SEO companies on the web

with PR0...

[bluemi]

This is probably nothing new for the pros here. I just went to a couple of websites of SEO companies listed on the Open Directory. Funny how many of them have PR0, and the majority doesn't make it via PR4. Doesn't look convincing to me...:). I think a talented 12 year old spending some time in this forum and following the advice given here could do better than that.

[EliteWeb]

It is not that they deserve a PR0 the fact remains many people put up sites that do not have enough content and are not catored to specific keywords. They will setup a site that has no links to it. I for one have a Search Engine Company Website which i put into dmoz and I know I havnt done what is needed to make it a successful site like my others so it has a lower PR. Sure some do deserve the PR0 but others are half-ast jobs for people just trying to bring in a few extra bucks from people who may find them.

[JayC]

I don't think I'd draw too many conclusions from the PageRank of an seo site. PR is only a measure of backward links, and for such a site not to have a lot of them doesn't really tell you anything at all.

A PR0, as opposed to a 2 or 3, may be a little different but still it doesn't tell you a lot. On the other hand, it doesn't take much effort to achieve a PR4... I guess the point is that if you're shopping around and find a firm with low PR on their own site, unless you're going to ask them to explain it to you the conclusions you jump to may not be accurate.

You may have read, too, some threads here where the point was made that a lot of seo firms want to stay below the radar and so make no effort to get high rankings on their own site. An extension of that would logically be to make no effort to increase PR.

And check out the links on high-PR seo sites... one technique used is to place hidden links on every client site back "home" -- links that the client may not even know about. So does high PageRank gained that way mean a good seo firm? A matter of opinion, I suppose.

[Chris_R]

I certainly would not hire any site that had a PR0.

Maybe it is being harsh, but there has to be a balance between optimization and conservativeness on the part of the client. I doubt 95% of the "firms" out there can do this - or let their clients know. A PR0 means one of two things - too many tricks - or not enough optimization.

[JayC]

Yeah, Chris, I probably didn't state it strongly but I would make a distinction between PR0 and "low PageRank." I'd look at a PR0 on such a site much more critically than I would, say, a PR3.

A zero probably means Bad Things were done, while a three might mean a number of different things: new site or domain name, no effort to build links, putting all the time and energy into clients and not their own site, relying on other marketing techniques instead, trying to stay under the radar, penalty, incompetence...

A PR3 might be a warning flag, but I wouldn't look at it as something that would mean automatic disqualification.