Should we fire our SEO Vendor?

[globaleyeglasses]

Dear SeoMozers,

We are working on ranking towards some hyper competitive keywords (each query has millions of searches a month) and working with an external SEO Vendor. We were not satisfied with the progress, therefore we asked them to send a revised SEO Plan.

Here's what they proposed:

1. On Page Optimization (standard techniques)

Off Page Optimization

1. Directory Submissions (100)

2. Article Marketing (Two unique 300 word articles to be submitted to 300 directories)

3. Press Release (Two Press Releases to 100 PR Sites)

4. Classified Ads Submissions

5. Business Listings

6. Link Reinforcement (Create wheel to circulate traffic)

7. Blog Submissions, Commenting, Forum Posting

8. Web 2.0 Link Building (Squidoo Lens, Hub Page, Link Wheel etc)

9. One Way Links (Not Specified how many)

Our concern is that this sounds like low quality link building. We've given them 19 top keywords to achieve rankings for and will be paying $20-25K  to achieve Top 3-5 rankings for the targeted terms.

Do you think this strategy would work or should we change the SEO Vendor?

[JohnW-UK]

This made me smile! HA

[SEO-Doctor]

Is that one of Distilled's link  building packages?  

[DougRoberts]

The "plan" doesn't look much like a plan... more like a list of (as already mentioned, low value) seo tactics to me.

Has anyone suggested tackling some less competitive, but related keyword terms first? It's easier to climb the tree from the bottom than to try and jump onto the top of it and you get to pick some low-hanging fruit on the way up.

What is important to the business - ranking for these highly competitive terms or more traffic/conversions now. Don't lose site of the business goals.

If you look at the sites that are currently ranking for your competitive search terms, can you honestly say that your site, your content delivers better value to the potential visitors and deservers to rank up there?

[Dr-Pete]

I think that's a great clarification. Paying $20-25K for someone to build authoritative, trustworthy links and content to drive you to the top on competitive keywords could be a bargain. Paying that for someone to create junk is worse than a rip-off - it could kill your rankings. Off-page (1)-(8) all look low-value to me, and (9) is ambiguous.

[KeriMorgret]

Also feel free to create a private question and ask for a second opinion from the Moz staff and associates. Those questions aren't indexed, and they're not viewable to anyone who is not Moz staff or associate, and you can share your URL and other details there if you would like.

[fassa]

Yep ... it is a public secret that once u rank first for some keywords and people get to know you you start ranking automatically for others too because people spread the word. And optimizing the next 5 is easier and thus less costly.

[fassa]

I totally agree with him here.

[RikkiD22]

I completely agree. For that budget I would expect a select amount quality links rather than a large quantity of spammy ones, but who knows... maybe the company is working on relationships to get some really good quality links and is just doing the run of the mill directories in the mean time (playing devils advocate here a little because I don't believe that is the case).

I think the on page SEO is just as vital too. If the website in question is the one in the OP profile then I would question that a little too.

The homepage seems to be targeting 3 key phrases plus the brand name which isn’t ideal, especially not with very competitive key terms.

I could go onto the categories too - you have the category which is targeting the key phrase for men, women and children when there are separate sections for each which could target the male, female and child’s keywords while the main category page targets the general term.

I think in 6 weeks it can be difficult to judge the link building strategy but taking the on page SEO into account I would say you might be better changing...

[activitysuper]

Can you throw one of your keywords your targeting into the mix, this will allow others to give you an indication on what type of link building worked for competitors and thus an idea what kind of link building you should be doing.

[fassa]

You should definitely find another vendor that does not use spam techniques because the recent google panda update really hits them very hard.

[activitysuper]

One thing I will say is targeting that many keywords in one go is way to much, take 5 of the keywords, work on ranking them first, then once they are ranked, start on the next 5 and at the same time keep maintaining the first.

[fassa]

I am not saying the budget is over the top ... I am saying that if they are spending it for the services they listed it is not well spent.

[EGOL]

We are working on ranking towards some hyper competitive keywords...

I do not believe that the work that they propose will be effective for your "hyper competitive" keywords.

[globaleyeglasses]

Hello, First and foremost - thanks for the great responses. The reason why we posted this question here was because when we received the report, we were very unhappy with the quality of links that were being built. We have not been with this vendor for long (about a month and a half), but overall - for over 77% of the keywords, rankings have declined (though we are aware that its too early to judge). What concerns us the most is those spammy .edu links, blog commenting, thin articles, bad directories and so forth. The budget that we have set is to achieve the Top 3-5rankings, from thereon - we do have a maintenance budget to retain the top positions.

[RikkiD22]

Not sure if I agree that the budget is way over the top for what you are trying to achieve if the keywords really are 'hyper' competitive. It depends how it has been structured - is it $25k when they achieve the rankings or $25k for the time period (3m, 6m, 1y) regardless of results?

In terms of their plan I agree with the others that sounds of the link building does sound a little low quality but even today those links can still get people ranked highly if done correctly (high quality directories, relevant one way links etc) and the on page stuff is good.

I don't like the way they state how many of each link you will get, that does sounds spammy and automated but there is know way of knowing if the 'one way links' are going to be high quality or not because there is no detail.

To me it all comes down to results - how long have you been with the company and how far have you progressed?

[fassa]

The price you are paying is GIGANTIC .... You can get what they are offering for like 250$ per keyword. and you are paying 100 times more.

And as the other guy said most of it is rubbish ... what they are offering is a lot of low quality links and what you need is not so much high quality links.

Regarding your content :

Google and people and "our world" basically favors quality over quantity. For the price you are paying you can get someone to "rework" your content so that it is professionally made like apple's content for the users and also keyword targeted for your searches. In other words REAL on page optimization.

Regarding your social networks status :

Also you will get professionally made profiles in all the social networks (VERY high quality backinks from them too)  As Gillian (The president of seomoz ) told me when i last met her ... "it is all about gathering and nourishing your community". You will start gathering the community of your real fans... the real people that like you and will really spread the word about you.

Regarding links :

You can get links to relevant sites to yours and high quality ones. For example the 1 link you get from YouTube which has Page Rank 9 is worth 10 000 of the links you are buying for 100 000 times lower price ... Also the open directory and so on. I am from Bulgaria and I always do quality work here ... it is amazing how great it works on the low markets ... I get a clients website to top 1 on all keywords for 2-3 weeks just including them to like 20-40 websites like youtube, dmoz , facebook , linkedin , and websites from their area. The days of "automatic seo" are over man it has SO LOW value that it is not worth it.

Advice : You should be paying someone to research your busyness and figure out link bait techniques, find high quality relevant websites you can make link partnerships with, understand your busyness and advise you on how to spread the word and go social, work on your content and do some usability work and so on.

Regarding your vendor :

The services you listed are the lowest quality possible and are being almost surely done with automation software which sooner or later gets "caught" by Google.

Advide : Totally YES ... change the vendor. You can find lots of great people that can do that for you here in the seomoz community ... including my company ( a bit of shameless self promotion here for the time i spent answering )

[activitysuper]

Personally (and many may disagree) but:

1. On Page Optimization (standard techniques)

Off Page Optimization

1. Directory Submissions (100) (could do this yourself)

2. Article Marketing (Two unique 300 word articles to be submitted to 300 directories) (rubbish)

3. Press Release (Two Press Releases to 100 PR Sites) (ok'ish)

4. Classified Ads Submissions (rubbish)

5. Business Listings (ok if its yahoo directory and some of the big ones)

6. Link Reinforcement (Create wheel to circulate traffic) (not worth the effort)

7. Blog Submissions, Commenting, Forum Posting (spammy)

8. Web 2.0 Link Building (Squidoo Lens, Hub Page, Link Wheel etc) (this works for me)

9. One Way Links (Not Specified how many) (?)

Basically you got $1000 to spend on each keyword, id use the other $5000 for onesite SEO and  a tidy up (if needed)

I would then take the 1k and spend most of it on having content generated targeting the keyword and throw it out on, your own site, guest blogging, squidoo, hub pages and a few other things.

Thats me though and im not a wizard at SEO (yet)