Comments on: How to avoid the SEO link building scam

By: Charlie Cairns

Charlie Cairns — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 18:22:10 +0000

I used ICO last year and they added about 1,000 links to my website at a cost of £hundreds. As the links were all crap (on a few “article” websites)it actually hindered the natural development of my website, and I reckon their input held back development by 12 months. It took a lot of complaining to get them to remove their links, and I didn’t even try for my money back. Avoid this company like the plague…

By: LG

LG — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 19:24:00 +0000

I’ll just add to my previous comment … it was embarrassing trying to deal with my client’s complaints about First Found as I had recommend them in the first place. They are utterly useless and must have shares in Horlicks just to get to sleep at night.

Another red flag is if the company has an aggressive outbound telesales operation, which most of these companies do. They usually have many more sales staff than they do SEO/web guys and so they can afford to not deliver for their clients, because they are generating huge amounts of new business.

By: LG

LG — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 19:19:37 +0000

I was sold on the sales pitch of FirstFound and because my clients were asking for SEO, which isn’t my forte, I took a gamble and advised them to go with First Found.

Three clients signed up, 6 months later, each were complaining they had no results.

I started to study SEO on and off page optimisation and their relative effect on the site’s ranking on Google, and I realised that FF had done nothing but change a few page titles add, a paragraph of content and some meta tags (why meta tags?)

Looking at backlinks via Yahoo, showed that they hadn’t built a single inbound link for either of the sites.

They absolutely suck and need to be avoided at all costs.

SEO is a costly, time intensive and skilled business. No company offering a low rate fixed fee package can get results on anything but niche, localised websites that have little to no competition.

By: Web Design Scranton

Web Design Scranton — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 00:37:02 +0000

I have a question. Linkbuilding.net contacted me to place a client’s link on one of my PR sites. They offered me $25. I googled Linkbuilding.net scams and your site came up first. Is Linkbuilding.net legit or not?

By: chris

chris — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 08:35:24 +0000

so if first found are so reputable why do they not give there clients access the there adwords accounts that they are managing for them, something to hide maybe. They come up with the usual excuse of having many clients on there “client management software” which in reality is Google My Client Centre which is ver easy to organise to have seperate logins for each client.

By: Alan Hoggin

Alan Hoggin — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 11:42:49 +0000

You just have to see how cunning they are on these forums as to what depths they will sink to with you and your company by the way its now 10-07-2010 and still no response from its cold outside steer clear they are not to be trusted

By: Graham

Graham — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 08:58:15 +0000

Google also makes it quite clear that link building to manipulate the search results is unacceptable.

There is sufficlent evidence that the methods employed by ICO go against the google guidelines. The forums links in the post are full of angry people disappointed with the services offered by ICO and others.

Note also that you have even tried to manipulate the comments by pretending to be two different people. The fact that you posted a reply to your own comment before it was even approved indicates a lax approach to ethical business.

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 08:16:57 +0000

spurious claims?? try typing in “how do i improve my rankings” into google and follow the ranking-webmaster tools help link. Google’s webmaster tools page describes, in general, what they want to increase natural positions. There is also a link on there to their technology overview discussing the value of PR and their focus on Links. If you really want to understand Google, search for the original thesis written on link integrity whilst they were at Stamford Uni….the birth of the Google search engine.
People making silly uneducated accusations against other companies to gain business for themselves gives the industry a bad name. Rethink your client gaining tactics and survey the facts before you attack other companies’ integrity.

By: Graham

Graham — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 21:37:12 +0000

And Dave is back again (5 minutes later) with a different email address but the same IP as ‘Jason’ now making all sorts of spurious claims.

Dave works for It’s Cold Outsite. Make your own mind up as the their business ethics.

By: Graham

Graham — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 21:32:41 +0000

This Jason has a email address of dapadave and actually posted the reply 4 minutes after the above comment and before I’d approeved it for publication!