SEO Company won't give references

I've gotten a quote for SEO and everything seems legit but the company does not want to give out references (for safety of the companies they have helped). They seem to be very knowledgeable and use white hat practices. They want to do a complete site rebuild using xhtml and css. They also do keyword analysis etc. They refund a partial amount only if they do not alter the site in such a manner that should produce results. I want to protect my company from getting ripped off. Any recommendations on how to proceed? Is it inappropriate to post here about anyones experience with this company? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

SEOChat is usually open to discussing specific experiences. If you'd like, you may post the company and those who have had experience may chime in.

One thing to remember is that the reason SEO costs so much is because it is a long term solution to the problem of monthly marketing costs.

The changes done to your site are long term and it allows a natural traffic flow to your site without paying high advertising costs each month. The cost is upfront, usually in the $thousands. If a company guarantees results, then I would stray away- but if they offer you a multiple month (3 months - 1 year) package, then it is a little more realistic because it takes time for results to occur.

My experience with web designers shows that those without references are hiding something - lack of experience, poor communication, bad customer service, inability to deliver, etc.

I have to imagine SEO would be the same.

Right now its like me telling you to buy a car that you can't see. I'll tell you it has 2 doors, 4 tires and an engine and sound like an expert. But would you buy a car you can't see? Of course not! But if I gave you a list of references for other I sold cars to and everyone on that lengthy list was praising my ability to match car and driver and that I was professional, handled the problems efficiently and got you the keys on time as promissed, you probably would.

Maybe a car was a bad example, but you see what I'm getting at.

Hi,

I don't share my client list of the same reasons. And I make sure that everything is being kept confidential when I buy SEO services myself.

I would suggest that you start out with a small project 5-6 hours, and if the firm is doing a decent job give them the contract for the real deal.

I can understand a need for confidentiality, but only to a point. As someone mentioned, proper SEO takes time, so if I were an SEO company I'd not list new clients as references.

However, if I knew a long-time client company was happy with my services, and I asked them if I could use them as a reference, then absolutely I'd use them.

Related story - was shopping for business insurance several years ago and asked the agent for references. He said he doesn't give references. I got up and walked out.

Robert,

You just pointed out the big problem with trusting references.

I would not use an SEO who shares my URLs with others.

What sort of project would be a 6-7 hour project that I could judge the quality of work on?

Its like a catch-22. I wouldn't want the company to use me as a reference and give out my URL however I need a reference in order to trust that I will be getting a good service. The company didnt make any blatant promises.. but estimated that I would go from 150 visits a day to around 600-800. Am I correct in thinking that SEO can seriously grow my business?

I work 16 hours a week on a single website, and it started out with me doing a review of that same website.

A SEO review of the web site will give you a overview of what issues the SEO firm thinks are important, what priorities they would make and a outline of how to more foreward.

SEO can do a lot for a business, but I would never build a business that depended on organic search engine traffic alone. It is sometimes cheaper to buy traffic (advertising, affiliateprograms, pay-per-click) than to go after high traffic keywords directly.

I don't get it.

If I knew they were happy with our service, why would I not trust them as a reference? If you can't trust that your clients are being truthful, I'd suggest that you need to communicate with your clients more.

Besides, you can always call those references yourself, pretending to be a potential client, so you can verify that they're spreading the word the way you'd like them to.

On the flip side of that coin, I can see why EGOL and others wouldn't want info like that made public. That's why any company offering any references should always ask in advance if they can use that client as a reference.

The SEO company providing the reference to you might have served 100 clients and they gave you one name - the only customer out of the 100 who has not complained - yet. Or that client is the SEOs brother.

Wow, you guys really are the suspicious types, aren't you...

What you say can be true of any company giving references. And it doesn't matter what services your company offers, be it plumbing, accounting, taxi service, etc, you're going to have clients that didn't like your services for one reason or another. The client we took to civil court several years ago probably wouldn't have too many good things to say about us, for example.

When we give references (for my day job, non-SEO related), we give a list of 20, and even that only represents a fraction of the clients we've done work for. We can offer others if there's a specific project someone wants a reference about, but it's true - we only give out the names of clients that like our work. Wouldn't make much sense to give a list of clients who hated us.

But part of the job of a person interviewing references is to get a feel for whether the reference is legit or not - just like interviewing potential employees. Seems candidates only ever want to mention the good things on their application (those sneaky employees ;) ).

But I think a company that can't offer any references at all would be more suspect than one who can show that they've at least successfully serviced one client.

I think the phrase you are looking for is `realists`.
You put suspicious which is wrong wording.