We are looking for someone in SEO to work on our online retail site. We got semi-burned by the last group we worked with (they over promised), so I want to get HN's thoughts on doing SEO before selecting someone.<p>Would appreciate thoughts on who has worked for you, how to best pick an SEO contractor or any SEO people out there: We have money, a good little niche, if you would take on another client.<p>Thanks!
I did SEO consulting for about a year and a half up until a few months ago. My employer was pretty happy with the results -- though I haven't kept up with the field recently as I've been trying to focus more on software & web development (being a Computer Science major). If you're interested let me know what your goals are and I'll write up a proposal. I could use the job but if I see that you wouldn't benefit much from my services I will reject your proposal. In the past I've told potential clients that they would be better off going to SEOMoz (or whatever site is popular these days) to read some articles and do it themselves.<p>As far as promises (or guarantees rather) and SEO goes, I don't make them. A search engine is basically a "black box" as far as I see - making a guarantee would seem a bit disingenuous. The only promise I can make is that I would do my best using whatever knowledge I have.
I think you'll find your experience with an SEO firm was fairly common (if not universal). They over promise and can't possibly deliver without a longterm (ie. prohibitively expensive) involvement with your company. The company I work for hired some of the bigger companies (SEOInc.com, Bruce Clay) and they provided some good advice. However, at the end of the day, it was up to me to implement the technical side of things and our SEO/SEM manager to work on the long term stuff. Plus, the knowledge they provided is either readily available or some new trick which is prone to change over time. Both firms cost a fortune (well, I consider it a fortune).<p>Save your money, hire someone junior but clever, give them 6 months to work on it part time--tell them not to try anything blackhat/fishy. I think you'd get way better bang for your buck. (They can start by adding METATAGS to the first (most important?) category (Egyptian Hookah) in your menu--Google says that keywords/description aren't that important anymore but every SEO consultant is going to tell you to do them first)...<p>You are sitting on a goldmine having a copy writer. Most longterm SEO is developing legitimately interesting content to encourage high-quality, inbound links. Have your copy writer colleague spend an hour or two a week writing Hookah Articles (I'll read them--always been a bit intriqued by them) and in a year your site will be killing it....
I don't post much on here, so I'll just briefly say that I run a web marketing consultancy in Denver that has worked with several start-ups and e-commerce stores. Email in my profile if you want to talk further.<p>Since the discussion in this thread is turning toward whether SEO should be a "buy or build" decision, I'll throw my two-cents in there, as well.<p>If your website is a hobby or just a side-project, I think SEO is something you can pick up by reading some of the better guides out there (SEOMoz's "Basics" guide comes to mind). This will ensure that your site doesn't have things like <title>Home</title> or inaccessible navigation.<p>However, all of "what there is to learn yourself" is what our firm would take care of on day 1. The real SEO (the kind that commands 6-figure salaries or 5-figure monthly retainers) is much, much more in depth than the average internet user realizes. The reason you can't learn those strategies in a day is because most successful SEO practitioners keep them private, for obvious ($$) reasons.
phpnode here on HN is pretty good: <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=phpnode" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=phpnode</a><p>Satisfied customer here. Not cheap but worth every penny.
Takrupp - I recently started my own SEO/SEM firm and one of the reasons being I have seen lots of businesses get burned with high fees and promises from SEO guys.<p>Here is my companies site <a href="http://www.digitalbaltoro.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.digitalbaltoro.com/</a> (site is a work in progress)<p>We are a small shop but we have great experience. Here is the link to my Linkedin profile to give you the overview <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/gforst" rel="nofollow">http://www.linkedin.com/in/gforst</a> as you will see lots of experience in e-commerce.<p>Give me a buzz if you are interested in chatting some more.
312-566-8944 ext 102
Free SEO advice. Guaranteed replies within 24 hours. <a href="http://www.page2sucks.com" rel="nofollow">http://www.page2sucks.com</a><p>It's like a StackOverflow, but for SEO and SEM.
I'm an SEO & SEM consultant with <a href="http://piconsulting.com" rel="nofollow">http://piconsulting.com</a> (excuse the page rust, we're launching something new in the near future). You can contact us via the website or you can email me directly (steve@)
SEO is a business based on fear and confusion. The only thing that matters is high authority backlinks pointing into your site. All the on-page stuff matters, just not as much. And we throw the on-page stuff in for free. We build backlinks to your site using our proprietary algorithm developed by studying the google patent filing and extensive trial and error. All sites hosting your link are PageRank 4+. Give me a shout and I'll send you our two-pager on who we are, what we do, how we do it, and expected results (we've ranked for the keyword "diet" before). Holla! :)
Send me a message (AIM sn in profile) I'll help you out, no charge. I'm the technical founder of a top 100 and top 500 site and picked up some SEO along the way.
I specifically do link building services for aggressive internet marketers and most recently local small businesses. I built a full web app to handle all orders and tasks and have a full staff of workers that can pump out orders quickly and efficiently.<p>Register an account for free here and you can check out what I offer. We can discuss things privately if you need a strategy put together.<p><a href="http://members.layeredlinks.com" rel="nofollow">http://members.layeredlinks.com</a>
Try www.pearanalytics.com. We scan your website in 30 seconds - no signup or email required. (We optimized that process by running through HN before :)