So this company calls me up on Friday afternoon and says:
Dubious company: Hi, we’re working with Google and we just wanted to let you know about a phrase that has recently become available which was last seen 11 months ago. It’s ‘marketing agency Surrey’. It’s a great opportunity. (There are so many lies in this opening sentence it’s hard to know where to start.)
Me: (Already smelling the BS) for what?
Dubious company: To get you higher up on Google.
Me: Hmmmm…right. So higher up the organic listings?
Dubious company: No. This is about sponsored links on page 1 of Google.
Me: Oh PPC then.
Dubious company: No. Sponsored links.
Me: (Totally cheesed off )Â if you’d looked at my site you would have seen I’m an SEO copywriter. It’s what I do for a living.
Dubious company: (Aggressively) SEO is dead. And you of all people should recognise that…
Me: ‘Click’.
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Moral of the tale: If you receive a call from 020 7345 5163 don’t answer it.
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I often work in-house next to an SEO team. One of them received a call along these lines, probably from the same firm, which obviously made us all laugh and proved they don’t research their market. But the sad thing is, there must be a viable business model behind these calls, preying on the innocent.
I wonder what you’d have been charged for them to ‘optimise’ your PPC campaign…
The bit about a phrase ‘becoming available’ made me chuckle. That, and the fact I’m not in Surrey or a Marketing Agency. Can’t help but feel I really missed out on an opportunity there though!
You should have told them “The phrase ‘Internet Scam’ just became available,” and that for a fee, you’d have helped them optimize.
SEO isn’t dead, but it doesn’t stand a chance against a celebrity in a bikini post. I’m just saying is all.
My website advertises seo services and I also receive many calls of this nature. The callers obviously do not look at the website they are calling about in much detail. What worries me is that my clients have been approached by some of these companies and been offered page one on Google along with high pressure sales techniques and ending up with very little if no traffic for there money.
I totally agree Roger. The trouble is, there are a lot of scammers out there and they give the SEO industry a bad name. I wrote a post about how to choose an SEO consultant. Hopefully some clients will read it!