Snake Oil and Used Cars?

SEOs are called ‘snake oil peddlers’, ‘used car salesmen’ and other unkind names on a regular basis. The truth is, some are. However, if you turn your back on SEO, you are letting go of a great tool. Seriously, a good SEO consultant can be worth much more than you pay for him/her. Doing the legwork to investigate which ones really do good work, and which are simply interested in hyping you and taking your money is imperative.

Promoting themselves as SEO ‘gurus’, many unscrupulous people are taking advantage and trying to cash in at the expense of good hard working people that are just trying to improve their website’s traffic and earnings. I these cases, you definitely can equate that type of person to the stereotype of a used car salesman.

The first thing to look for is a “too good to be true” line. The scammers who make huge promises are the ones that don’t deliver. Many print publications now appear on-line, so the demand for SEO rich submissions is constantly increasing.

Those in search of quick fix in order to bring in the almighty dollar are often wooed by statements such as: ‘We can boost your site to page one of Google!’ or ‘We can get you five thousand links in two days!’.

Of course, these are the used car salesmen of the Internet. They may indeed get you on page one – but for what phrase? will it even be anything a potential customer would Google? What kind of links? will they pass PageRank and are they relevant to your site? You need to ask.

When you start looking for an SEO, seek one with solid credentials, an up front transparency about their methods, and references. Make sure they will work to your framework, providing real service tailored to your site instead of stuffing your site full of keywords and a bunch of spammy links.

With a good SEO, you can see continued improvement in your search engine rankings and steady long term earnings that will pay for the cost of optimization. A bad SEO will optimize for a quick ranking, and disappear before you realize the results don’t last and in a worst case scenario end up losing ranking positions due to violation of search engine guidelines.

There are bad SEO gurus selling snake oil or selling used car formulas that are looking for a quick buck at your expense. That can’t be denied. However, there are also plenty of legitimate SEO consultants who know helping you helps them. These are the ones to look for, and they are focused on making you happy so you tell your friends!