US State Sues Web/SEO Firm For Deceiving Mom-and-Pops

netbuzz writes "The state of Washington is suing a search engine optimization and Web services outfit, based in Redmond, that has done business under the names Visible.net, Captures.com, and WebMarketingSource.com. In essence, the state says these entities have deceived mostly mom-and-pop sites through unfulfilled performance promises and financial shenanigans after charging up to $10,000 in up-front charges and more in monthly fees. About 90 complaints have been lodged over four years, the state says."

Comments

You would think

[Kilz]

Than they would have searched to see if the company was reliable.

Re:You would think

[morgan_greywolf]

Seriously. The easy way to do this:

1. Go to Google.
2. Search for 'search engine optimization'.
3. Go to MSN
4. Repeat step 2 ...

The company highest on the list of all search engines checked is probably the company you want.

Re:You would think

[mcgrew]

You're blaming the victims. That's like if I get robbed while walking home from Felber's and when the cops arrest the mugger, you're saying "well you shouldn't have been walking in that neighborhood". OK, next time I'll drive home no matter how drunk I am. The other drivers and pedestrians should know better than to be on any street between the bar and my house, right?

Wrong. The mugger should be prosecuted and if I'm drunk I should leave my car at the bar. If someone hires an SEO and is defrauded, the AG should prosecute. That's what he's there for.

Re:You would think

[morgan_greywolf]

Errmmm....I think parent might've been joking...

Re:You would think

[digitalunity]

Often times the road to being a victim like this is that the website owners don't have the technical competence to evaluate statements from SEO companies for truth. SEO companies also typically expend a lot of effort to maintain a positive image in search engine results.

I've had dealings with these types of companies before and the average SEO is very shady. They charge thousands of dollars promising every small business owner that they could be the next amazon.com if only they were higher in the search engine results. The reality is there is a lot more to online success than just ranking highly in search engines.

These small business owners though are most vulnerable because most don't have the ability to determine if the SEO company is credible and/or don't have enough knowledge about search engines to know what the true value is of the work the SEO will perform.

Re:You would think

[rugatero]

The company highest on the list of all search engines checked is probably the company you want.

Wikipedia?

Re:You would think

[tomhudson]

While you're right in all the points you make, it doesn't mean that the suckers are entirely blameless. They fall prey to their own greed, in wanting to believe that there's a "magic formula" to success, that rather than building up their business via good customer service and word of mouth, that throwing a few grand at some "web expert" will make them rich.

The business next to the office I work at told me they were going to use such a scumbag. I told him he was wasting his money. Sure enough, a couple of months later, he was complaining that he couldn't get hold of the guy any more. He's SOL because TTMAR (Take The Money And Run) is SOP for SEO "experts".

Word of mouth is still the best advertising that money can't buy.

Re:You would think

[Anonymous Coward]

So called Search Engine Optimizers are a small step away from spammers.

Users relying on either spam or SEO to sell their product are the scum, and are asking for it. No matter how much you perfume the turd, it will still be a turd.

Re:You would think

[morgan_greywolf]

Obviously you would only include company websites for companies who are in the business.

Re:You would think

[rugatero]

No matter how much you perfume the turd, it will still be a turd.

Ahh, so that's the politically correct equivalent of 'lipstick on a pig'.

Re:You would think

[nschubach]

Sarcasm? On the Internet?

Re:You would think

[mcgrew]

Possibly, but there are far too many poeople here who say "let Darwin take care of the weak" and mean it sincerely.

If he was joking, he did a poor job of it, and there are a whole lot of similar "jokes" in the thread. This was an obvious joke (and even got a grin from me); modded "flamebait".

Re:You would think

[scorp1us]

Even though the parent is joking, yours is no comparison.

Before entering into any contract you need to see if the contract is likely to be honored. This is called due diligence. I'm tired of this culture of victimization. No one is going to look out for you. You are responsible for yourself. The government is there only to provide protection of your property. The individuals aggrieved by the company have a right for their case to be heard in court. However, doing due diligence to minimize the likelihood of getting there is your responsibility. While legally entitled, you cannot be irresponsible in everything you do and go crying to the government. It is just not an effective strategy. It'll cost you money and time, an neither are in large supply.

The idea of a "crime" dates back to the time when kings went looking to get involved in the affairs of others. He inserted himself into every suit claiming that the controversy disturbed his peace and extracted a fine. Eventually crimes against the state by themselves were recognized, where you didn't need any actual harm to prosecute.

Re:You would think

[Dishevel]

How about both? We should always prosecute those who break the law. For the incredibly stupid people out there though maybe a few people letting them know that if they had half a brain and used it this would have never happened is ok as well. This PC every victim must be respected crap is bullshit. Darwin should blast the weak and stupid and the law should nail the strong and evil. There.

Re:You would think

[tsalmark]

There are good SEO techniques - Valid HTML. proper CSS. good English, or Language of your choice etc. Proper spelling and grammar etc. Proper use of Ad sense even. Then there are Bad techniques, that tend to not work or backfire soon enough. It's like money lenders some are better(Bank) some are worse, payday loans and some carry baseball bats.

Re:You would think

[Dallas Caley]

I'm not so sure about that (that the parent was joking) Whatever happened to buyer beware? Do you believe every salesman that comes to your door? of course not.

The fact is, the internet is still the wild west, there are still people selling potions and tinctures that promise to fix every problem. The only solution is for everyone involved to get a little smarter. If you coddle the consumer and protect him from scam artists, they will never learn

Now i don't know the specifics of this case, but obviously if they were straight up lying about their service, then that should be punished. If however they were just giving the customer the information (correct information) which led them to believe that they were going to get something out of it, then i think they should be off the hook. If they win this case, it will set a precedent that might not be good. You will now be able to sue because you didn't comprehend properly what was being sold to you, and who's fault is that?

Re:You would think

[mfh]

The company highest on the list of all search engines checked is probably the company you want.

Unless they paid Google to be on the top of the search results and they are evil. Do no evil? LLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

Re:You would think

[tompaulco]

Do you think it is possible that the Mom and Pops are not up on the latest technology (which would explain why they are looking to outsource their SEO) and possibly not aware that many SEO firms are basically scammers? After all, there was a time not long ago when SEO was a legitimate field where they assisted you in choosing good keywords for your site, setting up relevant metadata tags and generally optimizing your site to be crawled and categorized correctly.
I get those e-mails where they offer to put me in the top 10 of Yahoo, etc., but I guess I never really associated that with SEO, I just considered it a run of the mill scam.

Re:You would think

[lysergic.acid]

i would tend to agree with you. i have a friend from high school, who although is a nice guy in person and as a friend, is involved in a lot of shady business dealings. he's always been good at making money--it runs in his family i suppose--but he does so by less than honorable means. in high school he used to build list makers (for collecting e-mail addresses) and mass mailers (to send spam) for porn site owners. and he would get paid $10k+ for each application too.

after high school, he moved on to SEO. which was a pretty natural progression for him. and from what i gather, he makes a lot more money doing SEO now than he did with spam. in the past he's also been involved with credit card fraud, so i think he's always gravitated towards these types of online cons/scams.

what really upsets me is that he comes from a very rich family, and he has no real need to do these types of underhanded things for money. it's not like he didn't have the opportunity to go to college, and this is the only way he can make a living. i mean, he's a pretty intelligent person and i'm sure he'd be successful no matter what he does. but i guess for some people it's just hard to resist such easy and lucrative revenue streams like that, even if it means being a douchebag for a living.

i don't talk to him much anymore, so i don't know what kind of people his clients are. but i wouldn't be surprised if some of his clients didn't fully understand what they were getting into. an online presence is a basic necessity for businesses of all types and sizes these days. and SEO is a popular enough buzzword/industry that, it not only has a facade of legitimacy, but a lot of non-technical business owners probably see it as a requirement for all online businesses. so it's understandable that mom-and-pop businesses can be deceived into paying thousands of dollars for shady SEO services.

and to be honest, the attitude that SEO companies have is not too different from marketing & advertising firms. it's all about manipulating consumers to maximize profits by any means possible--whatever gives you an edge over your competitors. we live in a capitalist society, and these are the type of attitudes and people that our culture fosters/promotes. in a laissez-faire economy without any kind of government regulation you're naturally going to have people doing dishonorable or unethical things for profit.

Re:You would think

[tomhudson]

Do you think it is possible that the Mom and Pops are not up on the latest technology (which would explain why they are looking to outsource their SEO) and possibly not aware that many SEO firms are basically scammers?

They already have a web site, so they have someone they can ask, rather than just take a strangers' word for it. Or they can just search for "SEO scam" or "search engine optimization scam". When I hear of something that I'm not sure of, I search for the terms + "fraud" or "scam" or "bogus".

Now if we could nuke all the keyword-stuffed "doorway pages" ...

Re:You would think

[michaelhood]

Do you believe every salesman that comes to your door?

Of course I do. Just last week I got a great deal on some volcano insurance.

Re:You would think

[KDR_11k]

Possibly, but there are far too many poeople here who say "let Darwin take care of the weak" and mean it sincerely.

Last I checked they called themselves "libertarians" but that might have changed again.

Re:You would think

[redxxx]

Some prefer Objectivist.

Re:You would think

[MooUK]

I'm not disagreeing that people should be careful what they buy... but that doesn't mean we shouldn't punish or prosecute fraud.

Re:You would think

[spyrochaete]

I think your reasoning is very old-fashioned and jaded. Just because your website is a turd, doesn't mean your company is.

We're talking about mom-and-pop operations here. Small businesses should stick to what they do best, and subcontract when an odd job is needed. Do most companies shoot their own TV commercials or record their own radio spots? Of course not - they consult marketing firms who do it for a living.

Let's face it - all marketing is scummy. In traditional marketing the goal is to convince people they need something that they really don't. The web is the opposite because people query search engines to solve a specific problem, so you've got to convince them that you have the best answer to their question and you've got about 4 seconds to say it before they go elsewhere.

I argue that SEO is the LEAST scummy and perhaps the most skillful form of advertising of all time. Good SEO involves making one set of content useful to humans and spiders alike, and it requires the lightest touch to ensure the optimizations blend naturally with the prose and don't make the design any less attractive, nor the content any less informative.

SEOs are ninjas that must be experts at marketing, web design, and English, plus they must understand the state and history of the marketplace of each customer. It's not reasonable to chastise anyone for not having all those skills, and it's certainly not something you can excel at after googling the topic for a few evenings.

SEO isn't just about making your website better, it's about presenting your product more effectively than your competition. You first have to make people aware of you, and if you're that lucky you then have to make them like you. And who likes a scumbag?

Re:You would think

[idontgno]

Well, this is a valid test in at least one sense. If you wish to check their competence at search engine optimization, you look at how well their own search engine results are optimized. Kinda like checking out the quality of a sign-painting place by examining their own signage.

Of course, that's based on the possibly unsupportable assumptions that (A) They did their own SEO ("ate their own dog food"), and (B) that they'll work as hard for you as they did for themselves.

Re:You would think

[idontgno]

Which volcano did you insure?

Re:You would think

[aztracker1]

I think these people should look more for marketing companies, and less for SEO companies. It's more important to have a strategy when it comes to your online presence, and more often than not, this comes down to promotions, word of mouth, and traditional means of marketing. I've been telling my clients this for a long time. Of course, I am now working FT for another company, so see how well being honest has worked for me. ;)

Re:You would think

[tomhudson]

I've been telling my clients this for a long time. Of course, I am now working FT for another company, so see how well being honest has worked for me. ;)

No good deed goes unpunished.

Re:You would think

[FredMenace]

Perhaps. Though maybe not, if they're more concerned with increasing the SEO rank of their clients than themselves. I may have a biased point of view, but my own company is perhaps the best in the business at SEO (at least of companies that "play by the rules" and always try to be ethical), but pays little attention to boosting our own site. Most of the clients we'd be interested in wouldn't be finding us through random internet searches in any event. We get our clients (mostly Fortune 1000 companies) by demonstrating how the results we can achieve are far superior to their previous agency - that is, how we can save them tens of thousands of dollars per month.

Re:You would think

[ultranova]

No one is going to look out for you. You are responsible for yourself. The government is there only to provide protection of your property.

I've been wondering about this for a while now: why do the people who are so big on personal responsibility nonetheless require that someone else protects their property ? I mean, shouldn't that be your responsibility too, rather than something you'll call Big Brother to help you with ?

Re:You would think

[scorp1us]

Indeed it is. Possession id 9/10ths of the law. However, there are people who would leverage physical or other peculiar aspects. The need the government to give everyone equal protection arises, else you have anarchy.

Visible.net phone message

[elrous0]

Thank you for calling Visible.net, your search engine optimization provider. Please select from the following menu:

1. If you are interested in Visible.net's exciting service and wish to become a new customer, press 1 now.
2. If you are an existing customer and are having a problem or wish to cancel your account, press 2 now.
3. If you are a member of the media and wish to inquire about recent allegations of fraud, press 2 now.
4. To end this call, press 2 now.

Please press 1 to optimize your accounts...

[concoursrider]

$10,000 to optimize your search engine? Guess that's one way to stimulate the economy.

scam

[D'Sphitz]

The SEO industry in general is such a scam, it's amazing how many people fall for it.

Re:scam

[mcgrew]

Wow, that comment was modded "flamebait"? I din't see how. Looks like SEO employees have mod points today!

If your SEO company isn't a fraud, how about explaining yourselves to us? Using mod points to censor is itself fraud.

Re:scam

[tomhudson]

I'll join you. Let the SEO scumbuckets waste their mod points - they're ALL scum.

They lie. They mislead. They con. If Vlad the Impaler were around and there was any justice in the world, they'd be "Shit on a Stick".

You don't "build your brand" by being at the top of a search engine, but by giving customers what they want, in a convenient, cost-effective and timely manner. BTW, SEO "experts" are failures at building their own "brand", because we sure as shit don't think anything of them - or their pitiful phone pitches after trolling the whois database for contact info - "What - you don't want your customers to have more traffic?" Or their equally lame spam.

Die, SEO, die!

Re:scam

[Zebano]

Back when I was an applications programmer in IT, I was dedicated to creating apps for the Marketing department. This had an ancillary benefit of also making me responsible for maintaining our public web site and redesigning it to be "solution centric". I made some good tools like a product finder and comparison tool, and there are some pages out there that wasted days of my life.

After about a year of this, they decided against my and 2 other IT department employees advice to hire an SEO. We had a web tracking tool, but we now had to embedd 1x1 pixels + javascript images on every page so we could track how many users were using our site (we already had these metrics, but the SEO collated them in a prettier fashion); The best part about this was that the data was stored on their system and requires a yearly fee to use. After that we had to load up our pages with tons of misleading meta tags. Next we were encouraged to redesign our site to make it "solution-centric" (yes, we paid to be told to do this hokey redesign despite Marketing already deciding to do this; I still don't understand what's wrong with just advertising your products when your external app group has been decimated). Finally, they told us to buy paid search ads from google (about the only thing I agreed with).

In general we went from about 5th to 4rd on most search terms on the search engines we cared about (Google, MSN, Yahoo). I will third the opinion that SEOs are snake oil salesmen.

An amusing aside... After I left the group, they reviewed most of our pages and made suggestions on how to rework them (mostly the content which is in Marketing's domain) but they started trying to tell IT how the pages should be coded, going so far as to say that well-formed HTML is bad. That day, after another inane conference call; three of us left work at 3PM and spent the rest of the day drinking.

Re:scam

[MrCawfee]

Yes and no (note: i work for a company that one of the products is SEO related);

The yes:
The SEO companies the "promise" higher rankings ARE a scam, and they are complete BS. 90% of SEO is guessing what google indexes, and those criteria do change pretty frequently. And because of the undefined nature of SEO, it is extremely easy to pull shit out of your ass and profess it is true, and take people's money. Any SEO guy that speaks in absolutes, is scamming you. Anything that seems like it isn't useful to the user, is bullshit.

The No:

SEO is actually real, and is necessary for pulling newer websites from lower in the rankings. Effective techniques are pretty easy, and they are listed below. All others that these stupid companies suggest are either BS or will not survive a google update in the future.

  1) Page names in the URL that are relevant to what you are doing (not article11151.html)
  2) Meta tags in the document that are relevant to it's content.
  3) Clean HTML, use tags (such as h1) for what they were designed for
  4) Internal linking (limits redundancy on pages)
  5) Sitemap.xml
  6) No javascript/flash content

Not much else is really necessary.

But yes, 99% of the SEO companys are praying on these small company's dumbness.
 

Re:scam

[kimvette]

An amusing aside... After I left the group, they reviewed most of our pages and made suggestions on how to rework them (mostly the content which is in Marketing's domain) but they started trying to tell IT how the pages should be coded, going so far as to say that well-formed HTML is bad.

That's bizarre. Clients often ask about SEO stuff and we refuse to get into the black hat stuff. We tell them it's all about clean HTML, clean design and content, content, content. If they want lots of traffic they should put up a blog, post interesting videos on youtube, and offer other free informational services -- and/or buy adwords.

Link farms and doorway pages not only alienate prospects, but can get you punted from search engines.

I don't think anyone can honestly make a living from legitimate SEO. You can improve your existing services by incorporating SEO strategies into your web design and development practices, but if you're doing your job right to begin with then organic SEO follows naturally.

Re:scam

[initialE]

SEOs did an amazing job for expertsexchange though

Re:scam

[spyrochaete]

Your hostility makes me wonder whether you know what SEO is, or that there are such things as white hat and black hat SEO.

Black hat SEO is about exploiting oversights in algorithms. Black hat is a great way to get immediate gain, but will carry severe penalties when it's found out.

White hat SEO is about providing superior information to users and building your real-world credibility over time, which is subsequently rewarded by search engines. You first provide meaningful content which is relevant to your business, you ensure you are interesting enough that the industry showcases you which encourages enthusiasts to discuss you, and you maintain your brand and credibility for years while your PageRank snowballs.

Rome wasn't built in a day. Anyone who promises you Rome tomorrow might be telling the truth, but it'll be Pompeii the day after you buy it. White hat and black hat are not unique to the SEO industry, nor to marketing, nor to business. A rotten apple does not spoil the bunch. It's wise to be suspicious but it's foolish to be dismissive.

Re:scam

[spyrochaete]

if you're doing your job right to begin with then organic SEO follows naturally.

It's not as obvious as you make it sound. It's anything but natural, for example, to write a blog about your business, using a corporate voice. Companies didn't speak this way until a few years ago, and only those at the forefront are aware of this practise. And even if you figure that much out on your own, do you allow comments? Do you host it on your existing domain or on a new one? Do you speak as yourself or anonymously? Which strategies worked best for your industry in the past?

I agree with all the methodologies you've quoted, but those are non-traditional means of marketing. I agree with you that SEO is more of a mindset than a checksheet of items to search and replace in your source code. I think it's important for companies to partner with experts to work through this methodology and learn how it fits in with their specific company, in their specific marketplace, in order to communicate more convincingly than their specific competitors.

Re:scam

[mcgrew]

I think some previous posters answered your question quite well. If you need a web designer or webmaster, you need no SEO company. The web designer or webmaster should know how to ethically optimise your pages.

Nothing beats good content. For years after I posted "How to Quit Smoking Cigarettes" on K5, typing that into a Google search would lead straight to it (it's no longer on the first page of search items). And if you type biters anonymous into Google, that three year old diary still comes up first.

Re:scam

[pipingguy]

My site's been at the top of search engine rankings for years (admittedly it's an engineering niche market) and I figure the reasons it remains so is because:

- it's pretty basic HTML with some Javascript
- good, descriptive TLD name reflecting the site's content
- no pop-ups or intrusive ads, no ad services besides Google AdSense
- fairly regular updates
- features stuff that is of interest to my readers
- owner (i.e., me) has 30 years experience in the subject matter
- semi-regular uploading of searchable mailing list technical discussions to archives
- magical blessing from the Google Gods for some reason

The extreme piles of money flowing in are noticeable only by their absence, but hey, a labour of love doesn't always need monetary compensation.

Shocking.

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Is there any context in which "SEO" isn't a synonym for "worthless slimy huckster"?

Ok, somebody has to tell mom and pop about proper use of metadata; but as for the rest? "Say, this slick gentleman promises to help me lie to search engines for a very reasonable price, he seems honest to me."

Re:Shocking.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody uses metadata anymore, what they need is a well-written site (ie, not written by their highschool kid who's a "wiz" with computers) and some way of getting it linked into the intarwebs so that crawlers will pick it up (eg dmoz).

Re:Shocking.

[Anonymous Coward]

What about the kind of SEO where all you're doing is trying to figure out what keywords your potential customers are using when they're looking for a service like yours and altering your web content to rank higher on such searches?

Re:Shocking.

[hankwang]

Is there any context in which "SEO" isn't a synonym for "worthless slimy huckster"?

SEO usually means "search engine optimization" rather than "search engine optimizer", but even then I see no ethical problem if I give some advice on someone with a one-man-company with a small website. For example I tell him that he should get rid of the flash animation on the home page, should use alt tags on the graphical menu links, mention the name of his company and the product or service that he sells on the home page, have links from each website page back to the home page, and so on, get some links from index pages relevant to his industry sector, and so on.

Not all SEO involves setting up link farms and thousands of keyword-stuffed doorway pages. The proper term for that is search engine spam.

Re:Shocking.

[spyrochaete]

Is there any context in which "SEO" isn't a synonym for "worthless slimy huckster"? Ok, somebody has to tell mom and pop about proper use of metadata; but as for the rest? "Say, this slick gentleman promises to help me lie to search engines for a very reasonable price, he seems honest to me."

Here's a great example I learned at a web marketing conference (so I can't take credit for this pearl):

A major UK bank was flummoxed as to why less credible credit firms were ranking higher on Google for loans, even though their own popular "lending" website had been live for over a decade. The bank hired an SEO who interviewed them about the marketplace and its customers, researched the competition, and investigated rankings based on relevant keywords found in the web server referrer logs. This armed the SEO, an outsider to the banking industry, with a unique perspective from which he taught the bank to see through the eyes of their customers. In response to the SEO's advice the bank changed all their literature about "lending" to use the word "borrowing" instead. Poof - #1 spot on SERPs in a couple of weeks. It turns out that when people need money they're interested in "borrowing", not "lending".

SEO is all about empathy. You have to understand the business you're in and the problems you're solving for your customers. When people search the web they're looking for answers to their real problems, and the companies at the top of the SERPs are the ones who have the answer to that very problem.

Doesn't a company with that motivation deserve to be found? Do you feel that, in my example, the bank was being misleading?

Paid laziness

[ZarathustraDK]

For goodness sake, how hard can it be to optimize a website for a search-engine?

There are a plethora of howtos out there on SEO, and most, if not all, can be implemented by the people making the webpage.

Just spend a single day reading up on the stuff and save yourself a bunch. But of course that means learning something new, the HORROR!

Yeah yeah, I know, my site uses frames, which suck SEO-wise. I know... I'll correct it some day, but I wont pay 10.000 bucks to do so.

Re:Paid laziness

[mcgrew]

I doubt anyone at slashdot would use an SEO service, but you must realise that there are still a lot of net noobs out there that have no clue how to get information. For example, say you have Fred and Ethyl Mertz who have run Mertz Discount Liquor for forty years, and Ethyl's friend Lucy says "Hey, you and Fred ought to get a web site."

So Fred and Ethyl get a web site. They type "Stag" into Google (looking for their site; they're running a special on Stag Beer this week) and all they find are sites about deer hunting and porn.

They're perplexed and confused and have a hell of a lot to learn. These are the people SEO companies target.

Re:Paid laziness

[BlueTyphoon]

I'm assuming these people had to hire web developers to begin with. In this day and age, is it too much to ask that web developers perform the basic SEO? It should be a condition on the contract when developing the website, and it would undoubtedly be a lot cheaper than spending an extra $10k or more to an SEO company.

Re:Paid laziness

[Anonymous Coward]

For goodness sake, how hard can it be to read up in some medical text books for your ailment?

There are a plethora of books, and websites out there on medical issues, and most, if not all, can be understood by ordinary people.

Just spend a single day reading up on the stuff and save yourself a bunch. But of course that means learning something new, the HORROR!

Imagine for a moment that the above was said by a doctor, because some doctors were making people pay 1000s for unnecessary appendectomy operations. How are "Mom & Pop" supposed to know the difference between a bad stomach ache (or mild food poisoning etc.) and something more serious? We pay the doctors on the basis that they know this stuff.

We IT folk forget that what we do is easy because we're good at it. We have a frame of reference, and know that 10k for SEO is stupid. Most people don't have our desire to spend hours learning about nerd stuff (but luckily some of them are doctors, plumbers, mechanics etc. and when we we use their services they don't tell us to "RTFM n00b! ROFL").

Most models of capitalism (as opposed to the real world "capitalism" we have in actuality) rely on perfect knowledge of the market, otherwise capitalism is open to distortion.

Re:Paid laziness

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry to say but your point of view is wrong. Most people who build websites today use dummy tools and dont know a thing about SEO and dont want to learn. Is that wrong, no, that's what those tools were designed to be used for. Is it wrong for them not to learn about SEO? No again, if you buy a car and you know how to do basic maintenance is it your fault if you take it to a mechanic to get it repaired for something you know nothing about and have no desire to learn or dont have the patients or time? If the mechanic takes your for a ride and then your out $$$$. That's not your fault. Come on now. Be realistic. Yes there is plenty of information on the web about SEO but probably half of that is useless and only a small fraction will actually make a huge difference. I am in the SEO business but I have been in the webhosting business and seen many legitimate companies sell their services for SEO and their customers rave about them. So to everyone here, let's not say in general selling SEO services is a scam, let's just say there are some scammers that sell or act like they are selling SEO services.

Re:Paid laziness

[jafiwam]

No kidding, my friend Goat Se and his store Lemon Party Liquors had a very similar problem.

Re:Paid laziness

[ZarathustraDK]

Difference here being that messing around withh SEO yourself is free and does not involve accidentally damaging yourself if things go wrong. You can edit the content of your site if it doesn't fit with your SEO-expectations, you can't edit your spinalchord once it has snapped by home-surgery.

Plumbers, mechanics et al do work which is usually required to be done by a licensed professional.

SEO is childs play, it's legal to do by yourself, it's harmless, and it's reversible. If someone is ready to blow 10 grand on something that can be accomplished and learned in less than a day, free of charge with no risk involved, I feel obliged to say RTFM unless their precious time is worth more.

Re:Paid laziness

[dword]

You forgot to add, a simple book on the common cold is bigger than the encyclopaedia of SEO. Besides, regarding what the GP said, this isn't about mom&pops learning SEO, it's about whoever builds the websites learning SEO. When you make a website (we're talking about complex pages here, not just a Dreamweaver family page), you already have basic HTML, CSS, JavaScript knowledge. If this was about a personal static page and you wanted it to rank up in search engines, then I'd agree: you don't know anything about the web and any "SEO expert" that promises anything should be shot in the balls.

My point is (yes, I have a point) that if you have more than just a Dreamweaver site, you can't learn about SEO and anyone promising anything is clearly a scam. If you have something more complex, you can learn about SEO yourself and you don't need to pay a single cent to anyone for this. Now if I was sick, I'd have tons and tons of background information to learn about medical procedures before I'd try anything I'd read. Besides, we're talking about do-it-yourself stuff here. If this was about online information gathering, you clearly can't trust that in the medical world because it's extremely difficult to validate someone as a knowledgeable person and you should go see a doctor who has a diploma and has been recognized by people you trust (*cough*) as an expert in the medical field. When it comes to SEO, there is no high authority to validate these companies/individuals.

In my search for SEO, I've discovered that the following are the most important things you should take into account:

• Don't use frames/iframes/tables for design. Use DIVs.
• Don't use Ajax for anything you want the search engine to index.
• Make sure all your pages can be reached by links, not by forms.
• Use common sense - don't try to hide text or add text, use alt attributes for images, etc.
• Make sure you enjoy looking at your own website.
• Use common sense.

Why would you need an expert to TELL you to do that? If they were doing it themselves, then I'd agree: you're lazy or don't have the time and you're paying someone to redesign your website but that would be a web designer who has the skills to take the above into account, not a SEO expert.

Re:Paid laziness

[Xerolooper]

For goodness sake, how hard can it be to read up in some medical text books for your ailment?

I agree with you that's what we pay them for. However, this is exactly what many people do. I can't back this up but many /.rs probably fall into this category. If you have the presence of mind to do research it's rarely something more serious. At the very least you'll be better informed when you talk to the doctor. If your in so much pain you can't do anything get to the emergency room.
When I had conjunctivitis I did a bunch of research until I found eyebrite. That and some wet washcloths over my eyes fixed my problem. There are limitations. I do most of my own plumbing. If I have to rent equipment I start asking myself if it would be more cost effective to call a pro. I did blow a small transformer on the A/C one time when I was hooking up the thermostat. I did it by following the directions when my gut told me not to hook that wire up.
What you seem to be getting at is a bigger issue. Should IT professionals be certified like those other professions? Probably but then you enter the minefield of the paper MCSE fiasco.
Having said that. We are too hard on these victims they got suckered. It can happen to anyone when a silver toothed conman shows up.(insert politically charged remark here)
Slinging jabs at these people is a kind of therapy for /.rs

Re:Paid laziness

[Anonymous Coward]

Not necessarily. I agree that it is better to do it yourself. But, after spending valuable company time trying to "figure out" how to improve quality scores, organic searches and adwords placement, we attempted to outsource.

We felt (not being experts) we wanted to bring in someone who did this for a living. We found that they were all crooks and possibly did more harm than good.

Getting onto google is one thing. Getting your SEO tweaked to the point of good quality scores and placement takes a lot of work and know-how. Most small businesses do not have the staff to dedicate to this.

want to leave them a comment?

[ceejayoz]

Here's their GetSatisfaction page.

Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[Moraelin]

Well, if you were simply the victim, yes, i'd blame the mugger. But if it was you who hired someone to do a shady thing for you, and he shafts you, heh, I'm just going to say you got what you fucking deserved.

The fact is, there are honest ways to advertise. Just buy ad-words. There, you'll be on everyone's search page, if they search for that kind of product. Heck, Google even offers the option to show your ad when someone searches for a _related_ thing. E.g., it might show your sports shoes store, when someobody searches for slippers, if you activated that option.

It's honest, it's clearly marked as an ad, and it doesn't interfere with anyone else's search results.

But nah, that's too honest, I guess. Let's hire a "SEO" to do link spam, set up link farms, and try to _poison_ everyone's searches with your crap. It's a predatory model, in which a useful resource for everyone is devalued and turned into crap, just so some snake oil peddler can make a few extra bucks.

As business models go, it's akin to pissing in the town's water supply, so you can sell a few more bottles of soda.

And if you hired someone to do that kind of a thing for you, and he shafted you... good! Serves you right. I won't stop looking down on the crook too, mind you. But when the case is that one wannabe crook hired another crook, well, I'll look down on them both.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[colesw]

I'd agree with you, except most of these "mom & pop" type businesses would have no clue how a SEO works. As far as they are concerned these companies will do "magic" to make them appear higher on google (or engine of your choice). They'll also be the type of people to complain about the link farms, but have no idea its the company they hired that is helping to create those.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[Naturalis Philosopho]

No. This is the equivalent of those people who paid money for those empty plastic boxes with a button on them which promise to "activate" the "sensors" that they were told make lights turn green for cop cars and ambulances at intersections (ob car analogy: check). People looking to get ahead without work rarely seem to do enough research (a form of work) to find out if the scammers they are hiring actually do anything at all, let alone if they are a value. I consider victims of scams like this as just having had an expensive lesson, which they needed, to teach them that it's cheaper to work hard and to get ahead honestly. Crooks scamming crooks should still be prosecuted, but we don't have to sympathize with the victim in this case; just be thankful that it was the dishonest schmucks who got burned by these SEO crooks, acting as our lightning rods, and not honest people who got scammed.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[Anonymous Coward]

>I consider victims of scams like this as just having had an expensive lesson, which they needed, to teach them that it's cheaper to work hard and to get ahead honestly.

Here's the problem... you're wrong. Crime DOES pay. It is EASY to make a living being crooked. It' s not cheaper to work hard and get ahead honestly, that's HARD work. It requires a certain amount of moral fiber to NOT take advantage of the "quick buck" and fuck over your fellow man for your own advantage. The fact that all too many people in positions of power/authority are on the "weasel" side of that spectrum is the reason we have problems like the current credit crisis.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[Anonymous Coward]

Fly off the handle a bit much? Did I miss something in the article? Nowhere did I see any mention that alluded that the clients were requesting Black Hat SEO assistance. Do you actually know anything about modern SEO? There are tons of very valid and honest ways to go about marketing online and most small operation I would argue are looking for just that. Adding great content to your site that others will want to link back to, building tools that people might actually use and share, buying ad-words as you mentioned, and submitting useful information and content to other sources can help boost traffic in a big way when done correctly and does nothing but help the image of the company as a whole when executed well.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[hairyfeet]

Yes but you are bringing up a point and I doubt you even realize it,and that is the difference between a GOOD SEO and a BAD one. Because let us not forget that these businesses were Mom&Pop shops. Have you ever been to some of these little Mom&Pop shop websites? Most REALLY suck! I mean really REALLY suck! Hell on a lot of these kinds of sites simply bringing in a decent webpage designer that makes it not only easier to navigate but also easier for the robots to index would do a lot. And placing ads in trade papers,websites that cater to the clientele that you business is aiming for,etc. There is a BIG difference between being successful locally and having even a decent regional website business,much less national or global.

So while I agree there are plenty of "piss in the pool" types,unfortunately you find that with ANY business,especially on the web. So I personally am quite happy that this AG is doing the job he is paid to do and protecting the consumer from the bullshit artists. Because I have seen how much better a website can be simply by having someone who really knows what they are doing design it instead of some Deity awful thing cooked up in Frontpage.

Oh,slightly offtopic but funny is the fact that the best website designer I ever met was a 16 year old girl who designs websites on an old P3 400MHz laptop with nothing but a text editor while popping her gum. I really wish I'd have thought to back up my old business contacts sites so I could show you some of her work. Really quite impressive. And if you wanted to piss her off just ask her to design an "OMG PONIES!" Myspace page! Damn that girl hated those things!

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[jlarocco]

Is "link spam" illegal? No. Despite your not liking it, they're completely within their rights to pay somebody to setup a "link farm" for them. If that person rips them off, they have the right to sue. Whether or not *you* like their choice doesn't matter - it's their decision.

Also, I'm not seeing how buying "ad-words" is any more "honest" than paying for SEO. They're both for scumbags, IMO.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[Anonymous Coward]

Parent is absolutely correct. That's how it works, alright.

I freelance online for a living, most of it article and blog writing. I turn down any client who mouths the dreaded 'SEO' acronym at me. I tell them that it's snake oil, that logically there's only so many search hits that come up on page one, and everybody and his dog wants to be #1. I tell them that it's a racket, and anybody who tells them different is trying to scam them.

Some don't listen, and go to somebody else and get scammed. They come back to me crying that Google black-listed their site for shady techniques. Some do learn that way.

Common sense should tell you that if the number one search engine allowed itself to be gamed, it wouldn't stay the number one search engine for very long. And everybody thinks they're so smart with meta-tag voodoo and keyword count percentages, making a science out of nonsense, without thinking that maybe the search engine staff has seen it all before.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[ELProphet]

You're assuming the "wannabe crook" is actually a crook. I don't get that impression. It seems that Mom & Pop simply didn't know much about this new-fangled "Google" thing, and someone came up and said with confidence "I can make Google work for YOU!" Still not knowing about Google or the internet, Mom & Pop said "Ok, sounds good. You seem like a nice guy, and guarantee me 100% return on investment, sure I'll pay for that." Now, Crook has come close to committing fraud by mis-selling his services. Google did what Google does well- whacked the SEO (the crook). The only thing Mom & Pop should have done differently was a bit of research.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[ultranova]

Is "link spam" illegal? No. Despite your not liking it, they're completely within their rights to pay somebody to setup a "link farm" for them. If that person rips them off, they have the right to sue. Whether or not *you* like their choice doesn't matter - it's their decision.

And the grandparent is completely within his rights to look down on them for choosing this option, call them crooks, and say they got what they fucking deserved. I agree with him: these bastards deserved to get their hands burned for making search engines less useful.

That's how it works: if you are an asshole, don't expect any sympathy from the people you are being an asshole to, even if you are a law-abiding asshole.

Re:Dunno, but I'm blaming the crooks

[Moraelin]

Oh, they are well within their rights to sue. And I should hope that the scammers get punished too.

But nevertheless, they're not mutually exclusive. If scumbag A hired scumbag B, it's not an either-or-situation. Both are scumbags. That person B is a scumbag doesn't automatically exclude person A from being a scumbag.

Basically it's like this: person A hired person B to piss in the city's water supply, so person A can sell more bottled water. Person B took the money and ran. Can you say that either of them was in the right? Person B was obviously a scammer. Person A is the one who paid to cause harm. It's not mutually exclusive. Just because B was a crook, it doesn't make A less of a low-life.

And let's say that the utility company, dumbly enough, placed their filters and pools in some place where they can't forbid you access to. Is it legal to go piss in them? Even if it were, it's still a scumbag act.

Sounds like crass stupidity to me, then

[Moraelin]

So basically they hired someone, and paid some tens of thousands of dollars... but they don't know what that person will do, nor what they'll get for their money? :P I mean, how stupid is that?

Actually, now that I think about it, that's not the answer I'm interested in any more. I'm thinking more: is there a list of these suckers (e.g., the AG must mention them in the lawsuit), so I can offer them some equally undefined services for lots of money?

Ok, so that wasn't entirely serious, but it serves to illustrate a point: I have trouble imagining that such people, with a habit of giving away some money without any clue what for, would have the tens of thousands of dollars to give to a SEO in the first place. Not to mention the costs of opening that store in the first place.

I mean, ok, maybe _some_ of them are just simply fucking retarded, and genuinely just blew some money without even understanding what for.

But I have to wonder for how many it's just plausible deniability. I.e., how many understood full well that they're trying to be predators, but figured out that they can afterwards play the "oh, dearie me, you mean _that's_ what the nice young man offered to do for us?" card anyway.

Re:Sounds like crass stupidity to me, then

[tomhudson]

So basically they hired someone, and paid some tens of thousands of dollars... but they don't know what that person will do, nor what they'll get for their money? :P I mean, how stupid is that?

1. Chiropractors
2. Investment advisors
3. Fortune tellers
4. Rating agencies
5. Lawyers
6. Incomprehensible EULAs and closed source software upgrades that aren't really upgrades
7. 419 scams
8. P3n15 3n14rg3m3nt pills
9. "sure thing" stock tips
10. "make money working at home - small investment required"
11. Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke, bailout ...

I'm sure you can add more ...

Re:Sounds like crass stupidity to me, then

[Moraelin]

Oh, I'm sure there _are_ plenty of stupid people out there. I just

1. have trouble imagining that the same persons who'd cheerfull blow all their money on a 419 scam, still end up having enough money left to open a store _and_ pay some tens of thousands to a SEO.

2. At least for _some_ of the things you've listed, there is _some_ explanation of what they do. If I decide to go to, say, a fortune teller, I know what service they (pretend to) provide.

There still is an answer -- no matter how stupid or dishonest -- to the basic questions:

A) what do I get for my money? and

B) how does that work?

E.g., if I go to a medium, the answers are, respectively, A) "I get to chat with my late grand-grandmother", and B) "because the medium can invoke spirits." They're stupid, but they're some kind of explanation. If I were retarded and delusional, I could believe them. The point is that the questions were asked, and the answers were (mis)judged.

Whether it's a hot stock tip, or getting my aura read, or buying a hi-fi ethernet cable, or getting some holistic bullshit therapy, _everyone_ asks those two questions and wants an answer to them. Again, even if the answers hapen to be lies or retarded, but you want to know. That's why they bother writing all those metric buttloads of pseudo-science for all those scams: because people ask the what and the how, before parting with their money.

I have trouble imagining that many people would just give some money to a stranger, without even asking those two questions. How does that go? "Sure, go ahead and do whatever you want to do, I don't want to know, just take the money and go." Does anyone actually do that kind of thing?

Re:Sounds like crass stupidity to me, then

[Anonymous Coward]

but they don't know what that person will do

Many people do a similar thing when they hire their accountant. Read again the above poster's description of the legit ways to advertise: they all involve a certain level of search and sales familiarity. There is no reason to expect that the owner of Joe's Shoes will know how to best pick the correct Google search terms, or even know how Google is different than MSN. Recall the average person has trouble grasping the difference between "the internet", "the web", and "logging in to their computer", and if it isn't their job, it's not even so terrible to be thusly ignorant.

We all hire others to do services that we are not skilled enough to do. Lots of SEO hires are done by people who know exactly how loathsome their practices are, but that doesn't mean all such hires are done in-the-know. Never attribute to malice and all that...

90 complaints in four years?

[Anonymous Coward]

Comcast and Quest both get more complaints than that in a day....formaly filed...for similar devious practices and failed promises.

Sue THEM!

Re:90 complaints in four years?

[aztracker1]

In this case it's a matter of scale... what percentage of customers complaining in a given year, for Qwest and Comcast, this is probably a fraction of 1%, for concerns of less than $100 generally. For this company it is probably 10% or higher, with the dollar values in excess of $1000.

It's like the difference in petty theft vs. grand theft. Even if you commit a few thousand petty thefts, it's still petty theft.

Good Unlimited Hosting Companies should be next

[future assassin]

Like these two who hide behind their TOS to limit you on the resources they advertised to you.

http://www.bluehost.com/

That offer

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UNLIMITED Hosting Space (NEW!)
UNLIMITED File Transfer (NEW!)
web hostingHost UNLIMITED Domains!!!
2,500 POP/Imap Email Accounts
SSH (Secure Shell), SSL, FTP, Stats
CGI, Ruby (RoR), Perl, PHP, MySQL
2000/2002 Front Page Extensions
Free Domain Forever!
Free Site Builder (NEW)
24/7 Superb/Responsive Sales/Support

Or

http://www.wostgator.com/

Our Most Popular Hosting Plan

        * UNLIMITED Disk Space
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        * Host UNLIMITED Websites
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        * CGI, PHP 5, RoR, Perl
        * MySQL, SSH, SSL, IMAP, POP
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Ad agencies generally offer this as well

[areusche]

I know from experience that a lot of Ad based publication agencies for RF magazines also offer search engine optimization for a particular customer.

It's generally offered as part of a deal like "I'll put you ad on pages 100, 125, and 150 and then we'll send you over some web developers to help you clean up and optimize your website."

Personally search engine optimization is hit or miss and I would definitely not pay $10,000 for something like that. Sadly this is one of those cases were a little common sense could have gone a long way.

Less Voodoo

[schlick]

While it certainly isn't Google's fault or any other search engines fault, how many people could they help by providing a link on every results page (off to the side some where) with a little explanation of how the results were achieved and maybe search links to articles about good web design and how to make your page relevant (and possibly an explanation of why SEOs are bad.)

I'm just saying, if they tried to take a little more voodoo out of the web I bet this would happen less.

Re:Less Voodoo

[dword]

Actually, have you searched on Google for google seo? Try this link: http://www.google.com/search?rls=ig&hl=en&q=google+seo+tools&btnG=Google+Search&aq=2&oq=google+seo

Shocking

[h3llfish]

It is absolutely shocking how easy it seems to be to set up a business that has no intention of offering the services that they claim to offer. Most people quickly see through these shams, but sadly, there really is a sucker born every minute, if not more frequently.

I once spent a few days working for a company that claimed to offer assistance with using eBay. It seemed legitimate enough at first. They sold an instructional book and a couple of CDs, and they offered a few other services like hosting images for your auctions.

But it quickly became clear that the whole thing was a scam. They ran infomercials late at night, which convinced people that it was trivially easy to make money online. Once the dupe called in, they were connected with a bored phone jockey who blazed through a rather lengthy terms of service. Buried in there somewhere was "oh by the way, we'll be dinging your credit card for 29.95 a month from now till doomsday".

Getting out was not easy, as the phone lines were always jammed. A 45 minute wait to cancel service was typical. And, once you got an operator, they were trained to stall, distract, or convince you to keep the service. It made canceling AOL seem very easy by comparison.

And the actual "service" that they offered was similar... an hour wait to talk to a human being, and when you got them, they didn't know much about eBay, and they certainly didn't have any secrets on how to get rich. They just tried to upsell you ever more expensive "services". Not making money yet? Must be because you need us to make you a custom web store, for another 2 thousand dollars.

The law really needs to change, to make scams like this less easy. The two owners of this shitty company were both quite well off. Once a number of complaints built up about their company, they just scrapped it. They always already two or three new schemes already in motion.

I quit without notice before I completed my second week. And this was during the dark times of the dotbust, when I was desperate for work. But not THAT desperate.

Re:Shocking

[mschuyler]

Video Professor?

Re:Shocking

[h3llfish]

No, but when I see those Video Professor ads, it sure does seem like they're the same type of organization. I was with epowerandprofits.com. They used to run a late night infomercial starring Chuck Woolery, of Love Connection fame. Sleaze!

Re:Shocking

[azrider]

Ever notice that the "Video Professor" does not have a web site?

So, let me get this straight...

[Moraelin]

but they don't know what that person will do

Many people do a similar thing when they hire their accountant.

So, let me get this straight: you actuall have no idea what an accountant does, but you pay him anyway? Oh, goodie. Then I'm a lurblologist, give me some money too. Don't ask what a lurblologist does, after all you didn't want to know what the accountant does either.

Re:Update from company...

[visiblenet]

Appreciate all the inquiries about the recent press release. We will be posting our official statement on our corporate blog by the end of the day. We'll be sure to post the link here as well. Thank you for reaching out in this manner, that is why we have several customer centered profiles and resources available and remain members on several customer/company awareness sites.

This is typical, unfortunatly

[Anonymous Coward]

I have been burned from a similar company. http://www.seohaus.com/

We needed help with google adwords and organic searches. We ended up getting linkfarmed to pron sites, getting articles written that mentioned our competitors, and forum posts that hurt our credibility. When we tried to fire them, we could not get out of a contract and were unable to collect a refund.

I tried to hire a 2nd company. After doing extensive research and meeting them one-on-one, I also found that they were using the same tactics to get placement. Nothing legit and really shady when it comes to deliverables.

I am convinced that this is a sleeze-ball market and anyone who is an SEO expert is lying. No one but google REALLY knows how this works. Best to do it yourself and get advice from other webmasters and marketers.

Re:Good Unlimited Hosting Companies should be next

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, even if this were on-topic, it would still be useless, since you just repeat what they advertise, without saying why you think it's wrong or what the truth is.

How, exactly, "these two... hide behind their TOS to limit you on the resources they advertised to you."? This could be a useful point if it actually included this information; instead, it's just a troll.

Re:There are legit companies for the honest

[Lord Bitman]

If a company says "we will get you high placement", they are going to be doing something which search engines will do all they can to block, forcing you to the bottom of the results.

If a company says "we will help you make YOUR page more attractive to search engines", they just might know how. Google bombing is not the way to the top. Displaying good content in a way which robots like /is/.

There's the guys who say "Post your links into a blog's message board. Search engines like to see links to your site on blogs."

And there's the guys who say "Make a blog about your site and keep it up to date with information about the industry you're in. Search engines like to see links to your site on blogs."

In the end, it's good content which search engines are trying to find. SEO is about letting search engines know about that content, not about tricking their algorithms.

Re:Update from company...

[visiblenet]

Read our official response to the AG Release here... http://www.visible.net/visiblog/visiblenet-is-serious-about-customer-service-support/

Re:Good Unlimited Hosting Companies should be next

[future assassin]

Oh yah I'm a troll. First they can't offer unlimited space and bandwidth as there is not such thing. If there was they would be offering it on their dedicated servers (Hostgator)

How do you explain this?

[dword]

I've bothered to ask this question to the Visible.net SEO company and they've bothered to reply on their blog.

Basically, they said they're just recommending you the same things you can find on this page and saying that the Attorney General didn't care about their happy customers (which have no idea that they got just a few tips for thousands of dollars). To me, that's like being charged for stealing and saying "But why won't you listen to other people I've come in contact with, because I never stole from them? I'm also confident that I don't steal, either and I really believe myself!"