I’ve been thinking a lot about how SEO specialists market themselves and try to attract new business. Truth is that most decent SEOs don’t!. They never need to advertise their services, never mind solicit new clients, so it surprises me as much as it irks me whenever I hear of people I know being sold a bit of an SEO dummy.

I’m not interested in outing anybody so for the purposes of this article, let’s change the name to something suitably Glaswegian…BAWBAGSEO. This list just serves as an example of stuff I’ve discovered going on that I believe no decent web or SEO professional would ever involve themselves in. Furthermore, if you are a business and considering outlaying for some SEO on your site, steer clear of any of these scenarios…

1. BAWBAGSEO carries out SEO work for Client A and gets Client A good results. BAWBAGSEO then approaches client B, who is a competitor of client A and offers to optimise client B’s site for a long tail search term that Client A hasn’t optimised his for. You read that right…SEO’s offering out sloppy long tail seconds to client competitors. Very poor.How to avoid: Ask your SEO if they have any other clients in a similar sector to yours and what their policy is relating to this.
2. Aside from providing SEO services, BAWBAGSEO also runs 3 day “all you can eat” SEO courses at a £1000 a pop so participants can then carry out SEO successfully themselves (alongside running their day to day business)
3. Scaring client B into SEO expenditure (preferably supplied by BAWBAGSEO) by showing them their site’s W3C validation error report when BAWBAGSEO‘s validation report has twice as many errors as client B
4. Guaranteeing page one results for long-tail, traffic-light, highly specific search terms. A recent post on the consistently excellent Hoboweb blog titled How many clicks does a no 1 ranking in Google get compared to No 2, 3, 4 & 5 threw up some pretty interesing data that shows how much potential traffic can diminish past the first few results. Of course, using the Google Keyword tool, you can find out roughly how many searches across the Google network there have been for a specific search term. I reckon it’s even tougher now because the first page of search results is getting so clagged up with Google Places, Adwords and other Google bolt-ons.  Remember folks..technically, a page one result could be position 10 and you’ve got to ask yourself how much of a return on your SEO investment will this get you?
5. Beware the one month contract.  Any SEO relationship needs to be set up for the long haul.  If an SEO tells you they can achieve everything they need to achieve in one month they are lying.

I guess we all know companies similar to BAWBAGSEO. Has anyone uncovered any other unsavoury SEO practices they’d like to share?

Interesting video post from the dependable Matt Cutts at Google regarding how often the Google Algorithm gets altered….much more than you’d think – maybe as many as 350 times in a year!

Whilst some of the changes to this algorithm can be minor, some can have a pretty major impact on your search positions – good and/or bad.

How are you placed?  With changes taking place almost daily do you have the time to keep up with these developments?  Contact us to find out how we can help with your website optimisation and safeguard your Google Equity now!

The Digital Economy Bill that was hurried somewhat undemocratically through the Houses of Parliament this week is an ill-conceived, poorly thought-out and downright ludicrous piece of legislation that will cause all sorts of problems whilst potentially and unnecessarily criminalise a considerably significant proportion of the unwitting British public.

This piece of legislation is going to throw up all sorts of legal and logistical conundrums as it primarily affects the provider of the internet connection rather than the “illegal” downloader.

I’d love to get a legal perspective on the following scenario that I’m currently testing at the moment.

I’m on my way to London on a Virgin Train, enjoying free Wi-Fi coverage courtesy of a mistaken upgrade to First Class.  I’m also currently downloading “God Save The Queen” via Pirate Bay, which was the first single the band released on Richard Branson’s own Virgin Records.  Seemed like the perfect test track to use (Malcolm McLaren RIP) as I’ll also be over by Buckingham Palace in a wee while visiting Google HQ (that’s a story for another day!)

Would this count as one of the three “strikes” that could lead to Virgin Trains losing their internet connection? Can I expect the police to be waiting for me at Euston Station?

Sure, in the past I’ve written about  the 12 step guide to successful business blogging but Lisa Barone from Outspoken Media, a highly respected internet marketing company out of NY has written an excellent post that covers 100+ blogging ideas to kick start 2010.

It’s a great list full of really achievable ideas, some obvious, some less so and covers everything from targeting to social media to using your own company, experiences and staff to generate posts.  Plenty for all of us to learn on there.  Nice one Lisa!

I’ve been going to a fair number of work-related events lately and what’s amazed me (more than the huge amount of bacon rolls some people can consume in 30 minutes!) is how poor an understanding some business owners have of their company’s own web presence.

Even basic information such as number of visitors.  The classic line from Mr One Man Business is “my web guy told me I got 30,000 hits last month“…that’ll be around 3 visitors a day on an image and script-heavy, Frontpage-designed site then?

Knowing how busy your website is is important, but other stuff needs covered too…stuff like “where am I on Google?”, “what does Google see when it finds my site?”, “what are my competitors up to?”, “who links to me?” and most importantly, what straightforward steps can I take to improve things?

This might end up being a bit of a crazy move, but we’ve decided to help small businesses out by offering to carry out FREE website audits .  For no cost, we’ll take a look at your site, generate a very useful report and give you some pointers on how to improve your web presence.  No strings, no obligations.  As if we weren’t busy enough!  Madness!

Recession-savvy…is being aware of the recession and how it affects your business.  It’s about being just as aware of the dangers as you are of the positive opportunities.  A while ago I wrote about speeding up during the slowdown and it’s worth checking out.

If you don’t allow yourself to get freaked out during these tricky times then you might just clear enough space in your head to think about how to get ahead.

Web design…is what we do best and when we apply our recession-savvy thinking to your web project you’ll get some pretty impressive results without breaking the bank.  It doesn’t stop with the website either – we look at cheap ‘n’ cheerful ways of using the internet to market your brand and sell your products.  We don’t just think outside the box, we live outside it.  My God, that sounds cheesy but it’s true.

Here’s some questions you shouldn’t be afraid to ask anybody that might be getting involved with your website/web strategy…

• What’s the least amount of money I can spend to achieve the biggest impact?
• Do I really need a website?
• What’s the first three things you would do to improve my site?
• Can you provide me with some client success stories?
• Is there anything you’ll do for nothing for me first to prove you know what you’re talking about?

Feel free to ask us!