I think it’s time to share some insight with all my friends and colleagues in the photography industry about an increasing trend in scams targeted at photographers involving search engine optimization, and their promise to “put you on the first page of Google”.
Here are facts that I think may help many of you avoid being scammed:
1) NOBODY, regardless of how talented they are at SEO (search engine optimization) can gaurantee you “first page of Google“, of “Top ten listing” of Google. Let’s be honest, if everyone is promising this to their customers, someone is going to fail at living up to this “guarantee”. I would think that EVERYONE who promises this, fails at delivering it.
FACT: reputable SEO firms do not use bold and outrageous terms like “gaurantee”. They understand that there are thousands of factors involved in SEO that are out of their control, regardless of how skilled and knowledgable they are. Not the least of these factors is how much competition you have! Real SEO firms do not use terms like these, as they are hype marketing. What they can gaurantee is that they will make your site more visible to search engines, and give you advice on practices to rank better, nothing more.
2) Reputable SEO firms do not spam your inbox. Sort of goes against the whole idea of responsible online behavior doesn’t it? It’s a safe bet that if you receive an unsolicited email offering “SEO” services, they are scam artists preying on the un-informed photographer.
Take Scott Wright for example (company name not given in email). Mr. Wright has sent me 3-4 emails per day, for the last 4-5 days. He claims he can put me on the first page of Google. Scott apparently forgot to check if I was already on the first page of Google before he claimed he could do it for me. Scott’s email has a footer that claims “If you no longer wish to receive these messages you requested please delete this message and allow 24 hours for removal” Dude, your stupidity is stunning. Slap yourself.
He further gaurantees that he can send me 100 new “qualified customers” per month. However, I find it very hard to believe that Scott did the research on us that would be required to know what qualifies as a “qualified” customer. And frankley, it offends me that he uses that term. His email is full of absurd claims of what he can do for us, and what he knows about us. None of which are remotely accurate.
3) SEO firms that can actually deliver the goods, charge THOUSANDS of dollars, not hundreds. Rightly so, as the amount of work and effort involved in quality SEO is extensive, costly, and requires a vast amount of knowledge that has a shelf life of 3 days.
4) Often, the services these snake-oil salesmen are offering is detrimental to your rankings. They use automated software to submit your domain to many different search engines. First of all, you can do this yourself by simply submitting your domain to Google, the rest will happen on it’s own. Or, you can simply do nothing at all and it will happen on its own anyhow more often than not when Google spiders the web (I am referring to Google finding your site only). It’s very likely that these “SEO” experts will get your site banned from the search engines for using automated software….and charge you for it. Furthermore, simply submitting your site to search engines is a seriously juvenile task to be boasted as a professional search engine optimization service.
*While writing this article, I received a call from yet another snake-oil salesman offering me this service. They claimed to be a “Partner” company of Google. Which brings me to point # 5.*
5) Google is the most powerful brand name in the world. No really, it is. It’s offical. It doesn’t “partner” with other companies in this manor. It does however, have companies that it works with like AOL, Amazon and the like. However, these partnerships are entirely different than what is being claimed by these scammers. When a company suggests they are a “partner” company with Google, has formed a “strategic alliance” with Google, or are old college roommates with Google, you can be assured they are selling you nothing of worth, and that Google wouldn’t give them the time of day if they met on the street.
Let me give you an example of a very polished, yet unethical example of these scams. If you visit Isellpagerank dot com (I sell page rank dot com), then copy and paste its URL into http://www.prchecker.info/ to check IT’S OWN PageRank, you will see that it comes up with a big fat goose egg. It has a zero PageRank. The fact is, PageRank is not a comodity that is bought and sold on the Nasdaq Exchange. This company doesn’t own it, thus it can’t sell it. This may very well be why Google has penalized it with a zero PageRank. These jokers can’t even rank for the term “I sell page rank” which is not only the name of their company, but also their domain name.
*Yet another interaction with one of these low-life’s while I am typing this article. The email that prompted me to write this blog post (the emails from Scott Wright) also compelled me to respond to his email by writing Mr Wright by saying “I detest your business practices, and am glad that I do not share them with you” to which an Alan Goodriche ( Who? I thought your name is Scott Wright?) responded with “Thanks for your opinion, best regards, Alan Goodriche.”
Well, that tempted me to Google the name “Alan Goodriche”, and what I found was really no surprise. Alan is indeed on page one, but for less than admirable reasons.
I suggest you Google his name as well, and read the entire page. I won’t include the entire page here, but apparently I got off lightly for daring to speak to Alan without fear in my voice. The other guy wasn’t so lucky.
Here’s the gist of the email:
Somone else writes to Alan and says:
And all of that big deal hoola-baloo from an AOL address? Doesn’t that stink of somebody not wanting to use their own email server? You partnered with Google, and I walked on the White House lawn once – does not make me the president’s best friend. Pure trash, I’ll make sure that Google is informed how their “selected partners” are abusing their name and spamming the world. How about them apples?
To which Alan Goodriche replies:
Im not sure what you are talking about however your hostility is absurd. You go ahead and make sure Google knows and I will make sure of somethig else. Mine is a surprise though. Just go ahead and google your business name tomorrow and you shall see. I hope you understand who you are threatning and that Im somebody that will obliterate your business.
Alan…..you might need to brush up on your definition of “hostility”.
Honestly, I doubt that Alan Goodriche is his real name, but if it is he has trully shot himself in the foot. So…….if you trash your own name on the internet, just give yourself a new one! Scott Wright is taken though.
Photographers….please don’t be taken by these people. Regardless of how polished their sites are (if they even have one), or how slick they sound, they can do nothing for you except take your honestly earned money.
I apologize for the negative tone of this email, however I felt it was time to warn as many of my friends as possible. I won’t be so negative in future blog posts. Stick a pencil in your eye Alan.
Warmly,
Brad
*If you are interested in reading more about this topic, SearchEngineLand.com has a great article about this and a few other relevant issues.*
Update: Shortly (very shortly) after saving and posting this blog post, I re-Googled the name Alan Goodriche to finish reading about his awesomness, and was shocked at what I saw. The first organic listing for the name “Alan Goodriche”…was none other than this blog post.
It took less than 52 minutes for Google to crawl, and return this post in its results page for the name Alan Goodriche. Unbelievable. To me, this speaks volumes about how efficient and powerful Google’s algorithm is, and why everyone doing business online should practice ethical SEO tactics. Google knows when you’ve been naughty. I’m not saying Google has it in for Alan…..just that Google can easily spot unethical SEO tactics and has stated publicly that it penalizes it (again, not saying that Alan is participating in unethical SEO tactics on HIS OWN site). Gotta love that.
One more thing, if you are interested in reporting unsolicited PHONE calls, and your phone number has been on the Do Not Call Registry for at least 31 days, here is the link to do so. It’s fast and easy. I encourage everyone to hold these people responsible for their actions.
Denver Colorado photography by Brad Walters Photography
