Did I get a decent SEO deal

Hi all,

If i'm posting in wrong forum please move.

About six moths ago or so I engaged an Indian based company (not a freelancer) in SEO project for company i work for. We started with PR0 and ended up with PR2 as of September 1st. Daily visits according to g.analytics went up from a few to about 100-120 a day. Not a whole lot, but it was significant to us. Again, the project was for 6 months and in short included, directory submission, article submission, SMO, blogs building, pages optimization and monthly reports. We're in temporary staffing field where most of the business leads come from online sources. The total cost of the project was $5k. I realize that i'm not revealing much details about the SEO project scope but I'm curious to see what you experts think about the total cost of the project. Have I been taken to the cleaners or I simply got what i paid for?

Now, I'm considering continuing the SEO project and debating whether or not hire an Indian or eastern European freelancer, as have pretty good experiences (years) with working with people from oversees or just renegotiate the contract with current company and continue with them. Sure, you might say get a real SEO pro, but my IT budget is limited and need to consider all options.

Would you think the first couple of months of initial SEO activities are easier to get tangible results as opposed to picking up the project where somebody left off?

Any ideas/thoughts appreciated. Also, if anyone is interested in picking up this project pls pm me for more details.

thanks a lot.

Can you post the url so we can look at it? =]

Firstly.. There has not been a PR update since April. So what you current PR is displaying is what it was from the snapshot in March. (not that PR matters)

As to wether you got what you contarcted for. Read the contract. Have they done what they said they would do?

or

Does the income generated from what they have done justify the expense you have spent? Remember the traffic/income is likely to be ongoing.

I am a bit suprised that most of the things you have listed above have made any significant difference to your rankings at all. But if this is what you asked the company to do and they have done it than the company has filled the contract you asked for.

I would not expect a lot for $5000. Personally most of the outsourcing I know do is purely for link building services (including some content creation).

Ask yourself did you get the ROI which justifed the expense? For $5000 you were not going to see miracles.

Just from the very limited information given it appears you have gotten what you paid for if the contract said that was what you were paying for.

I'm not questioning whether the company has fulfilled contract reqs, as it nothing tangible was guaranteed. I’m thinking could I have gotten the similar results had I hired a freelancer instead? As for getting return on investment, some other factors might have played role here, such as the actual content, which is rather pretty plain, old and boring at the least. Luckily we are about to launch a new site in a few weeks.
Oh, here the URL for those interested: snistaffing.com

Sounds like an emphasis on SEO... and the chasing of low quality links.

I'd move the focus to content development 90%, then spend 10% going after a small number Ultra High Quality, uncompensated, one-way, unreciprocated links from authority domains.

My bet is that three of those links are worth more than all that you already have.

I took a look at your site. It looks a bit "old style", not very attractive from a visitor's point of view ( I won't say if it's attractive for search engines or not ). That could be one of the factors that might have played a role for getting return on investment.

Looking at your site, mainly the page titles, I don't think that it reflects much of a professional work...it indeed could have been better.

But the main thing to consider is what was your goal or the business objective of your site and optimizing it for the search engines, if you feel that the goal has been achieved then it's fine. Here I would like to suggest that set your goals on the number of leads and not on PR or # of visitors, PR can be manipulated and so can be the number of visitors. So set your goals on the X number of leads you want generated from the site...IMO that would get you a better ROI.

To me $5K looked way too much for the site considering that the job was done by an Indian company.

Try to concentrate on page contents in order to make it friendly for both user as well as Search engines.

At the end of the day what matters is the quality traffic you bring and the return on investment. If you can honestly say that you made more than you spent then sure it was a good deal.

All comments and feedback are greatly appreciated.

As for ROI we do exactly know how many leads we need per day (given specific conversion rate) to meet the budget. What I’ve been noticing though is that we get quite a few applicants out of the continent, which is not quite what we’re focused on.

Definitely need to concentrate on enhancing the content and making the site more user friendly, etc.

Kind of agree with sensei. Site design doesn't looks very fresh, you should check your bouncing and return visitor rates.

Otherwise, $5K looks like reasonable compensation for what you get, you have quite good ranking for several keywords in Google, so you are on right track.

identify the areas from where the potential is and promote ur site there....

btw ive left you a PM

Sounds like a plug for some SEO work.

Hey Kontech,

I'll start off by saying I agree with most of the comments you received. Especially about the usability/navigation of the site (or lack there of).

IMO $5,000 is a good budget though. I know most (and a high percentage at that) will disagree with me on this. But looking longterm, SEO companies know (or should know) that the better job they do, the more that company is willing to invest in them, so considering this (my way of thinking of course-long term) then any SEO company should be ok with a $5,000 budget for the first trial whether it be 6 mos. 1 year etc... Especially with all the SEO companies in the game, stating that all can bring great results. This allows you to show them to put up or shut up.

With that said, are you going to get the best SEO company to take on your project, probably not as $5,000 isn't to encouraging... but you'll still find very good/qualified ones that can set deals with you. Another potential is to look for a company who does PFP or cuts a deal that when you make money they make money... it doesn't always have to be about upfront payment. And when it does, that's when you get into shady companies... again IMO.

As for the site... you have to keep in mind that your design/content puts constraints on your success. If your design is poor, navigation is bad etc, then regardless of how well they do SEO wise, your visitors will not stay/buy.

If you're going to be serious about ROI/SEO... put some effort into your site design first... then let the professionals take it to the next level. Don't give them a piece of deadwood, and expect them to carve a nice sculpture.

point well taken. now, concentrating on augmenting the content, improving navigation and making site more visitor friendly, etc.
thank you.


btw. for those how are sending me PMs I can't seem to reply, I guess because I haven't completed activation, so pls leave your alternate contact info