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Look at the Alphabetical listing----what crap!
(Let's avoid naming specific companies and URLs - Thanks! - JamesR)
These people actually bought domains that say:www.exclamations-numberone-search---etc.....com
They also have a money back guarantee to attain a top Yahoo listing, guess how that one works. What if you took them up on something really competitive like www.lots-of-exclamations-cheap-plane-tickets.com
Come on folks, have you no shame!
[edited by: JamesR at 9:04 pm (utc) on Sep. 6, 2002]
Zuko
So lighten up, itīs rather funny.
Andreas Friedrich
http://!#1-seo-in-my-little-town-in.de
I think it's pretty well known around here how I feel about keyword-in-the-domain names .
;)
Seriously, next time - someone may expose your domain. Normally these (I'm telling) posts disappear.
We are SEOs here! Some more visible than others - but we don't knock our own community! Understand?
! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! Online CasinosThat is the title! 9 exclamations! Where is is Yahoo's integrity and where does it end? It makes me mad to see that when my submissions get butchered.
[edited by: kris at 8:55 pm (utc) on Sep. 6, 2002]
Under what search term did you find that !site?
Lots of good ones
[edited by: Marcia at 11:39 pm (utc) on Sep. 6, 2002]
[edit reason] fixed sideways scroll [/edit]
I bet the guy who submitted: "AAA Online Casino Guide" a year ago thought he was getting over on Yahoo! Now he is buried 90 deep in the directory.
They don't take any pride in their directory, they are about $ and I think this is a good thread to point out Yahoo's ridiculous editorial guidelines.
Now you know how to get to the top of your respective Yahoo category :)
>No serious company will use their services for fear of being discredited by such practices.
Exactly, that is why it is a kind of non-issue for me, of course I don't try to compete with them. Seriously, they are just playing the game, it is Yahoo's fault for having such low standards.
The best way to get SEO business is through reputation and word of mouth referrals....maybe offer some kickbacks too :)
[edited by: JamesR at 9:08 pm (utc) on Sep. 6, 2002]
I agree but what is to be done about it?
Those sort of "neighbourhoods" mentioned seem to be very competitive. One thing about a competitive neighbourhood is you will get some characters buying up a couple of hundred domains....cyber squatters etc etc
If all the good ones are gone, what are you to do?
It's a rat race - they're just doing the thing that we do here, use whatever possible to get the most out of our websites IMHO ;)
These people are not SEO experts, they just read enough about yahoo directory and studied an ascii character map, and boom....they're full fledged SEO experts worthy of charging customers money.
Sorry, but I'll have the balls to knock it. Those kind of people, and bad directory management are going to give us bad names.
Zuko
no,
but let's say a customer finds this service, and pays them for their services, and bad service is what they get.
By word of mouth, they say they were given bad service, and that they would not suggest paying for a search engine optimization service again.
No matter how you slice it, word of mouth is still the most effective form of marketing there is -- positive or negative.
Zuko
SEO is a bit different. Because our industry isn't completely understood by the general public, consumers will tend to lump every SEO into the same basket. Horror stories or black eyes against a company in this industry will affect all SEOs, not just the company in question.
In this industry, nobody will remember the company name. They will remember, "I had a friend who had an SEO company optimize his site and they ripped him off."
That isn't good for any of us.
The fact that SEO is very misunderstood is a strike against us and a lot of people just hear horror stories about SEO in general and that makes people think we are all spammers. It is something that you hear quite a bit.
The specific example you used startup is a bit extreme. I worked as an auto mechanic for seven years and the only thing all the shops I knew had was word of mouth. In certain scenarios, like the one you describe, it is on a very large scale. Most shops don't get that kind of free publicity. You mostly have the folk you have done work for telling the people they know about you. Most shops survive on neighbourhood traffic and bad reviews can kill you.
Both points are valid in regards to our particular business.
Any publicity is good publicity
but
A satisfied customer might tell 5 people about you when a disatisfied customer will tell 10, no matter how you cut it, that's bad.
The difference for us is people don't know they have to promote a site. They know they have to fix their car. Auto repair is a necessary evil with well understood ground rules. Lots of website owners don't even know SEO exists let alone understand the basic premise.
It's all spammy magic to them.
