Link Building Agency refuses to report Hours of work completed, is this normal?
-
A link building agency we are interested in is promising to work until X number of whitehat (manual) links are acquired for $YYYY each month. They say they don't report on hours, but instead focus on results. Is this common or is it a red flag?
-
The hours it takes them is really not relevant since the contract will be "x" number of links per month for "$y". Focus your correspondence on the quality and relevancy of the links they are providing. Hopefully the adding of links will take a natural progression and not all at once each month.
-
I agree with the other people. An hour sheet isn't necessary. I can "try to build links" for 20 hours and not get much accomplished. Clearly not what you are looking for.
I also would be weary of someone who says they will "build you 15 links" or whatever number is promised. As EGOL mentioned, they may have their own blog network, pay for links or any other number of tactics you want to avoid. Remember, 1 good link is better than 20 bad ones.
It really is a tricky business. A good link builder can offer no guarantees. They can however keep working hard until their client is happy or until they deliver results.
Ask to see some of these things instead:
- Techniques they plan on using
- Link Targets
- Outreach Emails Sent
- Links Acquired
-
I can't say that i have ever provided an hours worked report or ever been asked to, more on results providing data on a regular basis.
-
I have seen company's offer link building packages in many different ways.
Since this particular company works until a certain number of links are acquired each month, they should show you the links they acquire each month. That would be a very good way to check their work. Quality links take time and talent to acquire, so if they are doing a good job every month acquiring good links, I would not worry about their hours.
However, if they are using links farms, spammy directories, or anything like that, that is a red flag.
Also, you could ask to see a link portfolio of one of their clients to see what type of links they typically acquire.
-
Maybe they only work 5 minutes per month?
The links could be purchased, rented, traded or simply uploaded to one of their drop/grab sites?
How the links are acquired and their long-term persistence might be more important than how much these guys are workin'.
-
pbhatt.
Focus on their repore and what other people are saying. Asking for Hours is like being a big boss on top of them asking them if they punched in on the clock. If they can get the work done, it doesnt matter how many hours they worked. UNLESS, they are charging you by the hour which at that point your red flag makes sense.
But search the company on the net and see what other people are saying about them. You can easily get an answer. and be careful with people on Freelancer or Odesk, i have had some bad experiences, and stay away from people that are offering to link you o PR8, or such. Its all BS. ( speaking from experience here )
Best of luck.
Hampig M
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Why Google not disavow some bad links
I have submitted bad links that I want to disavow on google with the Moz Pro hight spam score. Its almost 4 months completed yet I have a bad link that exists with high spam score any solution? https://fortniteskinsgenerator.net/
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | marktravis0 -
JavaScript encoded links on an AngularJS framework...bad idea for Google?
Hi Guys, I have a site where we're currently deploying code in AngularJS. As part of this, on the page we sometimes have links to 3rd party websites. We do not want to have followed links on the site to the 3rd party sites as we may be perceived as a link farm since we have more than 1 million pages and a lot of these have external 3rd party links. My question is, if we've got javascript to fire off the link to the 3rd party, is that enough to prevent Google from seeing that link? We do not have a NOFOLLOW on that currently. The link anchor text simply says "Visit website" and the link is fired using JavaScript. Here's a snapshot of the code we're using: Visit website Does anyone have any experience with anything like this on their own site or customer site that we can learn from just to ensure that we avoid any chances of being flagged for being a link farm? Thank you 🙂
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | AU-SEO0 -
About link building in 2015?
I don't think we still can use the same link buildings tools of years ago. So, how relevant is this article (from 2009):
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | nans
http://moz.com/blog/17-ways-search-engines-judge-the-value-of-a-link Or is there any update? Nancy1 -
WP Datar site shady linking to my site
Hello, I have done some research on this but cannot find a solid answer to my question. After recently reviewing my "not found" errors in webmaster tools, I see that a site called "WP Datar" has linked to a number of our pages that actually do not exist. I am wondering first, if this will harm our site, and second, what is the best way to get those links from their site taken down? I tried emailing, but of course, the email address listed on the site did not work. 🙂 Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | lfrazer0 -
Strange Pingback/Blog Comment Links
On one of my sites I've noticed some strange links from Google Webmaster Tools recent links feature. They are pingbacks/blog comments but they are using keyword anchor text and linking to my site. I know we are not doing this. Should I be concerned about this possibly being negative SEO? Here's a sample (be careful, shady site)
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | eyeflow0 -
People buying links to their profiles on my site
As we have a major Penguin update looming in the background, I am looking for expert advice on how to deal with professionals buying into link programs whether they are doing it deliberately or not. Our site provides detailed profile information on hundreds of 1000's of professionals and some professionals apparently believed that buying into link program will lift their profile in the SERPS. About 10 professionals have paid shady link building companies to buy links to their profiles on our site. The biggest offender bought over 1,500 links to his profile. Aside from adding the known toxic links to our disavow file, what else can we do to avoid any link penalties? I can think of three distinct options and would love to hear feedback especially based on actual experience. Option 1. 404 the existing profile - "http://www.anysite.com/jones_smith" and create a new URL "http://www.anysite.com/jones_smith_1". Option 2. Keep the existing URL and fully rely on the disavow file. Contact the professionals and kindly ask them to stop buying links and to contact their link building companies to remove the links. Any other ideas?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | irvingw0 -
Link Building: High Ranking Site vs. Relevancy
Hello, When link building, is it acceptable to link with a site that has high authority but has minimal relevancy to our site? For example, if we sell nutritional products and the link exchange would be with a site that relates to free coupons, would that work? Also, if we are publishing articles on other sites, should we also publish them on our own site? Should we add "nofollow" if we publish them in our site?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | odegi0 -
Good link networks?
Hey Mozzers, quick question about link networks. I've identified quite a few, like these: Build My Rank Unique Article Wizard Authority Link Network Article Ranks EZ Article Link Socialadr Linkvana SEO LinkVine Does anyone have experience using any of these? The basic premise is they own or their members own tons of different blogs. You write an article, give it to them, they publish it one one of those blogs. You include a link in your article. Done. They charge a monthly fee to use and all that, so is it worth it? Anyone had any success with them? Finding mixed things on forums online, and since many of their websites like awfully spammy, wanted to poll the Mozzers and get your thoughts.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | DanDeceuster0