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Ask HN: Do you pay for SEO

8 points by pdenya ↗ HN
My site knottablenecklaces.com currently has fairly low traffic (700 uniques a month including the 500 from adwords). I was approached by an SEO firm: auroin.com. Paying $200/month for this service will take a large portion of the monthly profit from this site but if the results are anywhere near as good as those posted in the few case studies they sent it'll pay for itself.

Is it worth it?

11 comments

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_ud4a
a word of advice, NEVER go with SEO companies that approach YOU. it should always be the other way around.

usually the ones approaching you end up taking your money and because of the nature of SEO it may take several months before you realize they haven't done anything and you've already lost $1000

pdenya
Any recommendations for reputable companies?
aymeric
Upfront disclaimer: I run the taskarmy.com website.

Marius is one of the freelancers on the website and guarantees to put your website on the first page of Google for $199. (If the keyword is too competitive, he will quote a new price).

I have been following his assignments with clients and he has always delivered what he promised to do, this is why I feature his service on the front page of taskarmy.com.

pdenya
Thanks for the info, really nice site btw.

I'll contact Marius now, $200 as a 1 time fee and $30/month is a massive savings over what I thought I had to pay.

oziumjinx
Don't ever give money to an SEO firm that "guarantees" first page placement. It is impossible to guarantee such a thing and it is written over and over to never go with a firm that promises such: http://www.seroundtable.com/sketchy-seo-company-google-12786...

http://www.websightdesign.com/services/search-engine-optimiz...

aymeric
I used his services three months ago to rank my website for "outsourcing pros and cons". It still ranks high.

The reason why he guarantees the result is because he knows how to analyze the competition on the keyword you give him. He won't accept a keyword that is too competitive.

And in the unlikely situation where he wouldn't deliver, my website protects because he won't receive your payment unless he delivers.

_ud4a
doing SEO is not as complicated as you think. read a few books and you can do it yourself

-target main keywords - have proper titles - validated html files - BACKLINKS to your site from valid sites (pr4+). this will help increase your page rank and boost you in google pages. Single handedly this is the most important aspect of SEO.

pdenya
Thanks for your input. I believe my site is built in a fairly SEO friendly manner, with keywords taken into account in copy, titles for pages, etc. I've been reading about SEO for a while and i've done pretty well with a few sites but I'm sure folks who spend their days doing SEO will still be better at it than me.

Back links are the main issue because I don't have many (any) and i'm not sure where to get them for this particular site. Normally I'd build up content myself but this is more of a side project and i'd rather not commit that level of time to it.

johnnytee
http://seomoz.org is an awesome research tool for seo. They do have a pro account, it's a bit pricy but well worth it for organic keyword research.
mrwangkai
I used to do SEO for a Samsung mobile support site. We rarely use anything monetary in an effort to up our traffic. After a few months, we went from 30 unique per day to a few hundred per day. And by the time I left the company in a year, we are about 3000 unique visitor per day.

It definitely takes some effort to build good content alongside some SEO attributes. Just need patience (& Googling good ways to help things along).

I won't recommend going with a SEO firm, let alone $200/month.