I get it, as a business owner it’s really easy to let things like SEO and your website slide. Your phone is ringing, people are mentioning that they found you on the web, so life is good right? But if you have an SEO company, web advertising company, or anyone else that does any kind of promotion of your website with the goal of attaining better rankings online for you, it might be time to start paying attention.Continue reading
In this day and age it’s pretty easy to come across someone who claims they are an SEO Expert. As a small business owner you are no doubt contacted by several people every week via phone or email claiming they can rocket your business to the front of the pack for mere dollars per month. So the question here is: with all these people claiming they can do the same thing, who is telling the truth, and who is selling SEO snake oil?Continue reading
Hiring a reputable Internet Advertising company for your small business may seem like an easy task. There are many choices out there when it comes to website marketing, search optimization and search marketing companies. Unfortunately the decision to hire a reputable company to handle your online advertising is not as easy as it may seem. In many cases, small business owners choose internet advertising based upon convenience, rather than diligent research, which can have unintended consequences down the road. Don’t become a victim of a company that doesn’t have your best interests at heart.
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Google recently announced an update to their search ranking algorithms that in most part only affects what Google terms “spammy websites” but with that being said, there is in my opinion, some unintended affects to small business websites…Continue reading
In this final article of Website Ranking Factors For Small Business, I will cover factors that can get your website penalized by the search engines, hurting your chances of appearing for the keywords you want. The below information is by no means all inclusive, but covers some of the more common black hat SEO activities that will eventually hurt your rankings.Continue reading
Recently I read an article from PPC Associates titled How To Spot Fake Google Reviews, obviously I was enticed to read the post as gaining reviews for local businesses is one of the best ways to affect rankings and help set your business apart as a trusted partner. I often talk to my clients about the importance of reminding their customers to write reviews about the service or product they received. In fact I had one client that took this to heart and emailed his past clients asking for reviews…and to my surprise he garnered 15 reviews which shot his business to the first page for a highly sought for keyword. But the reason the above article caught my attention is explained below.
It’s can tempting as a SEO company to help your clients position out by writing a few fake reviews for them. After all you might think that your helping them get to the first page, they get business, and you look like a hero, right? Wrong. Fake reviews are black hat.
Earlier this last summer I met with an insurance agency that wanted to get to the first page for the keyword string “Auto Insurance Portland”. One very well known company here in town known for their outrageous commercials and well known slogan was the first Google Places result for the search. After looking at this company’s place page, it became pretty clear that whomever was handling their SEO was involved in Black Hat tactics to get their client to the first page. The biggest factor was Fake Reviews. Whomever had posted these fake reviews didn’t even try to hide the fact they were fake. Instead of writing a review, they had just stuffed a bunch of keyword strings (keyword stuffing) into several different reviews. Keywords such as:
were repeated over and over again in all these reviews.
So after reading the article on How To Spot Fake Google Reviews, it made me think of this well known insurance company. So of course I went to Google to see how this companies Black Hat SEO Tactics were working. And to my surprise, this company has been been removed completely from the results on “Auto Insurance Portland”. I did find their Google Place Page after doing a name search and found that not only did Google remove all the Keyword Stuffed reviews, but they also placed the page back into “unclaimed” status. One lone review still remains…and from what I saw it still stinks to high heaven, I’ll let you decide for yourself below:
I decided to block out the company’s name for obvious reasons. But it seems to me that whomever wrote this review is trying for rankings for:
Moral of this story? If some SEO Company promises you rankings, find out how they plan to do it. I’ve always tried to use the rule that if a Google employee asked how I gain rankings for a client, how would I feel when I told them the answer?