I must say you’re always the pleasant host and indeed always great to chat with online.

Forgot to mention above that in addition to guaranteeing benchmarks, our clients all invariably attain dozens and in some cases, even a hundred or more 1st page positions.

And if I may be so bold, for a competitive keyword value that I would invoice say $5K, R. Fishkin would charge about $150K for the same job. Though that’s not the only difference.

Fishkin to my best recollection doesn’t actually do anything; he charges for a website review and for some suggestions for the client to follow. Myself on the other hand, I actually perform the SEO and position the site.

I think you’ll find that those who seek to divert your attention away from their own deeds are the most “guilty” of the biggest scams of all. The “submit to 1000’s of search engines” albeit still somewhat an effective sucker bait, is such an old grift that it barely merits mention anymore.

If the SEO isn’t capable of positioning a website within their niche, and/or is unwilling to guarantee their work, IMO he or she doesn’t deserve the job. Clients shouldn’t have to pay for incompetency.

John Barremore
Houston, TX

Thank you for your input! I wanted to clarify my point of view so that any confusion can be cleared up.

I am against those hack websites that clearly and blatantly rip off the uninformed by promising unachievable SEO goals. You know the type, ridiculous claims of website submission to 1000s of search engines and top rankings across hundreds of engines that people do not use.

In terms of providing ‘pay for performance’ guarantees, as I understand The Visible Dentist provides, I think these can work very effectively for clients. Especially, if the terms of the agreement are built around competitive keywords and traffic level goals that will drive a positive ROI for the client. This is exactly
what I tried to say in the post, is to explain to people what the difference is and that ‘pay for performance’ could be an option for them.

Please understand that my post does not discuss ‘pay for performance’ from the perspective of what The Visible Dentist offers – so in my paragraph:

But what are Satisfactory SEO Results? From a general point of view, I am bringing to the reader’s attention that even ‘pay for performance’ can be manipulated against the client. That is not to say that all SEOs do this, nor to imply in any form whatsoever that John, your business, would ever do this.

What drove me to write this post is that in the comments on the Marketing Pilgrim post there appeared to be a misunderstanding between straight ‘SEO ranking guarantees’ vs. ‘pay for performance guarantees’. I wanted to clarify this to those who may be confused by the two, or even consider them to be the same thing.

I cannot simply say that ‘pay for performance’ is great, without pointing out to people that there may be loopholes because people who are not familiar with the SEM industry may not understand some of these loopholes, unless they are pointed out.

I have previously worked with SEO clients on a PFP model and found that it can really work well, particularly for those businesses who are hesitant dipping their toe into the SEO pool. I think the PFP model itself has many positive points and certainly, one in which contracts are not utilised is even better for the client.

So, in conclusion, I wish you all the very best with SEO in the dental industry! It sounds like your model works very well for your clients – having a few dentists in the family – I think that it would be the way to go (especially if the dentists you work with are as far removed from the Internet as those in my family!)

Thank you for your feedback!

Marta

Since I am/was the person rocking the SEO boat in your guest post, allow me to elaborate a bit more.

First and foremost I disagree with the assertion that website owners should avoid guarantees in SEO, and as you conclude, I object to those who seek to claim that any SEO service offering a guarantee is a scam.

Now that we know where I stand, let me assure you, we offer an SEO guarantee and we’re 100% legit, effective and recommended by both peers and clients.

So who is fooling who?

I’m familiar with Rand Fishkin and the hundreds other SEO outfits that cover their butts by saying, watch out for guarantees, they’re all rip-offs. Total BS. If a company can throw that line out there it means they have a license to steal with impunity. Don’t be a sucker.

I specialize in the dental industry — though, I’ve worked just about every industry since ‘99 with hundreds of successful campaigns. You’ve probably visited websites that I positioned.

That said, allow me to finish where you left off — you were going pretty good there till you hit some sort of Fishbump.

What this says is this: ‘We (SEO company) are confident that you (the client) will be satisfied with our services. We (SEO firm) do not control rankings but we do control our own strategy and we are confident of our abilities. Thus, if we do not achieve the agreed to goals of meeting satisfactory SEO results, you (the client) do not make any payments.’

But what are Satisfactory SEO Results?

The above is almost exactly our operating model — The Visible Dentist says just that; we do not charge until we attain results. What kind of results?

We target the most competitive keywords for our clients and we show them the numbers — NOT 10 word longtails; real 2 and 3 word phrases highly relevant to their target market and very productive in terms of traffic, profit and ROI.

We also benchmark starting keywords — the client receives bi-weekly ranking reports and is always kept in the loop — there is no manipulation in our favor at all — to the contrary. The deck is stacked in favor of our clients and unless we perform, we don’t get paid. It’s a very simple and effective model, for all parties concerned.

Contract? Never used them — and don’t want anything binding; our clients love the concept. We give our word to perform a service for a fella and accept the client’s word in kind to pay for services rendered. We’ve never had a problem.

A few hundred bucks for first page positions? I don’t think so; we’re not cheap, though not out of reach. Our prices are actually commensurate with client ROI expectations.

I’m sorry if this sounds too good to be true — but it is. While all you guys are arguing about it what to do and how to do it, our clients are laughing all the way to the bank — and them some.

If you have questions, by all means I’m listening.

Cheers!

John Barremore
Houston, TX