We’ve seen it all here at SEO Advantage over the last 14 years, and during that time we’ve heard from lots of people and companies in the SEO industry.
Often these contacts are initiated by fellow marketing firms hoping to guest post on our blog, and of course we see resumes from people with all levels of SEO experience. That results in a lot of research and vetting of people and businesses who want to be involved with our company. Because of this, we’ve developed some standard practices for vetting the people who get in touch with us, so that we can easily confirm that their SEO skills match their claims.
Weeding out the fakers
One problematic pattern we’ve discovered: those who claim to be experienced SEO professionals often don’t even rank for their own names and professions. Consider what that means. We get inquiries from people essentially asking us to help them promote their work via our blog, and some of the folks claiming to have expertise in driving search rankings have not managed to successfully rank themselves.
With companies the results on search vary. Some of us use common search marketing terms in our business names, and most of us are constantly adjusting our techniques Even so, SEO Advantage consistently ranks on page one for a large number of common industry-related searches.
Search the name, not the brand
For individuals there’s nowhere near as much competition to rank for a name. Unless they share a moniker with someone famous, anyone contacting you claiming SEO expertise should be able to at least show up on page one for a search that includes their name and the term “SEO.” Regardless of the company they work for, dedicated online marketers are always cognizant of their personal branding.
To get the best results with this vetting method, search for the name surrounded by quotation marks alongside SEO. Anyone claiming to have SEO skills and expertise should return results that look something like this:
Try it for any of our team that posts here on the blog, or the folks in our employee spotlight. You’ll find social media accounts and published work for every one of our people in the top spots on the search pages in Google, Bing and Yahoo. Even those who work solely behind the scenes and don’t publish writing still have proof of their experience and credibility. Meanwhile try this search for someone you know who isn’t involved with SEO and you’ll get results from directory listings and genealogy websites – results unrelated to the search marketing profession.
So the next time someone approaches you claiming SEO expertise, do a quick search to check the validity of that claim, and vet the people as well as the company. If a search marketer isn’t skilled and driven enough to get ranked for their own personal brand, chances are they won’t be doing your brand any favors.