Do you get emails from “friendly” Search Engine Optimisers and Web Designers saying that they have “looked at your website“, noticed that it is not ranking very well for “important keywords”, and offering to help you optimise it? Because I do….lots of them ….sometimes several times a day!!!
I am actually a professional Search Engine Optimiser, and my website is all about Search Engine Optimisation, so you might think that I should be a little miffed, or at least a bit concerned, that perhaps my own site might be under performing. Is this a classic case of “The plumber with the leaky taps” or is there more to these emails than meets the eye.
- Most of these emails tell me that my site is rubbish, has no hope of appearing in search results, and will be outranked by all of my competitors – Oh dear….
- Many of these emails actually contain some SEO related terms and jargon which sort of makes sense
- Some of these emails even offer some useful (if general) information about optimising my site
- Only a very few of these emails actually mention my site
- Many of these emails contain poor English or bad grammar
- Most of these emails seem to originate from another Country (often India)
Should the warning bells be starting to ring ? Do these emails inspire confidence that the person who is offering to improve my site actually knows what they are doing? Did they really spend any time looking at my site, and how do they know what my business is, or what keywords I want to rank for anyway?
Email Marketing Spam
Of course, most of these emails are just another example of email marketing spam. Someone (who may or may not be capable of optimising a website) has got hold of my email address – by scraping my site, buying a list, or some other weird or wonderful means – and decided to send me an email on the off chance that I would be willing to pay them to optimise my website. I guess that some people might actually respond to these emails, and they might even convince a few to pay them something. But if they were any good at what they were doing, why would they need to resort to this type of marketing strategy?
I just don’t know where these people get the time or energy for these types of email marketing campaigns. I tend to be busy doing SEO and spend very little time or money on marketing. I seem to get most of my work as a result of referrals from happy customers. If these SEO email spammers put some of their energy into actually learning about SEO, they may find that they get some happy customers of their own to help spread the word.
Here are some things to look out for that should ring warning bells for you :
- unsolicited offers to optimise your site
- general content that doesn’t specifically mention your name, website or any keywords associated with your business
- sender is using a gmail or hotmal email address (if they are a legitimate business why not use a legitimate email address)
- originates from overseas (often India) – don’t get me wrong, there are some very good SEO firms in India, but the good ones do not have to resort to these spammy tactics
What You Should Do
If I were you, I would be very dubious about responding to any email of this type, but if the email looks legitimate, you could dig a bit deeper by taking a look at their website or Googling their name.
Of course, if you are serious about improving your rankings, increasing your traffic, or optimising your conversion rates, you could always contact me. No matter what your website is – or how well it has already been optimised, there is always something that could be done to further optimise it. I’ve never seen a site (even my own) that could not be improved.