Last night I got a strange call to my local business here in Milton Ontario, I started a dog walking service, from someone claiming to be actually from Google Local Business Listings. There were some funny things going on with my Google Places listing so I thought great here is my chance to get answers from the horses mouth.
To make a long story short these people claimed that my business was not showing up in the Google maps or on the first page of Google for that matter for my keyword terms and offered SEO services in order to give my site visibility. The strange thing about this whole conversation was that ...
I am ranking for all my keywords on the first page of Google results, not first place in them but my site is, at the time of this post, less then a month old. I was doing these searches in real time as, I was talking to these people and they kept on insisting that I was not ranking when my local results were telling me otherwise.
The first clue that these are not actual Google is that they referred themselves as Google Local Busines Listings, but Google changed this recently to Google Places. Someone from Google would not make this mistake.
The second is that Google doesn't call any one to solicit services, lets face it business comes flocking to Google. The only time Google contacts you is to verify your Google Places or to tell you that you violated the terms of use of your Google Adwords and your account has been terminated.
The third clue, they kept pushing on their SEO services, lets face it Google sells advertising and they don't sell website optimization services.
I was lucky I know exactly where my website stands, what SEO needs to be done for it to rank and which keywords I should be ranking for, but many local businesses are not this knowledgeable about how to market on the Internet and get search engine visibility. So be wary of someone calling you and claiming to be from Google.
They will throw a lot of words like keywords, keyword research tools before you trust these people get the advice of someone you trust. Check the results yourself on Google and use their free Google keyword tool, it will tell you exactly which words for your niche are most searched, what your traffic estimation will be and may other useful things. Don't just trust someone to your research first and do ask your webmaster for advice and communicate with them, they know their craft and they will tell you the truth.
Also be aware that if you have a new website that you are trying to rank you will not see results right away. It is all dependant on your competition and their strength. It will take time and effort to rank your new business website and expect the rank of your site to fluctuate for a few months (this is known as the Google dance) until the Search Engines index enough pages and trust your website.
Never trust any one who tells you that they can get your site ranking fast, most likely they are using black hat SEO methods to build links to your website that could get your site blacklisted from Google forever.
Remember trust your instincts, scammers pray on your fears and greed, so ask lots of question, double check your information and ask someone you trust who understands SEO for advice. There are a lot of legitimate SEO companies out there so do your research before you give anyone your money or access to your website. Most will be honest with you and will tell you straight out what they will do for you and what you should expect.
No legitimate SEO company will ever guarantee the results since they do not have control over what Google does with their search engine. They will only guarantee their work.
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