Got an SEO package, paid $400+ for it, basically got scammed.
-
Hi guys,
I know this is stupid but I bought an SEO package for around $400. Received the report, and my... it was a complete load of spam.
It was basically a blast to lots of sites with random articles and my anchor texts all over the place. Theres thousands of these links and the articles dont make sense, I'm not sure what i'm going to do! This is my main Ecommerce website and i'm worried, i've complained and I hope to get a refund however i'm worried hes going to just blast my site and get me penalized by Google. It is clearly blackhat.
Is there anything I can do? I'm very worried.
Thanks
-
I thought I would update your answer...
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/disavow-links-main?pli=1
-
Hi Raymond,
Unfortunately, this is all too common. I work with a lot of clients who fall victim to this type of thing. What's even more unfortunate is sometimes, the "SEO" company doesn't realize they're doing anything wrong. Some of these techniques used to work in the very near past, and a few folks still think they're selling legitimate services.
Regardless, Google will most likely discount most, if not all of these links, but in the meantime you want to take steps to make sure these links don't hurt you.
1. Monitor your organic search traffic and keyword rankings. If they start to fall, take action.
2. Watch for messages in Google Webmaster Tools for penalties or warnings of unnatural linking.
3. If you need to, try to get the links removed. Unfortunately, the people in the best position to do this may be the same folks who built the links in the first place. As distasteful as it may be to actually pay more money to get the links removed, this may be your highest ROI option.
4. There are several do-it-yourself link removal resources out there. Here's three:
5. If you've received a message via Webmaster Tools, consider a reconsideration request. Document everything. Be truthful. Tell them everything and your exhaustive efforts to get links removed.
Remember, you only have to do this if your ranking/traffic tank. In the meantime, to guard against these links hurting you down the line, work on building as many quality, high authority links as possible. Here's some ideas to get you started.
Hope this helps. Best of luck with your SEO!
-
Yes, what's done is done. As many of the others have already suggested here, you will be much better off by focusing on getting better quality links rather than trying to clean up the mess that's already created.
-
cut the guy a break......to answer your question it would probably cost way more than $400 or a lot of time to have all those links removed. to be honest if you payed $400 1 time, you prolly just got like 200 directory submissions, 100 social bookmarkings, x amount of forum/blog comments ect. in the scheme of things its honestly probably not gonna matter. you may still even see a boost in rankings. just focus on more long term strategies and dont make the same mistake twice. i wouldnt worry too much.
-
I always tell clients that you get for what you pay for. If SEO and Ranking on Google was as easy as paying $400 one time, we all would be on the 1<sup>st</sup> stop of Google. With that say, if everyone is number 1 then no one is number 1. There is only one spot at the top.
SEO is a fluid process. To achieve results in SEO you have to invest either time or money. Invest time if you want to learn it or invest money if you want someone to do it for you. I recommended you do both. This will allow you to weed out all these charlatans that sell so called SEO packages.
Truth is that most of the SEO information is available either online (in this community) or with books. Invest some time and you will be ahead of the curb and your competitors.
-
What he did was blackhat backlinking, he probably used some stupid software to do it or used software that is legitimate but in the wrong way.
A lot of companies use link building software, it's fantastic if you use it properly and efficently.
Instead of spending $400 on a 1 off SEO package, maybe do it yourself or watch some of the whiteboard fridays.
If not, i'd always be willing to help you sort your SEO out, i wouldn't ask for anything until i can show you some proof. That's how i work with anyone who's a client of mine.
-
Was it $400 monthly or what?
If you've paid a 1 off fee of $400 for "SEO" then you did not receive what most of us on this site would call search engine optimization. In other words rather than being scammed, you just bought into something which was not SEO. You are right though in saying that someone willing to take your $400 for something he calls SEO is probably the kind of person who would ruin your site if you push for a refund (I've seen some dodgy companies do this to their clients in the past)
Just cut your losses, find a better SEO company and let them deal with whatever damage has been caused to your site by this other company.
Be prepared to spend quite a lot more than $400 though, if you're going to insist on cheap don't expect miracles.
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
-
It's possible a bounce-rate attack manipulate SEO?
My site has been visited by unusual users with one second session times. This leaves my analytics data confused.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | CompraBit0 -
Best tips needed to compete in SEO industry? (Thank you in advance)
Hello Moz Friends, So I wanted to ask for your friendly tips. Im in Colorado and my competition has business names like Colorado SEO and then one company owns like 5 of the top 10 Google ranked sites under different names. Im an honest guy, but how does someone compete in a crazy competitive industry? How about you? Did you start at the very bottom and never got to the top? Or did you outrank the leaders? I know seo people are smart, but it's easy to wonder if there is any room left? So just wondering your success or failure stories with competing in a competitive market online Any tips are appreciated! Chris
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | asbchris0 -
Are CDN's good or bad for SEO? - Edmonton Web
Hello Moz folks, We just launched a new website: www.edmontonweb.ca It is now ranking on page 2 in our city. The website is built on Wordpress and we have made every effort to make it load faster. We have enabled the right caching and we have reduced the file size. Still, some of our local competitors have lower load times and more importantly lower ttfb's. Is a CDN the right answer? I've read articles demonstrating that Clowd Flare decreased a websites rankings. Is there a better CDN to use, or a propper way to implement Clowd Flare? Thank you very much for your help! Anton,
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Web3Marketing87
LAUNCH Edmonton0 -
Got dropped on Google rank - Tips to discover why please
Hi guys originally my website was poor ranked on Google. So, after sign in on Moz and follow their tips I achieved the 4th position for one of my keywords (amazing!). But a few days ago my page dropped to bellow the first 50th pages for this same keyword, but I didn't make any changes on it. Anybody has some tips of how can I discover/repair what happened? Thank you all in advance. Best regards Paulo
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | phlcastro0 -
Press Releases and SEO in 2013
Mozers, A few questions for the community: Distributing a press release through a service like 24-7pressrelease.com - is it a serious duplicate content issue when an identical press release is distributed to multiple sites with no canonical markup (as far as I can tell)? All of the backlinks in the press release are either nofollow or redirects. If there IS a duplicate content issue, will the website be affected negatively given the numerous Panda and Penguin refreshes? Why SHOULDN'T a company issue a press release to multiple sites if it actually has something legitimate to announce and the readership of a given site is the target demographic? For example, why shouldn't a company that manufactures nutritional health supplements issue the same press release to Healthy Living, Lifestyle, Health News, etc _with a link to the site?_I understand it's a method that can be exploited for SEO purposes, but can't all SEO methods be taken to an extreme? Seems to me that if this press release scenario triggers the duplicate content and/or link spam penalty(ies), I'd consider it a slight deficiency of Google's search algorithm. Any insight would be much appreciated. Thanks.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | b40040400 -
SEO plan
Hello to all, I have done on page for my new seo project and now after all these google updates, i am thinking that how to start my off page work like what should be the off page strategy. What are the off page tasks which i do to improve my website serp? Pls guys suggest me so that i can start my off page for the website... I am totally blank that what are the off page tasks one should do by looking at the seo updates... Thanks & Regards KIRTi
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Tinny0 -
Explain To Me How Negative SEO ISNT Real?
I'm seeing lots of "offers" springing up to do negative SEO on your competitors. I know people keep insisting this sort of thing is just a bogeyman, but follow my logic here: We know the Penguin update PENALIZED, and not just devalued "over optimization." Read: exact match keyword links. We know that if your link profile is too "unnaturally" keyword heavy, (it should be majority your brand or your domain or your company name, etc) you get penalized. Again, not devalued, PENALIZED. Ok. So what is to stop a blackhatter from using one of those software bots to just kill a competitor? Knowing the above two points, lets say a website is ranking for "cool widgets". Why not just create a bunch of exact match keyword spam links for "cool widgets" targeting that website. In a while, the Penguin penalty kicks in and bammo. The thing that scares me about the post Penguin landscape is that google has specifically named an activity ("over optimization") that will get you PENALIZED. So, don't do that, right? Except, that means they've explicitly outlined an activity that will be penalized, and is easy for others to do to you, and that you would be powerless to prevent. I await the usual "this is an age old worry that has never come true" replies. But if you reply that way, ask yourself, can you refute the logic of the points above? And also... oh no... It's happening. I'm seeing it.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | brianmcc1 -
Contacted by an SEO company..
We have been contacted by a free SEO company, who seem to use your domain and create articles for you on your site, linking to other relevant sites, while other relevant sites link to yours. All they ask is a small link on your homepage. An excerpt of the instructions are: Download the attached files in a folder to be uploaded to your server (public_html) folder Set 777 permission to the folder. This allows our script to work on your site Add the "site wide" link on your homepage, as well as on the inner pages, the same way we do in the article section. Implement the "site wide" link following the instructions on the README.txt file Copy the script on the file or you can provide us with a temporary FTP access to your server and we will do it for you. Please note that if you can upload our folder to your site within 48 hours, you will be eligible to receive 20 bonus links for your SEO campaign. Should we tread carefully?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | filarinskis0