Are businesses still hiring SEO that use strategies that could lead to a Google penalty?

[williamgoodseoagency.com]

Is anyone worried that businesses know so little about SEO that they are continuing to hire SEO consultants that use strategies that could land the website with a Google penalty? I ask because we did some research with businesses and found the results worrying: blog farms, over optimised anchor text. We will be releasing the data later this week, but wondered if it something for the SEO community to worry about and what can be done about it.

[williamgoodseoagency.com]

Thanks for the answer Marie. That is true about the SEO in the middle who can talk the talk and can get away sounding like a pro. It's also true that many small businesses, especially those online, have little budget but have the desire, if not the need, to rank and just can't afford big budgets, so they are at the mercy of the cheaper SEOs.

[EGOL]

At my office we have two people working almost 40 hours each per week on content and one person filling the sales.  That, in my opinion, is what is required to produce rain when you don't have a big brand name generating automatic traffic.  (We also make a little money from ads.)   Most business are not willing to spend that kind of time on content.  The only SEO that we do is on-site.

[MarieHaynes]

Yes.

A few years ago there was a massive pool of people who called themselves SEOs who could generally accomplish decent rankings by using techniques that are not in line with the quality guidelines. Now, that pool has gotten a lot smaller. In my opinion the "good SEOs" are those who are extremely knowledgable about on-site SEO and know how to properly create content and promote that content.

Those are skills, however that take years to learn. Gone are the days where someone can take a quick course, buy a few links, slap up some spammy microsites and rank. Yet, some people are still trying because that's all they knew. And sadly, business owners are still buying this crap.

What bothers me the most though is the type of SEO provider who is borderline. They promise that they are "white hat" and don't make spammy links, but they'll happily post links on their private blog network and submit guest posts to hundreds of sites that will publish them. The business owner often hears "white hat" and is easily convinced that this stuff is going to work.

I had a client recently contact me to ask me my opinion on the new SEO work they were getting done. I had removed a link penalty for them a couple of years ago and thought I had educated them well on what type of SEO is acceptable. They interviewed several people for an in house SEO job and had me sit in on the interviews so that I could ask them questions to make sure that they were within Google's guidelines. They didn't have one candidate whom I felt understood Google's guidelines. They all wanted to guest post, but just do it on "authoritative sites". A little bit of guest posting is ok...but if that's your main SEO strategy, that's not good. I lost touch with this client until they just recently contacted me. They had hired a great guy who had "white hat" strategies and asked if I could review 150 links he built for them. That's a red flag, isn't it? Any time you can build 150 links you're probably crossing into unnatural territory. Well, these links were all comment spam and forum profile spam. I couldn't believe it.

I think though that the main problem is cost. Anyone who thoroughly understands the technical aspects of SEO and can legitimately build a site's traffic is going to cost $3000+ a month (perhaps less, depending on the niche). So, if I'm a small time small business and can't afford $3000+ a month, I'm going to be looking for the $500 a month type of package...and sadly, this is usually not going to move the needle much.

[EGOL]

The problem with many websites is a lack of content.

The business owner doesn't want to write the content (can't write, doesn't have time, can't afford, etc.).  The SEO has a hard time finding someone to write content that fits the business and satisfies the owner.

So, the SEO is left trying to promote and optimize a turd.

This is what creates demand for low quality SEO and links that are bought or provided but never earned.

Are businesses still hiring SEO that use strategies that could lead to a Google penalty?

Yes, as explained above.

[williamgoodseoagency.com]

Yes. Serious SEOs have the analytics to show business their worth, showing that SEO is more than just keyword research etc etc. However, many there has been a rise in small online business opening with little budget. Online start ups can be up and running with little budget. They are creating the demand for low quality SEO providing links but not earning them.

[ClaytonJ]

There is nothing to be done about it, but stay the course. Unfortunately their are no credentials for SEO as such. So anyone can claim to be an expert.  Ironically it would be difficult to create a course as there are so many potential solutions given most sites have unique criteria.

All that said the new Search Analytics has given me hope in setting identifiable dashboards for clients - ie simply clicks per page. We are introducing that. Measurable and identifiable tangible results.

On worried - not at all, though some give SEO a bad name, good quality work leads to more work from word of mouth than is almost achievable...