My internet passion started back in 2003. A little eBook set me on the road, it was Google Cash by Chris Carpenter. I set up a few campaigns in a relatively competition free Australia and started making money directly promoting affiliate programs.
I was quite successful at this in the beginning and then had the pleasure of watching the market flood with new entrants, all doing the same thing, forcing keyword bids up. I also had the pleasure of watching Google continue to refine their rules to make their search engine perform better, often at the expense of affiliate marketers. I watched and modified my approach until the time required to exist in the market, was no longer compensated by a justifiable remuneration.
So I changed tack. I'd pretty much learned all I could with pay per click advertising anyway. At this juncture I started building and optimising websites. I spent thousands working out the most successful and enduring methods of search engine optimisation (SEO) and applied all the techniques to my own businesses. I still own about half a dozen successful websites. Only one promotes my own product, a tourism service I set up a couple of years ago. All the others sell products in affiliate programs or advertising space.
As my skill grew, so did my reputation. The result of this was a continual stream of business owners who, having heard of my expertise, wanted to hire me to sort out their web presence. These business owners all had two things in common. They all saw the potential the internet had for their business and they all had been taken advantage of by unscrupulous internet operators who took their money yet added no value. So I took them on and applied the same strategies to their websites that I applied to my own. Much to their delight, their websites now create business for them.
There is a real issue with the internet industry, it is packed with these bogus operators. There are graphic designers who put together internet masterpieces, charge a fortune for the website, yet no-one can find it. There are marketing professional who apply all their skills, yet they know nothing about the internet so their message doesn't find an ear to fall on. Our industry is unregulated and we are largely self trained. Unfortunately this has left the industry open to the unscrupulous and ignorant. Our clients have been damaged and the industry suffers also.
Every week I see these operators at work. They operate on the assumption that they know more about the internet than their clients and therefore can create sales through misdirection. They promise the world, deliver very little and once paid move onto the next unsuspecting victim.
For example, my tourism business hires out surfboards on Australia's Gold Coast. Do a Google search on "Gold Coast Surfboard Hire" or even just "surfboard hire" for that matter. I'm sure you'll find me, mine is Gold Coast Surfboards. Clearly for the product I am selling, I am very well optimised in the search engines.
Despite this I get the so called "professionals" writing to me every week trying to sell me their SEO services. "We can put your business on steroids" they tell me, getting you on the first page of Google on such terms as "Surf Board Accessories" and "Holiday Rentals".
I think I've figured out what these charlatans do. I think they find a small business website and mine the search engines for "sort of" related terms, until they find one which is pretty low on Google. For my website, the type of terms that they come up with are "Surf Accessories" and "Holiday Rentals". Terms which are related but not really relevant. Once they have found one, they'll construct a sales pitch based on the traffic they'll send my website by optimising it for those terms. Of course there is always a decent amount of scare mongering in these sales pitches, telling me how much of my business is going to my competitors, business which I can claim for my own.
This sort of thing really scares me. It makes me realise that there are people in my industry who manipulate our clients to make a quick buck. They are quite happy to modify a website to attract irrelevant traffic in order to make some money, with little care of the damage this does to the customer's business. To embellish, if I had have listened to these hard selling conmen, my website would either be attracting lots of people who needed surfboard wax or fins, or in the Holiday Rentals case, people who are looking for hire cars or accommodation at goodness knows which destination. One thing is for certain, people visiting the Gold Coast would not be hiring my surfboards.
If you are under pressure from an internet salesman to sign up for their optimisation services, my advice is to first get a really good understanding from you clients, as to which search phrases they use on the internet when they are looking for your product. If the salesmen are trying to get you to optimise other phrases, don't do business with them. At the very least they have not researched your market enough to work on your website. At its worse, they are just manipulating you in an attempt to wring some money out of you. Either way, it will damage your business.
If you are thinking about using the internet as a way to promote your business, ask around. See if you can get a referral for an internet professional who has built and marketed a website for someone else in a way that brings them business. The good professionals run their businesses on referrals with little self promotion. When asking around though, be very clear with people. Tell them you are looking for someone who markets websites, not someone who builds websites. There are just too many people out there who will charge you a small fortune to build a masterpiece, one though which no-one will ever find.
If you are an internet professional reading this article, its time for all of us to smarten up. We need to look after the industry and we can only do this by being ethical in the manner in which we operate. So please, stop going out trying to extract a pound of flesh, go out to add value to your clients. Once you are adding value, the new clients will come, following your reputation. Continue operating as you are though and soon no-one will talk to internet professionals anywhere. - 15275
I was quite successful at this in the beginning and then had the pleasure of watching the market flood with new entrants, all doing the same thing, forcing keyword bids up. I also had the pleasure of watching Google continue to refine their rules to make their search engine perform better, often at the expense of affiliate marketers. I watched and modified my approach until the time required to exist in the market, was no longer compensated by a justifiable remuneration.
So I changed tack. I'd pretty much learned all I could with pay per click advertising anyway. At this juncture I started building and optimising websites. I spent thousands working out the most successful and enduring methods of search engine optimisation (SEO) and applied all the techniques to my own businesses. I still own about half a dozen successful websites. Only one promotes my own product, a tourism service I set up a couple of years ago. All the others sell products in affiliate programs or advertising space.
As my skill grew, so did my reputation. The result of this was a continual stream of business owners who, having heard of my expertise, wanted to hire me to sort out their web presence. These business owners all had two things in common. They all saw the potential the internet had for their business and they all had been taken advantage of by unscrupulous internet operators who took their money yet added no value. So I took them on and applied the same strategies to their websites that I applied to my own. Much to their delight, their websites now create business for them.
There is a real issue with the internet industry, it is packed with these bogus operators. There are graphic designers who put together internet masterpieces, charge a fortune for the website, yet no-one can find it. There are marketing professional who apply all their skills, yet they know nothing about the internet so their message doesn't find an ear to fall on. Our industry is unregulated and we are largely self trained. Unfortunately this has left the industry open to the unscrupulous and ignorant. Our clients have been damaged and the industry suffers also.
Every week I see these operators at work. They operate on the assumption that they know more about the internet than their clients and therefore can create sales through misdirection. They promise the world, deliver very little and once paid move onto the next unsuspecting victim.
For example, my tourism business hires out surfboards on Australia's Gold Coast. Do a Google search on "Gold Coast Surfboard Hire" or even just "surfboard hire" for that matter. I'm sure you'll find me, mine is Gold Coast Surfboards. Clearly for the product I am selling, I am very well optimised in the search engines.
Despite this I get the so called "professionals" writing to me every week trying to sell me their SEO services. "We can put your business on steroids" they tell me, getting you on the first page of Google on such terms as "Surf Board Accessories" and "Holiday Rentals".
I think I've figured out what these charlatans do. I think they find a small business website and mine the search engines for "sort of" related terms, until they find one which is pretty low on Google. For my website, the type of terms that they come up with are "Surf Accessories" and "Holiday Rentals". Terms which are related but not really relevant. Once they have found one, they'll construct a sales pitch based on the traffic they'll send my website by optimising it for those terms. Of course there is always a decent amount of scare mongering in these sales pitches, telling me how much of my business is going to my competitors, business which I can claim for my own.
This sort of thing really scares me. It makes me realise that there are people in my industry who manipulate our clients to make a quick buck. They are quite happy to modify a website to attract irrelevant traffic in order to make some money, with little care of the damage this does to the customer's business. To embellish, if I had have listened to these hard selling conmen, my website would either be attracting lots of people who needed surfboard wax or fins, or in the Holiday Rentals case, people who are looking for hire cars or accommodation at goodness knows which destination. One thing is for certain, people visiting the Gold Coast would not be hiring my surfboards.
If you are under pressure from an internet salesman to sign up for their optimisation services, my advice is to first get a really good understanding from you clients, as to which search phrases they use on the internet when they are looking for your product. If the salesmen are trying to get you to optimise other phrases, don't do business with them. At the very least they have not researched your market enough to work on your website. At its worse, they are just manipulating you in an attempt to wring some money out of you. Either way, it will damage your business.
If you are thinking about using the internet as a way to promote your business, ask around. See if you can get a referral for an internet professional who has built and marketed a website for someone else in a way that brings them business. The good professionals run their businesses on referrals with little self promotion. When asking around though, be very clear with people. Tell them you are looking for someone who markets websites, not someone who builds websites. There are just too many people out there who will charge you a small fortune to build a masterpiece, one though which no-one will ever find.
If you are an internet professional reading this article, its time for all of us to smarten up. We need to look after the industry and we can only do this by being ethical in the manner in which we operate. So please, stop going out trying to extract a pound of flesh, go out to add value to your clients. Once you are adding value, the new clients will come, following your reputation. Continue operating as you are though and soon no-one will talk to internet professionals anywhere. - 15275
About the Author:
Damian Papworth, concerned with the lack of honesty displayed by todays internet professionals, promotes honesty over greed
