Backlink Transparency with SEO Agency
-
Hello everyone. I recently started working with an SEO agency and today they gave me an updated keyword report which showed some increase in rankings. I was not aware that any backlinks had been created yet so I asked for a report of the links. Their response is below and I am just wondering if this is normal practice being I have not worked with any type of SEO agency yet.
"
Hey Daniel,We release a small report on them which the guest blog team will do soon. We don't reveal all backlink sources unfortunately because people have tried to bother the webmasters we have and basically steal our techniques.
But rest assured you will be ranking at the top of the pack with our methods
" -
This doesn't ring true to me because:
- There are all kinds of ways you can find links to your site (referring traffic in GA, link analysis sources like moz's own tools, ahrefs, majestic etc, and tools like Google Alerts)
- You've already got the link in these cases, so you would have no incentive to "bother" the webmasters
- In general, my experience has been that most providers want to tell you about as many placements as they can!
Add to this some of the phrasing (e.g. "webmasters we have" -- emphasis mine) suggests that there may be payments taking place or other schemes afoot that place these well outside the Google guidelines.
Per the conversation in the other comments - I would recommend that you get at least a statement of work in place to govern what you are expecting for the money you are paying even if you are not committing to a long-term contract. This could include agreements on any of the above (what information they will provide you with, what you will do with that information etc). At the very least, you should want to understand the techniques in use in order to make your own informed decisions about the risks and rewards.
Hope that helps.
-
Thanks for the feedback. Anyone else want to chime in on this?
-
There should be some sort of contract.
You are sharing your private information with the agency and vice versa. Also the contract will govern what services the agency provides and what you can expect from their services. If they write content for your site, the contract will govern who owns that contract.
It is my opinion that you may want to get out of this deal before you are in to deep. They are already shady with a backlinks report. This is only my opinion.
Thanks,
Don
-
There was no contract between me and the agency. It is month to month.
-
Hello,
You can use moz's link explorer to reveal the back links https://analytics.moz.com/pro/link-explorer/home
If they are good quality they usually show up in the index but not always. Another area you can check is google search console.
I do not think it is common practice to give a backlinks report upon request. They may not want to reveal their sources. But this information should not be private to a client. The contract should govern any information that is shared.
Thanks,
Don
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
-
What are the benefits of having more refering domains than inbound backlinks or vice versa? and is it neccassary to get a click on a backlink which i created on someone elses website,
somebody told me if i get a click on my backlink , i will get more refering domains
Link Building | | calvinkj0 -
Outreach for backlinks
What are some of the best ways to reach out for back links? The goal is to get a link from their website to our root or an anchored text but what are some techniques and options to consider to make it beneficial for both parties?
Link Building | | Cfarcher0 -
Subdomains and SEO
My question has 2 parts: 1) Can you optimize a subdomain template site (a company is providing us with a template site they provide many other salespeople, but we can control the meta and content on each page), and 2) Does forwarding and masking another domain to the subdomain in question, hurt my SEO efforts?
Link Building | | gotchamobi0 -
Advices On Yoast SEO!
Hello Guys, I have a short issue, that i still can't figure it out from my previous Q&A. Why is google doing this ( ranking for a tag and not for title tag ) - do I have some misplaced setting in yoast seo? Please find the attachment. Also there is any way that someone could help me edit something in yoast? Thanks. KDu0Z1Y
Link Building | | DexSmart0 -
Will this Blog Tool hurt our SEO
Hi, We have come across this tool that we are considering using for some of our blog posts. We will still continue posting our own post blogs weekly, we will just use this if we come across anything interesting. Our concern is it will produce duplicate content from other sites. We are very new to blogging. https://home.passle.net/ Will this hurt our SEO? Will it improve it? Or will it make no difference? All thoughts welcomed please. Thanks Andrew
Link Building | | Studio330 -
What are the best SEO agencies for link building?
I am not looking for a full service SEO agency. I just want link building. Not paid links, not link networks, not blog comments, not bookmarks...real, legit, decent links. Does anyone have any experience working with an SEO agency that helped them develop their link profile positively and at a reasonable price? I'm willing to pay for the service, I just want to work with someone who won't buy links or send a bunch of spam our way. If anyone has worked with such an agency, please let me know so I can contact them for more info. Thanks!
Link Building | | DanDeceuster0 -
Creating Backlinks On Behalf of Client
I'm on my first SEO project with a law firm. I'm at the stage where I am doing competitive backlink research on other law firms that my client gave me. I saw a blog site called typepad. It has a high domain authority so I was going to recommend to my client that they set up an account and blog away! Since it's a law firm, I am not qualified to start blogging on behalf of my client and I know they are extremely busy so now I have to "ride" my client to get busy and start creating content. I feel like I want to do more for them on the blog side to keep things going but not having a law background, probably not doable. Question: Do most SEO's do the blogging for their clients, farm it out or keep pushing their clients to do it? I also want them to sign up with articlebase but the same thing is going to happen. I have to push them to write articles. I guess this is my job? -Bob
Link Building | | Czubmeister0 -
Utilizing Print Media for SEO
Hey SEO MOZ, We have a client that holds the license to a famous Australian designer. The Designer and our client both get mentioned a lot in the print world. They get coverage in publications like the New York Times, Home and Garden Magazine and other top print media publications. Sometimes it's our clients business name mentioned and sometimes it's the designer's name who they hold the rights too. I'm wondering how we can utilize this exposure for their SEO? It already drives traffic to their website but it also be great to harness this exposure to increase their rankings. I know one way is to see if the article is also printed online and see if you can get a link on their. But I'm wondering if there are other ways to use this? Also do you have experience contacting major publications to see if they can put a link in an online published article and if they ever respond to these requests? Really appreciate this!
Link Building | | TWSOM0