn’t matter because the other 99 won’t.

Tip 4: AS SEEN ON: In addition to trying to make it seem like they work with large companies it is also a common practice to pretend that they are newsworthy and have been “featured” in the media. A common practice is to try to get on sites like the Associated Press, CNN, or the Washington Post.

Guess what the trick is?

You can pay to have a premium press release sent out to top news outlets and many of them just publish these news releases on their site with no editorial review. PRESTO!!! Now you can say you were “featured” on a big media site! No real credibility can or should be gained by merely buying a press release submission for a few hundred dollars.

Tip 5: BBB / REVIEWS / Rip Off Report: Make sure you type in the company’s name or the owner’s name into www.RipOffReport.com, the Better Business Bureau, your state’s Attorney General, the Federal Trade Commission or other review sites. You can also try searching in Google for the company’s name and the word “scam” or “rip off” or “reviews“.

If there is negative feedback you can bet the company will have tried to use reputation management to suppress that information so that it doesn’t get out. They could do this by purchasing and launching one-page blogs or setting up Web 2.0 sites, or profile spamming to get the negative sentiment pushed off the first page. They can also pay sites like RipOffReport to do a fake “verified review” using their “Corporate Advocacy Program” to combat the negative feedback.

If you confronted these companies on their complaint they may even claim that all of the negative reviews were just competitors or disgruntled ex-employees trying to hurt their reputation.

While this is possible, and some clients can be overzealous in their reviews even if they got a full refund, you should still consider this information as there is likely some truth to be found especially if there are multiple negative reports. There is a good chance that for every one bad review there are 20 more unhappy clients that never took the time to post anything.

Tip 6: FAKE DEPARTMENTS, INTIMIDATION, DEFAMATION, SLANDER: There are a lot of companies that when threatened with a negative review or a contact with the Attorney General will come back strong with intimidation and claim that they will go after you for defamation or slander. Most of the time this is just to scare you.

They may even CC a “legal team” in their email that doesn’t even exist (remember anyone can set up an email of “[email protected]”). Though we aren’t here to give legal advice the fact is that there is something called the burden of truth. You can’t really defame or commit libel or slander if what you are saying is actually TRUE. Likewise, everyone is allowed to post their PERSONAL OPINION or EXPERIENCE on a subject. It is protected under free speech. The offending company would also have to prove that meaningful financial harm was done which is extremely difficult to prove especially if there are already many other complaints on the company.

If it was so easy to win defamation lawsuits then every company that EVER had a negative review on Yelp, Amazon, Ebay, Angie’s List or any review site anywhere would sue everyone. There would be no negative reviews on any company ever. You don’t hear of these lawsuits often because they are EXTREMELY difficult to win. You have every right to report on your personal experience with any company you wish. You don’t want to make up false accusations and you will want to be as factual as possible, but you can certainly make your discontent known to the world and possibly save others from making similar mistakes. Don’t be intimidated.

2) OUTSOURCING: I could list at least 50 companies that have over $1 million in annual gross revenue that outsource almost all of their services. Many of them don’t really have a true expert on staff and even if they do that person likely will not be the person working on your project. You would be AMAZED at how many companies outsource to INDIA, CHINA, or the PHILIPPINES. I have nothing against these countries or their people. I DO have an issue with the quality of work that most of these companies produce and the substandard services they provide.

To be fair there is a lot of mediocre work being done in the US as well. Most of this is due to poor business models that are based on the mass production of SEO tasks, while little consideration is given to the overall strategic approach and creative artistry that goes into successful Internet consulting. There are also people that will always look for a shortcut and either don’t know or don’t care about the risk associated with such practices when it comes to SEO, content creation, or link building.

Some agencies outsource to other US-based companies that have an army of interns that have little experience and are simply ill-trained to handle the nuances of digital marketing, content writing, conversion optimization, SEO, PPC or branding marketing.

Tip 7: IN WRITING – NO OUTSOURCING: If it matters to you that the company you are hiring do all of the work themselves then get it in writing that you do not want ANYTHING outsourced. No blog posts. No social posts. No “likes” or “tweets” or “shares”. No getting people off of oDesk or Craigslist. No third party vendors of any kind. That means no outsourcing logos, web design, or web development to 99designs, Behance, Freelancer, Elance, Vworker, or DesignCrowd.

Let me be clear. Some of these services are actually OK and can produce good quality work if monitored for quality control. In fact there are a very small handful of SEO fulfillment companies that do EXCEPTIONAL work, but the vast majority are low-quality chop shops.

If you are OK with the outsourcing then the company should be up-front about it and should ONLY charge you for the hours of Project Management and should not be making money on you for being a middleman.

It has been my experience over many years that a large percentage of SEO and digital marketing firms do not have in-house teams that do the bulk of the work. Typically, it is a bunch of cobbled-together, low-cost vendors or contractors to do the grunt work while a Project Manager or Account Manager piece it all together and create reports.

If this work is audited by an expert and checked for quality then you might be OK but the point is that you shouldn’t be paying top dollar for something that is outsourced for pennies.

Tip 8: SPEAK TO THE PERSON DOING THE WORK: Ask to speak to the actual digital marketing, social media, web developer, or SEO specialist that is going to do the work. Not just the “Account Manager” or the “Sales Rep”. Also ask for their bio/resume/credentials and look the person up on LinkedIn.

The industry is FILLED with people that have only had one job in SEO ever, have almost no experience, or have read a few forum posts and subscribe to a few blogs and call themselves an expert. There is nothing wrong with someone working their way up in the field and paying their dues. The problem comes when these people are represented as digital marketing “gurus” when they really aren’t.

If you are in a competitive industry or are an Enterprise client, make sure they have shown success with those types of accounts before. They should not be learning on the job with your money! Make sure that even if the person IS in-house that you aren’t going to be sold by the their “top expert” only to be handed off to someone 3-4 levels lower that may not produce the type of quality you were promised. GET IT IN WRITING. If they don’t want to put it into the contract then there could be something fishy going on.

If their “top guy” is overworked, fine, maybe they should hire more experts. I’m sure there are other companies you can go to where their top expert ISN’T overworked. If you are paying good money for premiere talent then it isn’t your problem if the company can’t run their business efficiently.

If the agency you are considering is truly reputable and up-front with their process then maybe you can work with them. It is possible that their expert does the in-depth audits and creates the overall strategy then has his army of underlings do the work. There is nothing wrong with that if it is checked for quality. However, if that is the case it should be reflected in the price. If you are being charged $100 or $200+ per hour for a true professional’s time that is reasonable, but NOT for the time of someone making minimum wage.

Tip 9: LOCAL MARKETING: Almost every local search marketing company on the planet offers nearly the same type of services. And almost ALL OF THEM outsource to the same companies. UBL (Universal Business Listing), Yext, Acxiom, Local.com, or Neustar Localeze. These are NOT bad services. Many can really help you claim listings and get you exposure and business citations, BUT, don’t be fooled if a company claims to do all of these services themselves when they likely don’t. Most simply have a re-seller or white-labeled service with these other providers.

For example, if UBL would charge you a PREMIUM package of $169 for the ENTIRE YEAR (https://www.ubl.org/products/premium.aspx) then why should some company charge you $1000 per month ($12k per year) for the exact same service?! It is highway robbery!

If the agency is performing additional services above and beyond the deliverables that these providers offer then the additional cost may be justified.

How much on-page optimization are they doing? Are they doing additional Link Building? How many hours will it take? If much of that work is in Month 1 then why are you paying the same rate for the rest of the year?

If the scope of the project changes over time, that TOO should be clearly spelled out. Obviously the work done in Month 4 should be different than the work done in Month 2.

This is also why some of the best companies offer a block of hours for consulting services that can be allocated to a variety of SEO and marketing tasks each month. This way the expert that is spearheading your marketing efforts can determine the best allocation of the monthly time. Maybe the first 30-60 days is focused on SEO cleanup and on-page optimization while other months focus more on content creation, link building, or content promotion.

The price of the service or at least the scope and expectations of the project should reflect the various phases of the marketing process.

3) GUARANTEED RESULTS: Anyone that says they can guarantee rankings or an increase in your organic traffic is either incredibly naive or an outright liar. They don’t control Google and they don’t control your competitors. Even getting “first page rankings” doesn’t really mean anything if they are targeting the wrong audience.

4) SETUP FEES: Other than the time it takes to gather some information there should never be significant setup fees. This is where these companies often pad their revenues and get more money up front or trick you into thinking you are getting a good deal when they magically disappear.

5) STRATEGY: Make sure that you aren’t being fooled by some fancy reports to hide the fact that real work isn’t being done. Also check to confirm that the strategy being proposed is the best use of your resources.

There are some great tools out there that can help digital marketing experts audit elements of the strategy, promote content, engage users, or monitor progress. However, just giving you a ranking or traffic report each month should not be a replacement for actual work. You should be getting a clear explanation as to what has been accomplished each month to help progress towards the overall project objective. It could be content creation, on-page optimization, SEO cleanup, link outreach, claiming listings, brand promotions, or other tasks.

6) URGENCY: If there is a constant pressure to sign up RIGHT AWAY then you should be skeptical. It is the car dealer approach of “what will it take to get you in the car of your dreams today?” They know that once you leave the dealership the chances of closing the sale drop significantly. But, a true expert will not need to resort to such sales gimmicks. They should provide you with quality information and options and let you make the decision when you are ready.

Now that we have given you 18 tips on how to avoid getting scammed by an SEO or Digital Marketing company there are some things you need to do as a potential client.

That’s Right! You also have to take some responsibility!

There are many things that business owners don’t really understand about digital marketing and it can encourage or enable these shady behaviors by unscrupulous marketing companies. Because many clients demand low-cost services or “instant” results they can create the demand for these low-quality services.

1) PATIENCE: Digital Marketing isn’t a campaign with a start and end date.

Digital Marketing is a methodology for how you plan to market and interact with your audience FOREVER.

GOOGLE has purposefully tried to create and evolve the ranking formula so that people can’t just jump to the top of organic results for any meaningful keyword overnight.

Think for a moment as if you were Google.

If you owned a popular search engine and cared about the relevancy of the results you deliver would you want someone to be able to manipulate the keywords on their website, buy a bunch of links, get some fake social shares or likes and jump to the top of the results? How does that benefit the user? If you (as Google) could detect such attempts wouldn’t you take measures to prevent it?

If you want to get immediate traffic you can pay for it using Pay-Per-Click advertising. Google uses hundreds of search signals and ranking factors that can help quantify TRUST, AUTHORITY and RELEVANCE. They do this to help determine whether a company SHOULD be ranked higher in the search results or if their site or page is a good match for what they believe the user is looking for.

You don’t just develop authority by writing a check to an SEO firm and waiting 30-60 days. They want to see a consistent and long-term approach to marketing your business. What makes your site better than other sites on the internet with the same or similar content? Do other authoritative sites link to you thereby vouching for your online reputation?

As Twitter founder Ev Williams recently expounded upon at the XOXO Conference in Portland Oregon, the Internet is nothing more than trillions of connections. Connections between sites, people, businesses, content, interests, products — everything.

Every time you LIKE or SHARE or COMMENT you are making a connection. So, naturally these connections serve as a way to determine authority and even trust of websites throughout the Internet. You can imagine that Google would look at the natural growth of these connections with your business over time. Is it consistent and growing? Are the people that connect with you either socially or through links also authoritative and respected?

• What does it say if you launch 50 articles then do not touch your site again for another 6 months?
• What does it look like when you acquire a bunch of links in a short amount of time then almost no additional links for months or years?
• What should Google infer about your site if the people that are “liking” or “sharing” your content are fake profiles or originate from some other country?
• How do you think Google should react if they found that the links you got just “happen” to have the exact keywords you are trying to target (how convenient… what are the odds!!!) within seemingly generic content and is placed on low-quality sites that are filled with other forms of link spam or guest posts or comment spam?

Do you really think Google can’t detect and evaluate these elements? Their server computing capacity is estimated to be 4 times larger than the world’s largest and fastest supercomputer. Yes, more powerful than the U.S. Defense Department. And, they are only getting faster with investments in quantum computers that may be able to process information even thousands of times faster in the future.

Yet, these are the types of services you are being pitched by some SEO companies that just promise you links or likes or blog posts as if it was just that easy and simplistic to get “first page rankings”! There is no short-cut to online success anymore and those that try to “game” the system will typically only waste their time and money.

Search engines can now use many of these signals to determine your INTENT to manipulate the rankings. Many of these SEO agencies will say “yes but we make it look natural“. Sorry… no you don’t.

As Matt Cutts, head of the Google Search spam team, once said,

“The objective is not to make your links APPEAR natural, the objective is that your links ARE natural.”

So, if you think you can simply spend some money and jump to the top of Google’s organic search results in a competitive keyword within 30-60 days you will likely end up very disappointed and will probably blame the SEO company for not delivering. While some of the fault may be on their end you as a business owner or marketer also need to take some responsibility. You need to educate yourself as to the true nature of Search Marketing. If you decide to go with a company that tells you all of the things you want to hear to close a sale then do not be surprised if it you do not achieve the results you are looking for.

2) RESPECT TIME AND EXPERTISE: It takes time to do audits and analysis. Sometimes a LOT of time. It also takes skill and experience. Quality companies should not be handing off your strategy or keyword research to an inexperienced member of their staff or an outside company.

However, at the same time you shouldn’t expect a professional to spend a ton of time without being compensated for that time. It seems like everyone these days wants everything for free. Respect the expertise and time that needs to be invested to give you a proper strategy. You can not blame someone for not giving you a true in-depth analysis when you have shown no commitment on your part.

Is a digital marketing expert really suppose to spend 20+ hours looking at your site, your competitors, your backlinks, your content, your keywords, do user research, market research, usability audits, and conversion analysis when you can take that information and walk away?

Instead, sign a retainer consulting agreement just for the audit and strategy work. You can still walk away with good information and won’t be locked into a long-term contract, but you’ll at least get a company to invest good time and energy into really developing a custom strategy that will work for you. Also, the chances are that the strategy will be much more effective BECAUSE of the extensive research they have done on your company and industry.

3) REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS: In the same line of having patience you need to have realistic expectations based on your keywords, competition, industry, and budget. Some of your competitors may have YEARS of a head start on you and more than likely they aren’t standing still either.

Not only do you need to make up ground but also surpass them. There are tactics that can be used to speed up this process, but in the end it is still going to take time. In some cases it could be 3 months before you see movement in rankings and 6 months to make meaningful progress to the first page for some of your target keywords. However, there are some industries and keywords that even if you invested $1 million into it every year it could still take years to achieve top rankings and quite possibly you may NEVER get there.

Do you really think that you are going to outrank Bank of America, QuickenLoans, and LendingTree for the term “home loans“? Do you think that you can do this with $1000 per month investment? Even a $100,000 per month investment? There are some clients that want to be ranked in keywords like “fitness” or “health care” or “homes for sale“. I’m not saying it can’t be done, but the investment and time commitment would be so vast that it could take a 5+ year strategy with millions, even tens of millions of dollars invested.

A true expert will give it to you straight and not just try to take your money with false hopes and promises. Even for a small local company a budget of under $1000 per month can reduce your campaign’s effectiveness depending on the size of the city and the type of industry.

Sure there are loads of companies that can just submit you to hundreds of directories and throw up low-quality content that was outsourced for pennies. You should know by now that those strategies will likely not be very successful.

Money and Time Spent

Think about this for a moment, if you hired an employee for $1000 per month ($12k per year) what kind of talent do you think you would get? Do you think you would get the level of expertise that you need to succeed online?

Even if it was part time at 15 hours per week? That is 60 hrs per month so $1k per month would pay $16 per hour. That doesn’t include overhead or taxes. The fact is that a good quality service even from a legitimate company could be in the $40-$60 per hour range and an elite professional can be hundreds of dollars per hour. So if your budget is $1k-$2k per month just know that you might be able to still reach your goals, but it may require a little more patience as the work is spread out over many more months.

You can save money by doing a lot of it yourself, but you should plan to spend at least 1-2 hours per day marketing your company, writing content, engaging with your audience, and building online relationships.

A good budget for a national business or a competitive local business is typically in the $2500 – $5000 per month range depending on the competitiveness of your industry. For a quality company that isn’t looking to make massive profits on you, that kind of budget should produce good results. You may not reach all of your goals depending on the competitiveness of your industry or if there is additional work that needs to be done (site design, etc) but you should see measured improvement.