#1 Scam: "My company can guarantee your ranking
on Google."
A SEO company contacts you and gives you a guarantee of getting your website a #1 position on the search engine results page. What happens? You’ll probably find they actually DO get you on page 1. The scam part of it is that it is probably a very “off the wall” low volume keyword or phrase that would rarely be searched for. This is not the same as a “longtail” keyword which is a targeted, niche search phrase.
See the example below. If you are an ice cream shop in Lancaster, you’ll have a much better chance of showing up for “ fat free cherry vanilla ice cream lancaster” than you would for “ice cream shop lancaster.” Which one is going to bring more business through your doors? Plus, if you are paying by keyword, you’re going to have to sell ALOT of fat free cherry vanilla ice cream!
TIP: Ask that SEO company to run a report using Wordtracker or the Google Keyword report and show you how many people actually search on average for that keyword you are paying for. Think about the search terms that will bring you the most profitable new business. And by all means, have some way to test the keyword so you can know if you are getting qualified leads or new customers, rather than paying for empty clicks. Also, since the search results are different when the searcher is signed into their Google account, make sure you get accurate reporting from a proxy server.
If you're still not sure if the guarantee is a scam, here is it straight from Google's webmaster central guidelines:
"Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a "special relationship" with Google, or advertise a "priority submit" to Google." Check it out for yourself.
To sum this one up, it is Google and not an SEO company who has the final decision on rankings. An SEO company should guarantee that they will do their best with their techniques to ethically improve rankings and keep apprised of the latest search engine algorithm changes that may affect your business.
