Avoiding Seo Frauds And Schemes

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Everyone is looking for ways to increase traffic to their website. Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is sought by many businesses, large and small, in an effort to drive more traffic to their websites to increase sales and profits. This is a reasonable approach as you can’t expect more website traffic without significant increases in keywords rankings. However, if you are seeking fast results measured in days, weeks or even a few months, you are setting yourself up for wishful thinking and ultimately vulnerable to SEO schemes and “tricks.” Unfortunately, SEO can take a large amount of time, effort and skill. So, those looking for a quick fix are vulnerable to false and misleading claims of fast and meaningful results. It is possible some of these “shortcuts” or “black hat” schemes may actually appear to work; but without exception it is fool’s gold as the results never lasts for very long; the obvious results are frustration, resentment and anger. So, before you do anything else, become more knowledgeable ...
... regarding the long term nature of SEO, the patience, financial commitment and the commitment to content that is necessary for long term, lasting results. One of the best ways to avoid falling prey to these schemes is to learn the signs of the most common fraudulent SEO practices.

First, be leery of any unsolicited offers received via email. These are typically fraudulent, and should be avoided. This is especially true if the email is received from an unknown sender. It is always best to search for services providers yourself, instead of relying on what amounts to little more than spam e-mail.

Some of the most common fraudulent offers are:

* Guaranteed results, particularly rankings †no SEO can guarantee organic listings. Can anyone guarantee the future online activities of competitors; of the search engines? Of social networks?
* Guaranteed visitor counts- no SEO can guarantee the behaviors of searchers and future trends. Visitor increases can be guaranteed. Specific volumes simply cannot.
* Guaranteed Google PageRank †laughable †the factors involved is closely guarded proprietary information and is subject to constant change within the walls of Google. Also keep in mind that PageRank does not constitute success in SEO.

To the vulnerable, these offers sound promising; don’t be vulnerable (re-read above) … buying into them is equivalent to flushing your money down the toilet. In some cases, you may in fact see some short term “guaranteed” results; however, these involve black hat tricks that may work for a few days or weeks before you will suddenly disappear on Google et al. It’s a sugar high that always ends badly.

One of the most common scams, guaranteeing a certain number of weekly visitors, is handled in several underhanded ways. The traffic that will visit your site is ‘fake.’ Typically it is generated by automated click systems or by spyware. There are many ways of generating useless traffic to a website. Just check out Twitter … for those unaware, Twitter is often used to promote website visits using attention-getting, but completely irrelevant text only to be linked to your site. People click on the link and just get pissed off and leave. Consider the effect on traffic if the unscrupulous SEO scammer has a list of Tweeters that have 10 million followers and are led to your site under false or misleading text.

Because many of the companies offering fraudulent SEO tactics use black hat techniques, you are likely to see an even bigger negative impact †being black listed. Reputable search engines like Yahoo, Bing and Google have fairly rigid ethics policies. Websites who use techniques that violate these policies can and are banned. Fraudulent SEO companies typically use techniques like hidden text; automated click systems and fake landing pages that can get you removed from all search listings. While it is often possible to appeal a ban, you will end up right back where you started. Even worse, many of these companies will disappear once you realize that your site is no longer appearing in search engines.

Like any project, finding a reputable SEO company starts with research. Spend quality time. Understand that SEO is (1) expensive, (2) takes time and requires patience, (3) ongoing and never ends, (4) requires a major commitment to adding content weekly or even more often to your website.

Remember that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Guarantees are almost impossible in the SEO world. Instead, find a reputable company with good reviews and solid techniques and processes. Everyone says they want to be on page 1; very few are actually willing to do the hard work it takes to actually be on page 1.

Do you want real Google Page 1 results and leads/sales that come from those results? Contact us for a no-obligation initial consultation.