If you are like me and spend your days at home working alone then you will know how it can feel at times.

Yes I love my work – if I didn’t I wouldn’t have dedicated the last few years of my life to providing SEO to businesses all over London and beyond, but it has to be said it can be very challenging at times.

Of course working at home does have its benefits.  For instance, I can get out of the home office when necessary to visit a client in London to discuss SEO without the need for hours of travel.  I can also set my own hours (just about), but that said it can get very lonely at times when you’ve no one at home to talk to or share the day with.

Before you think I’ve gone mad and concluded that I’m suffering from some kind of breakdown though – think again!

Dillan my faithful chocolate labrador

The sheer demand on your personal life that working from home creates deserves some practical solutions and it struck me the other day, when I looked at my dog just how valuable he is to my company.

As a nation of animal lovers –something like 23% of those are dog owners.  That’s millions of dogs throughout the UK and I’m one of that 23% with good reason.

My dog is a great office companion to be honest.  As well as being fun, he’s a great excuse to get out and take a walk and while he does not possess SEO skills himself (although there’s plenty of time for that) the fact that I can be in my London home, working away with him next to me is really positive experience.

I’ve always had dogs in my life and never let it be said by anyone that they are NOT man’s best friend.    They can be natural stress relief, good fun and unlike virtually everyone else in the world to some degree – don’t demand anything but exercise, food and water!

In fact, whether other dog owners would admit or not – I’m sure there’s plenty of home workers outside of London that enjoy being able to vent some momentary frustration or express happiness to their old faithful dog!

There has been many a day when I’ve been under stress I’ve started talking to myself (maybe even sworn a couple of times) and in a moment, had that stress completely alleviated just by looking at my K9 friend panting away at me happily.

I remember years ago that someone somewhere in the world did a study of the affects of stress with and without a dog and apparently – those people with dogs suffered less from stress related illness.  So there has to be some reason we have the lovable animals.

A word of caution however…

This may sound ridiculous but someone I know had always worked in their own office outside of the family home and due to a relocation ended up basing most of their working week from their house in London.  Amusingly perhaps – the dog didn’t like it and it actually caused quite a few issues initially.

In fact, the person I’m thinking of said how bad they felt when the dog would just sit there all day staring right at them and would never look away, but that they never had the time to take him on a proper work or give him attention.

It wasn’t until I suggested that the dog just needed a better routine under the new working day that they understood.    What I didn’t tell them though, was that a good routine applied to them AND their dog.  Both needed a bit of a stress vent.

Letting the dog out is not the same as dedicating some play time and of course walks and I know that if I didn’t take mine out for a good hour a day, I’d go insane and no doubt he would!

All home workers have challenges.  Not, withstanding the fact that it’s virtually impossible to switch off if you work from home as technically you’re always in your office – even when you should be doing something else.

So, my best advice to anyone working from home is most definitely to get a dog!  It’s the only way you stay sane, get exercise and feel that you’re still connected to the world outside!

Paul

Recently while searching Google, I happened upon a rather bizarre and offensive site.  People who read my blog will know that I do try and share information on what I find – some of it SEO based – some of it as a way to offer up new insights in to the online sector.  But for this blog, I am digressing slightly, but most certainly with good reason.

While there has been a lot said recently about the lack of policing on the Internet and how it seems anyone can create a website with content that can offend or is indeed even illegal, it begs belief that in this society a website that looks like the official Her Majesty’s Court Service website, evidently feels that a Swastika is perfectly acceptable as a way to imply that the UK legal system is run by ‘Fascists’

I am not going to go in to whether the legal system in the UK is indeed run by Fascists or controlled by a totalitarian government – but that’s not the point. What I find more offensive is that the Swastika in its Nazi roots can be used in this way, like it has any bearing on something that is so far removed from what happened in Europe and beyond during the Second World War.

It is not remotely funny or clever to utilise a symbol that was part of a regime that imposed genocide on millions of people.  It is completely offensive to use a symbol that stood for a regime that tortured and abused millions of people.  And above all, it is not acceptable to use a symbol that stood for a world where hatred and condemnation of millions of people was allowed to happen, just because of their religion, sexual orientation and race.  It is not clever or justified to use it as a way to degrade the legal system, because the connotations of a Nazi Swastika are fundamentally more serious.

Millions of people died during the Holocaust and in my mind, you do not need to be Jewish to appreciate why it is offensive and how inappropriate it is to use it in a way that completely degrades those that suffered even further. It is not too dissimilar to seeing a certain Royal Family member or Conservative MP parading around a fancy dress party dressed as a member of the Nazi party. If used right, it can be effective satire a la Charlie Chaplin in The Great Dictator, if used wrong it can become grossly offensive.

It’s important to remember that the Swastika and all that can be tied to a time in Europe where the Nazis allowed horrific things to happen to innocent people was actually not really that long ago.  In fact, it was only seventy three years ago that the war started. That’s still within a lifetime for some people who lived through and survived it.

What really annoys me is the fact that upon calling HM Court Centre in Watford to complain about it and to ask if it could be removed completely I was promptly told; “We can’t promise anything. We’ll see what we can do. Someone will call you back right away”.  And guess what? Two weeks later I’m still waiting for that call and the offensive site is still ‘live’.

If someone was to stand on a street corner today, holding up a Swastika citing hatred to certain people in society they would be arrested and certainly wouldn’t be ignored.  There are in fact countries where this behaviour is a criminal offence.  So the fact that it has been used so thoughtlessly on the Internet seems to mean it’s okay and therefore because there appears to be no way to control it, it does not matter.

It’s frankly worrying that a site that also looks like an official HM Courts Service website is even allowed to operate on this basis, particularly when you consider that even pretending to be a Police officer in the UK is a criminal offence.

What is the idiot (Gerry Coulter of Hitchin, Hertfordshire) who is running this site trying to achieve exactly?  Does he have no consideration or respect for a history that saw some of the most awful atrocities ever seen in a lifetime?

So, if it’s so hard to get sites taken down, it’s interesting to consider that anyone who has uploaded content to You Tube of the recent Grammys has had it promptly taken down because of copyright infringement.  Therefore, if You Tube can remove a video of Adele singing so easily, then why is it so hard to do something about a Swastika on a site that is obviously playing on its similarity to HM Court Service, with no thought as to the real impact the Swastika may have to users.

If people want to express their hatred and dislike for our legal system – that’s up to them – but when they show no respect for people who have genuinely had generations of issues because of a regime that had no regard for people it is fundamentally wrong. Let’s not forget, the Nazis under their Swastika flags murdered women, children, men, elderly people, jews, gay people and gypsies during their reign of terror – something that should never be forgotten or abused for the wrong reasons.

The truth is that a Swastika is a symbol for hatred. That hatred became political and was used as the driving force for the murder of millions, and it’s not that long ago that world witnessed this level and degree of intolerance and genocide. Now the legal system in the UK may be riddled with many flaws and even potential ‘illegalities’ in how it operates, and while the justification for a website that highlights these things is not without merit, it’s all in the presentation of that information. They should drop the Swastika and the sensationalist approach if they ever want their message to be taken seriously at all.

Paul

Good customer service is a prerequisite for any ecommerce website that wants to be successful. It strengthens customer loyalty and retention in the future; it basically keeps them from wandering off to your competitors and purchasing from them. It’s a digital spin on positive word of mouth! If a customer has a bad experience shopping with a site, they have the enormous forum of the digital world in which to voice their annoyance and discontent.

Bad news travels fast online and a poor customer experience can result in your company being lambasted in a very public forum. Think how well your company can do with a strong SEO strategy and where it can land in the Google, Yahoo and Bing search results; now imagine that a bad customer review lands up on the rankings above or below your result. Online shoppers make up their minds very quickly and they are just looking for a reason not to buy your products.

David versus Goliath

In my previous blog, I wrote about the problems I’d had dealing with a small business and the abysmal customer service I’d received. It’s not just small businesses committing these infractions against their customers; big businesses are doing it too. Some small companies seem to think that they don’t have to provide a good customer service because of their size. Some big companies think that they’re above responsibility to their customers because they have survived this long.

In the end, both have a responsibility to do their best to offer customers excellent customer service. Strong customer service is a huge asset for businesses because it – like search engine marketing or SEO initiatives – can help to spread positive word about the business. Positive word will bring customers back time after time and as they tell their friends about it, the positive word of mouth will bring more people to the site.

Sweet Apples and Sour Lemons

I’m a bit of a computer game nerd. I had wanted updates for a game on my Mac – I won’t tell you what it is for fear of undermining my credibility. (Just kidding, but I’m still not saying.) I had two options: to buy directly from the Apple App Store or buy direct from the game’s company in question. I opted to go for the non-Apple company and I was appropriately punished for my choice.

I purchased the updates and breezed through the checkout process with ease. After purchasing, I found that the updates weren’t actually compatible at all (although this was never displayed on the website). When I emailed them (annoyingly there was no telephone number) to see about a refund, they told me that that wouldn’t be possible. They then referred me to an obscure section of their terms and conditions. They then reiterated the resolute and unwavering NO and told me that they would not offer me a refund. The service I received was so brutally blunt that I can honestly say that I will never buy from them again. Instead of offering a good service and a sympathetic ear, they were rude and trying everything they could to usher me away.

After I’d come to terms with my own anger, I went to the online Apple App Store with my tail tucked between my legs. As usual with all my Apple computer, music and movie purchases Apple gave me excellent customer service. The whole process was a breeze and they gave me advice from a place of knowledge and a foundation of strong, attentive customer service. In the end, I’ll sing Apple’s praises until I’m blue in the face and I will never go to the other company again. Ever. And my friends and family will never use them again. Ever.

Paul

It’s a hard question to ask. It’s also a hard question to get an honest answer to. There are a great many companies offering both direct and white label SEO services to companies in and around London. The surprising thing is not that there are so many companies offering search engine marketing, but that these companies are offering them to London businesses from as far afield as Edinburgh.

Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing inherently wrong or bad about marketing companies in the United Kingdom offering search engine marketing services to companies in London. I’m not saying – not for a second – that only London-based search engine marketers are knowledgeable enough to offer wise and comprehensive advice on SEO. Far from it; anyone with experience in SEO is more than qualified to advise businesses on their search engine marketing needs. But the difference is that London-based SEMs (search engine marketers) have experience working with businesses in the city of London.

It’s a funny situation when a London-based business is looking for SEO advice for someone outside of the city. I’ve learned everything I know about SEO from on-the-ground experience in London. I’ve learned a lot from working with businesses, getting to know a client and their needs and then applying it to marketing their specific keywords and information.

Working with companies is important, especially in a city like London where businesses are trying desperately to get a straight, honest consultation in SEO. Learning about their business needs is vital to providing a competent and informed SEO service; one that is suited to their business. I’ve always found it key to talk with the company first to establish the sorts of keywords that they would like to be ranked highly on, as well as bringing my own ideas to the table on what their keywords should be. So many companies don’t do this these days, particularly when they are not based in the same city as their clients. It’s also important to understand the brand well before advising them on search engine marketing.

It’s a worrying trend in the industry that people sell high-minded and pricey search strategy and search engine marketing packages to companies from up and down the country without anything to back it up. No experience, no real knowledge of the way search works. Nothing.

Being in the same city as your clients gives you a unique insight into their SEO needs and helps you to provide a better service to the client. Most importantly, it gives the client the best possible basis with which to improve their business’ digital offering. I strongly believe that it’s important for both the business and the SEO provider to be in the same city to build an informed and tailored approach to their search needs and deliver the best possible service.  That’s how I’ve built up my knowledge and skills within the industry and it’s how I provide the best possible service to London-based businesses.

Paul

Little soldiers behind the iron walls

Good customer service is a prerequisite for any ecommerce website that wants to be successful. It strengthens customer loyalty and retention in the future; it basically keeps them from wandering off to your competitors and purchasing from them. It’s a digital spin on positive word of mouth! If a customer has a bad experience shopping with a site, they have the enormous forum of the digital world in which to voice their annoyance and discontent. Bad news travels fast online and a poor customer experience can result in your company being lambasted in a very public forum. Think how well your company can do with a strong SEO strategy and where it can land in the search results; now imagine that a bad customer review lands up on the rankings above or below your result. Online shoppers make up their minds very quickly and they are just looking for a reason not to buy your products.

I’ve had a couple of very bad experiences online recently. Both of these experiences were down to appalling customer service, yet these companies were very different: one big, one small. The common thing tying both experiences together – other than the horrendous customer service – was the fact that both companies hid behind the comfort and detachment of their websites. In doing so, they remained separate from the issue and could ignore it for a very long time.

It started off simply enough, as most stories do. I’d placed an online order with a small company. The journey was smooth enough and the checkout process was relatively painless; I got through the whole process in about 10 minutes – I’d been reading some customer reviews and lost track of the time. I should have been suspicious when I didn’t get an automated email confirming my purchase right away, but hindsight is a blessing and a curse. The lines were silent and I didn’t receive the items I ordered, so I called the company to chase it up. After a week still no order. I called them again.

This time was a different story. They told me that they had ordered the wrong products and couldn’t fulfil the order. I reordered and still nothing. By this point, the vein in my head was probably the size of a football; I’d started to look like Stressed Eric on a particularly bad day. When I finally got through again, they told me that they had forgotten and that they took full responsibility.

‘Okay,’ I thought.

My last nerve was understandably raw. After another wrangle, they finally admitted that it was still kicking  around their offices. Never again.

I won’t name the company here because it wouldn’t serve any purpose other than to start flinging mud around. The point is this, some companies have grown so comfortable in the detachment of the online community that they have completely lost sight of the basics of a good shopping experience: customer service. So many businesses these days hide behind their websites and telephones to avoid having to face up to the fact that they have failed their customers. It’s not good enough.

If a customer has a bad experience on your site, they are almost certain to blog about it, tweet about it or circulate the information online. They certainly won’t recommend you to anyone else. They’ll most likely badmouth you to all of their friends, family and colleagues; by the end of it, they will deter a fair few people from ordering with you.

Good customer service costs nothing; bad customer service can cost you everything.

Paul

Okay, sometimes there are things that make me laugh out loud – some are not really appropriate for this blog but thankfully there are on occasion odd stories which are just too good to ignore and this one is both amusing and perhaps a statement about how the world has embraced Facebook in all corners of life!

Today’s chuckle came from what can only be described potentially as a slightly ‘stupid’ individual perhaps?

Tell us more…

Unbelievably, a man in Texas was recently charged with contempt of court for a ‘social’ faux par as it were, where he essentially asked to be friends with the wrong person in a court case!

No it wasn’t the judge – that would have been beyond stupid, but it was the female defendant he friend requested during the trial!  Surely this must rank as the second most stupid thing you can do with a Facebook account?

What possibly possessed him to do such a thing is frankly beyond me but this one action has created a lot of trouble for him it would seem.

He was charged with four counts of contempt of court and was promptly dismissed from the jury (because he had also updated his profile with details of the case???) but that wasn’t even the end of it…

Once he’d been thrown off the jury and perhaps realised the error of his ways, he then proceeded to contact the defendant to apologise for his actions!  I’m sure she was thrilled that the entire case had to be rescheduled and was delayed because of one jury member.

The sacked juror apparently wanted to tell her how sorry he was and that he now knew what it was like to be prosecuted.  Perhaps this is evidence of why he wasn’t suitable in the first place.

What a sorry, sorry mess!

We don’t know what the specifics of the case are sadly (maybe we’ll see if there’s any evidence suggesting that the other Jurors befriended the defendant?) but rest assured he is unlikely to be asked to jury duty again in his lifetime.

On the upside, at least he’s got another new friend on Facebook I suppose.

Despite his misguided actions, he actually was very lucky with the sentence that was handed out to him though.  He got off very lightly with just two days community service – unlike a recent UK juror who was given an eight month prison sentence for similar activities in a court room.

A lesson learned

While we’ve all become Facebook friendly and we love to update the world with our news, perhaps it’s the fact that people don’t always realise what they share on Facebook  won’t actually necessarily stay on Facebook that we should all understand.

It is also a fairly good indication that the authorities do look at social channels more often these days as criminals are silly it would seem and don’t mind what information they share on Facebook!

Advice

We would never condone any of this kind of behaviour but in terms of your own security, it may always be worth checking your security settings.  Your photos, friends list, wall and updates can be viewable by anyone if you have not restricted the settings.

Ho hum…Big Brother is watching you!

Paul

Despite the Google Panda update and our advice on using ‘fluff’ articles on certain sites to gain back links being a pointless exercise, there are still people out there selling Search Engine Marketing services that suggest this is a good idea!

Aside from being really, really annoying (double use of the word ‘really’ must show how irritating I find this) it is also a total and utter scam and waste of time and money.

To say that it is annoying (just in case I haven’t made that clear) is a total understatement and I’m here to say right now that what people deem as ‘articles’ for the purpose of links is a scam and should really not be allowed to litter the Internet with rubbish.

Imagine the scene of a nice, clean street.  You can see all the shop windows clearly and know that you want to head for the coffee shop, its red sign shining brightly in the sunshine.  It has caught your eye and you want to go there.

You go through the door, get your coffee and to all intents and purposes have found it an easy process.

Now rewind that scene and start again, but this time that same street is covered in paper and rubbish and is full of sales people handing out leaflets.  Someone thrusts one in to your hands, offering a buy one get one free on coffee.  You’re thirsty and really fancy one so you follow the map on that leaflet and head in to the shop, only to find the shop is selling coffee machines!   If you buy a coffee machine then you’ll get a voucher for a free coffee another day.  Would you not be slightly annoyed?  Feel mislead?  Think that it’s a scam perhaps?

This is essentially what bad articles placed on ‘article farming sites’ is all about.

It does work at times but it’s not sustainable because after the millionth person has had the same experience you did, you can imagine the street owner (in this case Google) isn’t going to put up with it for long.

So what are these articles like?

Rubbish articles or content that is crammed with key words relevant to your website, with back links in there, drawing you to a website somewhere else.

A bad, uncreative and potentially idiotic writer creates a pretty useless article.

How it works

Essentially a bad, uncreative and potentially idiotic writer creates a pretty useless article.  In fact, let’s not even call him or her a writer!  Now, let’s say they have a site that sells sportswear and that their ‘fluff’ article is about why sports are good for your health.

Within the sports article, that writer will put links back in to the main website based on applicable keywords and use the better rankings gained from the ‘article site’ itself to get placed higher in Google’s search results.

This then means that when you find that particular article you are taken to the article site and within the article you will find links that go back to that sportswear site.

But that’s not the end of the story because that one article on occasion can also be ‘spun’ in different ways and then (perhaps even worse) is submitted to numerous article directories and article marketing websites.

Once the article is published on these sites, then when someone puts a search in to Google there will hopefully be a whole page of articles (all by the writer) that come up, with links back to the original website.   However, they’re all similar or virtually the same and contain exactly the same amount of information – which isn’t really much use.

What you end up with…

Once that’s been done the most distressing part of this whole exercise is that it can actually work and will end up with relatively good rankings – but only for a very short space of time and eventually those articles will disappear back down the rankings again.

What are the biggest problems with bad article writing and submissions?

Where do I start?

Firstly the content really is absolutely rubbish and has absolutely no value.  If you are worried about your heart and find that article on why sport is good for you, will you honestly at that second want to run out and buy a pair of trainers because there happens to be a link going to some within it?  NO!  Of course you won’t!

The second issue is duplicate content.  There are various stories around that suggest how Google detects duplicate content and the biggest lesson here is DON’T DO IT!  Ignore the ‘advice’ of changing the first and last paragraph of an article to get the better of the search engines as it’s simply not worth the risk.

You WILL be penalised for it, it WILL affect your rankings and it WILL NOT be easy to fix!

Google will not realistically count those links – in fact since Google Panda a lot of those types of sites have dropped in the rankings because Google ain’t stupid!  It knows when you’re trying to manipulate the system!

So how do I avoid this?

By creating good quality content that is original, interesting and relevant.

What you want to understand is that Search Engine Marketing is a long-term goal and you constantly need to improve what you’re doing.

You can obtain guest articles for example and rather than throwing them around – just post them on your site, as you’ll find if you get a good guest writer, they’ll bring an audience with them right to you.

If you think you can manipulate the search engines then you are not very smart at all because that approach is out dated and not how the search engines are working in the long-term.

Isn’t it so much better to get ten people to your site that buy than 10,000 that don’t?

You decide but please don’t consider calling us if you are looking for this kind of SEO as we will have to say no, absolutely not, sorry and goodbye!

Get a blog

If you want to make a good, long-term difference then get yourself a blog attached to your site.  Create some fabulous articles and resources  (a bit like the ones on here) and you’ll have something that’s worth indexing in Google’s eyes.

Paul

In business there are two types of people.  The first is the service provider that will take money from anyone that wants to spend it and who frankly will let their clients tell them what they should be doing, while the second is more rational and knows that what someone wants is not necessarily what they will actually benefit from.

Thankfully we’re the latter in the above examples and enjoy offering a service only to those that really need it and who won’t end up being a nightmare client.

Despite what’s out there on the SEO landscape, there is no easy way of getting a website ranked.  It takes experience, knowledge and a lot of work – that no amount of automation or ‘cheap deals’ can make up for.

So here’s what we define as a nightmare client:

I know more than you

This client falls in to the category of ‘instinctive business owner’ who despite having no actual knowledge of SEO at all, has read a few books and Googled a few times.  They usually also take note of the new ‘technologies’ on sale everywhere that will enable you to do your job better.

In truth, they may have some good things to say, but they’re not SEO professionals and essentially don’t necessarily appreciate that Search Engine Marketing is a fluid medium.  Books get out of date, blogs change like the wind and the systems they speak of are bad practice.

We want a really cool website

This is one of the hardest areas to deal with.  Recently I heard from a web designer of a very high end brand who were looking for a website.  Their current site had less than ten sales per week and frankly looked terrible.  So they enlisted the help of said web designer for a rebrand and new user experience.  Well after a lot of ‘advice giving’ on the web designer’s part and some really fabulous designs more akin to an ecommerce experience the brand came back and said; “Do we need all the navigation on the front page?  We feel it’s better to not say anything”.  In other words, they were happier with pretentious and impractical – which in web terms really isn’t going to help them sell anything.

Badly designed websites that don’t consider navigation and Search Engine Marketing essentials are a nightmare!

We want to get to number one by tomorrow

This is another problem.  Despite all the promises out there, the genuine Search Engine Marketing professional knows that it cannot be done.

If you get anywhere, within a week you’ll fall back down the rankings again through bad SEO practice.

Competitive keywords will cost money and they will need to be sustained.  This is a fact but unfortunately SEO clients do not always understand this.

Which leads us on to cost

For good results and excellent keyword rankings it costs money to do.  Yes there are ‘DIY’ options available but that’s all they are.  It’s not different to Uncle Frank having a bash at putting in the new bathroom.  He can follow instructions but if they’re printed in another language then he will be second guessing most of it and you could end up with water all over the place.

Costs from the best in the field are there because of a good track record and in all things in life, you only ever get what you pay for.

We think you’ve got it wrong

This is by far the very worst scenario when it comes to clients and their Search Engine Marketing.  You do all the research on their keywords, you define a solid plan based on years of experience, you can be fairly positive about the outcome but then when you tell the client, they tell you that they think they should be ranking for something else.

Again, not to put too fine a point on this, if you know better then, aren’t you in the wrong business?

Of course this approach is not necessarily exclusive to Search Engine Marketing,  Website design and builds are full of the same issues and despite what you advise based on what you know, people are very attached to their businesses.

It’s all a matter of control.

A good film director will understand that his crew are all specialists within their industry.  There’s a cinematographer who is an expert with a camera, there’s the actors, there’s the set designer, there’s the production crew to name a few and while a result can be gained from a tyrannical approach, you’ll find the best way to get what you want is to use that crew as tools and work to their strengths.

SEO is absolutely no different but sadly it does not detract from the fact that on occasion you will get a bad SEO client who despite your advice will continue to make the wrong decisions within a medium they just don’t fully understand.

Paul

How do you tell a client it’s goodbye?

Don’t want to bring a tear to anyone’s eye, but on occasion it happens and for lots of reasons.  No one really talks about it either but that doesn’t mean it’s not a topic we won’t approach!

We have always been proud that as a company we offer transparency and honesty with clients – trying always to convey the reality of Search Engine Marketing of websites.

Sometimes we see potential clients who have a new domain that they’ve got a site for and like a lot of other people in the world they want Google results quickly.  But, in reality Search Engine Marketing success comes from hard slog and an ongoing level of maintenance and updates.

Often we will work hard on the Search Engine Marketing techniques for a company and after twelve months of slog, there can at times be tendency to think that now page one rankings have been gained across the board, there’s no need for the SEO anymore!  This is completely wrong of course but it does happen.  We have no power here at all but can say that when we go back to the sites we helped start, the rankings slip and our joyous results have been slightly greyed by lack of attention.

On New Domains

We always think of new domains like an apple tree in an orchard.  The younger trees do bear fruit but it’s the older trees with a bit of background that yield the very best results!  New domains are very similar in that they are by far the hardest to get ranked because there’s just no history.  The apples are the size of cherries and while they look nice, we’re still attracted to the giant fruit on the older tree next door.

Google likes sites that have been around a while and gained some credibility and if you have a new site, then you need to be realistic about what’s achievable and most importantly understand that it’s not a five minute job.

The hard keywords are achievable but not in five minutes and sometimes the reality as a Search Engine Marketing company is dealing with that.  If you can’t get them to number one in a month or two then it must be down to something not being done correctly.

All we do is prune at the right time, feed when required and if we can see a root needs some attention we do it because we know that months down the line the results will be so much better and here to stay!

Old Domains

An old domain has a lot more potential for Search Engine Marketing because very often it just needs a bit of TLC.  If you have a website that’s five years old but not getting much traffic, something can usually be done to improve its chances online and if we go back to the analogy some simple or even extreme pruning and nurturing will usually have it coming back stronger than ever before.  But, with clients, it’s not always easy to convey they just see a tree that’s not got any fruit on it!

Localised Keywords – SEO Finchley anyone?

The truth is very simple.  Anyone can get relatively good rankings for ‘localised’ key words (in fact you can read our previous blog for some information on this) but getting ranked for the words that will bring in the best traffic and therefore the best leads is a whole different ball game and so much more effort!

Unfortunately Search Engine Marketing is misunderstood by many and because of this it’s very easy for some ruthless companies to take advantage of that fact.  Whereas the honest approach is actually the better one – but it doesn’t have bells on it so it maybe doesn’t have the same appeal to the odd client here and there and that is one factor which can lead to ‘goodbye’ on occasion.

Brace yourself!

We love our clients – we really do and many of them have stayed with us for years because the SEO services we provide are high quality, transparent and above all very honest.  However, sometimes there’s the odd client that in reality wants the ‘bells’ to be ringing and who doesn’t really care about quality, longevity and the how or why – they just want to be number one.

But if they have a brand new domain – how do you really tell them that what they want is just not achievable over night?

We did a test on a blog the other day and wrote about the riots that were happening all over the country.  Within an hour or two we got a page one listing on Google for that particular blog.  You may think this is marvellous – but on day two we had gone to page two and I daresay that by the end of the week we’d be further down the listings again.

Anyone could write that blog, but how do you get it stay at number one or on the first page?  That’s the bit that an honest SEO company will be able to help you with.  The less desirable will sell you a service and get you to number one (maybe) but you simply won’t stay there.

Goodbye my Love

So, as a Search Engine Marketing company that cares, on occasion we are asked to undertake SEO and we like to deliver results.  But, here’s the thing, we don’t want business that is not founded on the very best principles and it’s times like those where we have to politely say ‘no’ or even ‘goodbye’ to the odd client.

It’s not because we don’t care – but because we do and for this reason we are always a little apprehensive about saying goodbye – even though we know it’s for the best!

So, how do you tell a client it’s ‘goodbye’?  Answers on a post card please!

Paul

If you have a toothache, you go to the dentist right?  And equally if you require some stitches you’d probably go to the hospital.

Now imagine you’re at the dentist and while he’s inflicting pain on you for that filling he says he can help you with that open heart surgery you spoke about last month.   He knows you’re going private but can offer you a better price if it is part of your filling!  What would you honestly think?

One reaction might be that he has finally lost the plot and you run screaming from the dentist’s chair and the other, more cynical (and thankfully more likely) view would assume he is looking to increase his turnover and as with all things in business he is selling to his current client base…you!

Okay, this is obviously an exaggeration.  Though if anyone does offer you open heart surgery while you’re at the dentist you’ve either fallen in to the Twilight Zone or you should report your findings at the nearest police station.   However, in principle it’s no different to your web development company offering you SEO and the best advice here is that you should proceed with caution.

So why can’t web development companies offer SEO?

The one man band - A jack of all trades, master of none

To be fair on at least a few web development companies, some of them use ‘white label’ SEO services, which are actually delivered by professionals.  For instance, we offer white label SEO to a number of web development companies and it works.  However, if you find a company that does not do this, then essentially the SEO they’re offering may not be their specialism.  While they’re great at what they do with websites, they aren’t necessarily as interested or focused on best SEO practice.

The worrying part of this is that a web company (especially a man who operates with the one man band approach) will essentially feel his or her way through everything else.  They may have one specialism that they’re great at but all the other things like the SEO, blogging, copy, email marketing etc. will just be ‘add-ons’.  It is here that the one man band can play plenty of duff notes which will affect you but if the base drum is loud enough you may not initially notice them until you’ve spent hundreds or thousands of pounds!

As an SEO company in London, we see many agencies offering services outside of their main remit and while we know some of them at least offer these services courtesy of the white label SEO approach, we also know a few that don’t.  But if you don’t know where they are getting these services from then you should be very wary about asking them to provide you with your SEO.  Unless you know for sure that they’re recommended or that they are happy to tell you the white label SEO provider they’re using then do your homework before signing up!

We use valued people in our business and never ‘have a bash’ at anything.  We know our strengths (that’s SEO in case you didn’t know) and we know our weaknesses (mine are biscuits) and on this basis we know that if you want the best – you’ll get the right specialist to do the job.

So how do I choose the right SEO service provider?

Not wishing to teach you to suck eggs – but generally speaking instinct and common sense are a great leveller in the world and you should not ignore them!

As we’ve written in previous blogs, if someone offers you the world for nothing – you really should question it.

And just as important, if you are a dreamer, try making sure that there’s a realist somewhere in your back-up because if you don’t spot a problem they will.

Essentially we’re all vulnerable when it comes to things we don’t understand but that doesn’t mean our instincts don’t kick in at some point.  We just have to learn to listen for them instead of focusing on the dream and completely forgetting the reality…

Paul