[Basikboy]

After trying to do the SEO work myself for a little while now and just spinning my wheels I have finally decided to outsource. My only problem now Is whether the company I chose Is best for me or not.

I have had numerous emails with this company and spoke with them on the phone. How do you know they are not just telling you what you want to hear? I would only be paying them $250. a month and I worry because I am not one of their top clients that I won't get the attention I need. I don't know why I am so reluctant to go forward with this.

How do I really know If they are actually putting In the work? I have been told that they will send me data every month to let me know where I was and were I am currently In search standing and what not. Supposedly $250. pays for 7 hours a month of dedicated SEO work. Does this sound right?

Thanks for any help or advice, I know most of you feel SEO can be done yourself but trust me I tried and would rather just pass the buck. I need to make my first payment by later today so please try and reply If you have anything for me. Thanks!

 

[PositiveDave]

$250 seems a lot per month, it really depends on what the company will do for you.
Get you to page 1 for a given phrase - dead easy for a lot of phrases.
Improve your Google ranking - easy for a while.
Are they whitehat? Are they buying links or linking to dodgy neighbourhoods?
I'm always uneasy about paying for something that I can't see (lawyers/accountants/seo etc.).

 

[Basikboy]

Here Is what I was told when asked what can be done for the search word "Funny T-Shirts"

We will work hard within the parameters of what would normally be a maintenance level of service. We are targeting a phrase, 'funny t-shirts' that is highly competitive and over the course of 6 months, I would be impressed if we reach the first page for that specific phrase. I am pretty sure we will reach the second page, and will definitely achieve first page rankings for other 3-word phrases that we will target as milestones to achieving our primary goal. I would then expect that we would be able to maintain or increase the level of service and start to make serious achievements in terms of first page and top 5 rankings in Google.

Our secondary goal in providing services is to demonstrate what it like for a web entrepreneur to have a trusting, professional relationship with a web solutions company, and to earn referral business from you.

 

[PositiveDave]

Sounds realistic at least.

 

[Basikboy]

I agree, I have talked to this company on the phone recently and all sounds well. I am taking the plunge, fingers crossed!

 

[Zinnia]

I'm not sure if 7 hours a month can get you moved to the second page for such a competitive keyword. Good luck, though! Definitely let me know how it goes!

 

[PositiveDave]

SEO advice - leave a link in your signature, cheque made payable to PositiveDave....

 

[AeresClothing]

PositiveDave speaks the truth. Always have a link back to your website on any forum or social networking website you use. This is solely up to you. No SEO wizards are going to go into your accounts and add links to your signatures and profiles to get Google props.

 

[puncha]

You can do seo by yourself if you have time coz seo take time so much. If you need to hire some company, I recommend you to check their profile first. Also, check their clients and their feedback.

 

[inkimprintscom]

I think doing SEO yourself is the best way. If you can dedicate maybe a hour or so per day, you can add your site to several directories,blogs, and link exchange. If you can you can also maybe write an article once a week. I figure most people who have websites and are starting out actually sit there everyday and try and figure why the website is not getting business. So if there is time for that, then you can dedicate that same time to SEO.

 

[Retro Campaigns]

Since we've sort of veered off into self-SEO, I just want to add that if you're set up with Google's Analytics and Webmaster tools, you can really monitor and do a lot on your own. Both of those are free.

 

[PositiveDave]

as is StatCounter Free invisible Web tracker, Hit counter and Web stats, which I use in conjunction with Analytics

 

[AeresClothing]

Since we've sort of veered off into self-SEO, I just want to add that if you're set up with Google's Analytics and Webmaster tools, you can really monitor and do a lot on your own. Both of those are free.

Agreed.

Definitely recommend using these two whether you are going to SEO yourself or hire someone to do it for you. No use spending time or money if you aren't going to track the results.

 

[ruch1v]

7 hours a month is nowhere near enough for seo, i'm trying to do my own and i put in 2hours a day, also i'd be expecting at the very least 30hrs for $250


just my thoughts


thanks

 

[PositiveDave]

$8 an hour!!!
Pay peanuts, get monkeys. You won't get any SEO for that.

 

[ruch1v]

$8 an hour!!!
Pay peanuts, get monkeys. You won't get any SEO for that.

as a British born Indian, I would agree with you by UK and US standards, but for people in India or even Philippines or China for that matter, that's a good living, as a matter of fact, i've been quoted $200 for 30 hours, I didn't take him up as I'm short on funds at the minute, but once by business is fully established I will do, but anyone interested I can pass you the details


Ruchi

 

[shirtsthatgo]

I think this will echo what is said in other places on this forum. Here is my take on SEO folks.

Many of us start a business and dont hear about SEO until we have our website built and think we are ready. There is a tendency to build it expecting them to come. I did this and they did not come. I have spent the last 10 years (my day job) in web hosting and other internet infrastructure roles and surprisingly SEO is something you just dont touch unless you either have a website or work in a marketing role.

I learned about SEO though and spent many an hour studying and getting to understand it. Now I am doing all the on page SEO for my site and I am outsourcing all the off page work to a great little firm located in Indore. There is a lot of work to be done still but in about 4 months I went from being a nobody to ranking top 10 for about 30 long tail keywords I was targetting.

This is fascinating stuff and I continue to learn. Yes, my site reeks of on page SEO but it works folks if you do it right. My plan is to back off the on page SEO as the off page work and associated authority of my site increases.

Anyone new to this I am glad to share with you what I have learned so far.

 

[designnbuy]

It's always better if you can do the SEO instead of hiring someone. If you don't have time to do and need to give the responsibility to some SEO company or any professional please be sure they don't use any black hat strategies to improve ranking so quickly!! It's really risky!

 

[mokothemonkey]

don't do it. thats almost $40 an hour, which you could do yourself. I got to #50 (listing, not page) on google for search "geek shirts" which gets 10,000 searches per month or something, all from SEOing my website - which is a spreadshirt shop so I could do little seoing - and putting my link in forum sigs with "geek shirts" as the keywords, and posted a link in a couple of blog replies. No payments at all.
I've also got to #2 (once again, listing not page) on yahoo! for search 'nerdy tees' and page 2 of bing for search 'geek shirts' all by myself in under 3 months. All without spending a dime, excluding electricity bill

For that much, you can do it yourself. Just work hard.

 

[shirtsthatgo]

Good tips there moko. You have done a lot by yourself. I notice that you mainly have a lot of inbound links and that they are only from a few separate sites (mainly forums) I also see how you are pretty limited with the on page SEO but you still rank well.

I will try some of what you have done in addition to what I am outsourcing.

Lets say you want to rank for keyword X. But you are posting a legit post in a non related forum. For instance I am into Kiteboarding. Any posts I make in Kiteboarding forums that are legit it is fair game to have my site link in my profile/sig for that forum. That being said how do you get the link to have anchor text? How do you have many forum links help with a given keyword?