Are you looking for ‘guaranteed SEO service’ – We offer…………………………
Guarantee – A word that grabs attention and instills a sense of security (monetary) in the minds of prospective customers. But can guarantee be given in the realm of SEO services?
We, as SEO service provider, have asked ourselves this question umpteen number of times. But that is not the intention of writing this post. The motive of writing this post is to challenge the legitimacy of such guarantees.
Many of our prospects have demanded ‘guaranteed SEO service’ in the past. They have gone to the extent of quoting guarantees offered by other vendors. ‘Organic ranking’ is what most vendors guarantee; it is a different story that closer scrutiny reveals a number of strings attached to any such guarantee.
Can anyone guarantee search engine rankings?
Let’s hear it from the horse’s mouth first
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Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings ….
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If this is not sufficient evidence to convince you; think of it yourself. Search engine ranking algorithms are one the best kept secrets in the world. The only way to guarantee ranking is to know exactly how the algorithm works, and nobody has that kind of knowledge except for a privileged few. Sure there are tried and tested methods but even they are susceptible to algorithmic change. Guaranteeing something, over which you don’t have total control, is not only unethical but misleading.
Our research took us from one service provider to another and we zeroed upon some of the most abused guarantee statements. Subsequent to which we decided to play the role of ‘Myth Buster’.
Myth #1 – Guaranteed top 10 rankings
Many SEO companies (we are not taking any names) give guarantee which reads something like this:
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We guarantee to optimize your website for up to 100 different keyword phrases.
(Your primary targeted phrase will appear on the first page of one or more major search engines.)
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Sounds impressive and many prospective clients fall for it. They however fail to understand that such ranking guarantee is for keywords chosen by the vendor and not you - needless to say that these keywords would be obscure in nature. Ranking for non competitive terms or terms with low search volume will give little or no benefit.
A pizza parlor which has an online ordering website will derive no benefit by ranking for keywords like ‘pizza recipes’ (non-targeted) or mozzarella cheese (obscure) – ‘online pizza delivery’ is the more apt Keyword option.
In essence, this flavor of guaranteed SEO offers no real value.
Myth #2 – Top rankings for competitive key phrases
Here’s an example of one such guarantee statement”
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First page ranking or money back!
(We will guarantee top 10 rankings across the 15 search engines or don’t pay)
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The top three search engines (Google, Yahoo and MSN) command more that 93% of the total market share in US (comScore). The remainder is distributed amongst various other search engines. The picture is pretty much similar globally.
If you read the fine prints you would know that these 15 search engines do not include the top 3. Such guarantees are offered for search engines having insignificant market share and are mostly unheard off. Ranking on search engines like these will have no benefit whatsoever. Would you open a shop in a desolate locality?
Myth #3 Search engine placement guarantee
Many companies are lead to believe that the only factor that is holding back their website from being an online success is search engine placement. They have a new website but it has not been indexed by search engines.
Unscrupulous vendors claim to have ‘special relationship’ with search engines and promise priority submits. Well there is no such thing for sure. This is what big G has to say on this:
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Beware of SEOs…… allege a “special relationship” with Google, or advertise a “priority submit” to Google. There is no priority submit for Google.
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There is only one way of submitting your website to search engines – the ‘add URL’ feature. If you have an optimized website which is linked from other web pages, you can even spare yourself the trouble of submitting it to search engines.
The Truth – Customized Assurance
Certain SEO companies will offer you guarantee/assurance derived from the analysis of your current traffic, the competitiveness of your business, and revenue of your site. You will ideally be offered this type of specialized guarantee from the beginning of your contract, and it will ensure that you will achieve meaningful results and maximum ROI. Fair enough.
However, most SEO companies cannot or should not give assurance that they would achieve something (especially the ones mentioned in this post) which is totally out of their control. We personally consider it as cheating a client. We commit on deliverables, something we can fully control, and execute it with professional integrity.
Don’t get us wrong, we by no means are trying to scare you. There are experienced legit people who can help your website perform to its potential. However, mention of the word ‘guarantee’ should set the alarm bells ringing.
A solid post, I think alot of people still find themselves seduced by the offer of all manner of gurantees which are, for want of a better word, snake oil.
I’ve seen evidence of some SEOs even moving to rev share model – now that’s transparency.
All great point regarding companies that offer guarantees. I think it’s a bad business practice to make guarantees as they pertain to SEO and I would be wary of any company that offers a guarantee.
How refreshing! I’ve felt like so many SEO pitches were like snake oil sales. Bravo on a great post!
Guarantee on a top ten positions, ok but how could you mesure it ? a the end of the contract, at every time on every search ? How ? You must be Google.
Nice Post.
I have been battling SEO Guarantees personally for last 6 years. Offering Guarantees on SEO is like a financial adviser offering guarantees on performance of certain equities. It’s simply unethical. However, you can offer guarantee on “quality of service, level of customer support” if you want to instill confidence in your customer.
[...] Google Myth Buster Page [...]
Worth a Sphinn? Definitely! I guarantee results as a SEO (depending on the client and the keywords they choose). I tell my clients up front what kind of guarantees they can expect. Do I offer money back? No. What I do offer (for keywords in which I offer guarantees – with which I evaluate every single possible metric before making) is my time. If I make a guarantee, I offer more of my time in free SEO for that keyword until promised results are achieved. How do I have clients check? By the indexed version of the page I SEO. I hope that works for the community and the SEO service seeking public!
Nice Myth Buster for those clients who fall
in “Guarantee” sales trap.This might open their eyes and warn them before falling in “Guarantee” pit.
Thank you all for your kind words. It is not astonishing to find that many of us are battling the same situation, as is evident from your valuable comments.
Revenue share model, Pay for Performance, etc. are all great business models and definitely applicable in our industry too. For that matter even guarantees are; we are not averse to guarantees but guarantees that mislead.
At the end of the day, the industry as a whole gets a bad name and bears the brunt for the misdoing of few.
Excellent guidelines for customers planning to hire an SEO. Great read! Stumbled and shared with 58 friends.
Thanks.
Unreliable SEO companies use “guaranteed” as an important point of sale to those who don’t know SEO at all. Decent SEO companies promise the overall improvement of client’s website in quite several metrics.
Great post – too often it seems that the honest companies, the ones who won’t offer such sensational guarantees, are overlooked because they don’t have the sales pitch. Unfortunately, those sorts of ethics are precisely what consumers SHOULD look for! This is exactly the difference between a company that guarantees they’ll make your video viral – you can do the right things to help it along the way, but there is no magic.
I’m so happy that somebody wrote about this.
I’ve seen this in other businesses too.There are people who’d like to be exposed to empty guarantees. Then, they buy it to have good feeling and find some logic for it. Can you believe it?
In the world of SEO, some sell by including a guarantee for top position in Google. Of course, it’s piece of cake to get a website up there for “a long non-competitive keyphrase that you choose yourselves!”
I can guarantee front page for key words and phrases…..if you are willing to pay more than everyone else to get that position in the Paid for ads….natural search result guarantee’s are a joke. Good article, unfortunately there will always be suckers looking for a quick way to the top i.e. the snake oil optimization (SOO)
Excellent guidelines for customers planning to hire an SEO.share with my friend
[...] our post on what can’t or shouldn’t be guaranteed in the realm of search engine optimization, we wanted to write a post on what can or should be [...]
[...] Re: Does this sound good? SEO developer guarantees top 3 positions for major keyword or money back. I think, it’s not worth the investment. As no one can guarantee a stable (1 to 3) ranking ( for competitive keyword) for long. I am not blaming any company but as I know this could be only possible through black hat technique which can harm your website sooner or later. I would like to share one article that can help you the best in your query. Legitimacy of guaranteed SEO | Online Marketing Blog [...]
Many products or services come with a money back guarantee nowdays so why not SEO, no one can actually guarantee to get your site ranked for XXXXX in the top 10 of Google but they can show they have enough faith in their ability by backing up what they offer to do with a guarantee that if they do not accomplish the ranking then the customer gets a full refund. I have used various SEO companies over the years and now will only deal with ones that back up what they say. It seems to me that the ones that do no offer a guarantee are just saying we will try but we really do not know if we are good enough so we want to get paid either way…. Remember the old saying: Actions speak louder then words!
I do not agree with this post at all. First of all instead of waseting time to write such posts, it’s better to get the job done. Such posts are made by Seo’s as a way of promoting themselves. If some one does a crap job in SEO work, the company can say but look at this post, no one knows how SEO is really done, there are no gurantees.
I may be an exception but the company who did seo work for me ( won’t mention the name so you will think i am spamming) , guranteed and gave me results , which have been stable past 3 monthes and im not in any filters. The site is skipping positions goes up and down everynow and then but the GURANTEE they gave me proved it self! To me this is a senseless post a typical SEO would be happy about reading, and would love to show there clients!