Not surprisingly Chiropractors were not the first ones to have a problem getting “Authority” websites to provide links. Most new companies are at a significant disadvantage when it comes to creating “Authority” for their website especially in today’s current environment of “Google Controlled Authority”. Literally, Google’s indexing program gets to determine who has the most important information or who is the “Authority”. Fortunately, they use a variety of criteria which we can work with and follow to provide predictable results in gaining “Authority” for our websites. The unfortunate part is there are some factors that we can not control for – one of which is how much SEO work our competition is applying to their websites. We can only monitor this and because their is a three month delay in reporting or this information we can only guestimate how much new SEO measures are being taken by the competition and then modify our plans based on the outcomes. Does our site move up in the results in a predictable manner or does it stay stagnate? One of the most important items to consider when applying SEO is to ensure that it is applied in a gradual manner so as not to get the website flagged as a spammer website.

Because of the “closed shop” or “old boys network” related to creating “authority” for a website – SEO companies were forced to create alternative methods in an attempt to promote websites without using the “old boys network”. These alternative methods worked very successfully for a period of time – however, “The Old Boys” were of course upset by this and forced the search engines to create new sets of rules and to classify these alternative methods or techniques as black hat SEO or spamdexing. These methods primarily employed link farms (websites that contained nothing but pages of links), keyword stuffing (repeating the same keywords on a page where it would appear unnatural) and article spinning (submitting slightly modified versions of the same article to hundreds of different article submission websites). Over utilization of these methods definitely degraded search results and the end users experience on the search engines. Today search engines police these methodologies with a strong arm, no possibility of parole or reprieve, if a site is caught using these methods they are out – permanently removed from the search engine results! The even more difficult part – if a website gets permanently banned and they were linking to your site it is very likely that your site could be permanently banned! Ouch!! Again this is the “Old Boys Network” protecting their territory – they are holding all the cards and they don’t like to share! So if an SEO company says that they have a new technique to get your website to the top of the search engine overnight…don’t walk away…RUN!! Employing unethical or unapproved methods for artificially boosting the “Authority” of a website may provide great short term results but with these short term results there are also significant risks…you could get your website banned permanently! Don’t run the risk! Work with a company that only employs methods that are proven and within the ethical guidelines of the search engines.

Many SEO firms provide some or all of the following very useful services:

• Review of your websites content, structure, appeal
• Technical advice for “Optimizing” your content
• Content development or redevelopment to achieve higher level of content Optimization
• Keyword research or advice
• SEO training to truly optimize your results

Remember that Google search results always includes organic search results, local listings (Google Map) and most often paid advertisement also known as "Sponsored Links and that today they are also including video and blog results as a separate category. Advertising with Google won't have any effect on your site's “Authority” or presence in organic search results. Google doesn’t accept money to include a website in their search results, and it costs nothing to appear in their organic search results, except the time and energy necessary to create “Authority”. Google also offers free resources such as Webmaster Tools, the official Webmaster Central blog, and their discussion forum that can provide a great deal of information about how to “Optimize” your site for organic search results. Many free resources and information on Google’s paid search known as Adwords, can be found on Google Webmaster Central.

Before deciding on an SEO firm, it's a great idea to become an educated consumer and get familiar with how the search engines really work. Then you can decide – do I want to do this work myself or would I prefer to delegate it? Understanding the totally depending on and SEO firm is never in your best interest. In fact if the SEO company says just leave it all up to us – you should probably look into another company. A good SEO company will typically need several weeks to fully evaluate your current position and determine exactly what will be needed to achieve great results. Then they should let you know what part you will be responsible for and what part they will take responsibility for. We recommend starting your education on SEO with the advice that Google offers (as Google is the number on search engine):

• Google Webmaster Guidelines
• Google 101: How Google crawls, indexes and serves the web.

When you are ready to hire an SEO firm, the earlier in your websites development the better. This can save a lot of wasted energy. If you SEO firm can work in cooperation with your website development company this can really reduce the amount of duplication. The best time to hire and SEO firm is when you are first deciding to get a website, or if you are redesigning your website, or planning to launch a new site. So that your SEO firm can ensure that your website is designed to be search engine-friendly from the very beginning. However, a good SEO can typically help improve an existing site but this takes a lot of time especially with static or html sites as each page will need to be edited and if you site has hundreds of pages…this takes time.

Some useful questions to ask an SEO include:

• Can you show me some success stories?
• How long did it take to climb to the top? – remember too fast of results can get you banned!
• Do you use the Google Webmaster Guidelines?
• What kind of results do you expect to see, and in what timeframe?
• How do you measure your success?
• What are your most important SEO methods that you utilize?
• How long have you been in business?
• How will we communicate?
• Will you share with me the changes you plan to make to my site?
• Will you provide information about your reason for making changes?
• What education will you provide for self SEO?

While SEO firms can provide their clients with valuable services, some unethical SEO firms have given the industry a black eye through their overly aggressive marketing efforts and their attempts to manipulate search engine results in unfair ways. Practices that violate Google’s guidelines may result in a negative adjustment of website's presence in Google, or even the removal of the website from Google’s index. Here are some things to consider:

• Run From Spamming SEO firms!

  We get this type of spam emails regularly:

  "Dear WellPlanet.com,
  I visited your website and noticed that you are not listed in most of the major search engines and directories..."

  You know the feeling you get when your read the spam for “burn fat at night" diet pills, or requests to help transfer funds from deposed dictators of Nigeria? You should get the same gut feeling for any company that provides spam email and especially about search engine results because as we have mentioned an unethical SEO can get your website permanently banned!

• No SEO company can legitimately “GAURANTEE” a #1 ranking on Google!

  SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings or allege having a "special relationship" with Google, or advertise a "priority submission" to Google – all of these should signal – RUN!! There is no priority for Google and Google doesn’t develop special relationships with SEO firms. In fact, in general terms Google doesn’t like SEO firms because they are attempting to manipulate the indexing of content. However, just as an example, to submit a site to Google is only done through their Add URL page or by submitting a Sitemap from within the Google Webmasters area and you can do this yourself! It only cost the time and energy for an SEO firm to make this submission. Typically a few hours maximum to develop a sitemap for a dynamic site and less for a static site (if you don’t have an automated one through your websites framework) and a few minutes to submit it to Google.

• Be careful if an SEO is too secretive!

  A high quality SEO company should explain in detail what they plan to do for your website. If they don’t…Please ask for explanations and if something is unclear get it clarified. If an SEO creates misleading or deceptive content on your behalf, such as "throwaway" domains or doorway pages, these are frowned on seriously by Google and the other search engines and could result in your site being banned! Ultimately, it is your website they are promoting and in Google’s perspective and rightly so, you are responsible for their actions because you hired them! So know exactly how they plan to "help" you and if you give them access to your website, whether via FTP or other framework for modifying your website they should explain everything they intend to change and also explain why!

• You should never have to provide a link to an SEO’s website.

  Any SEO that talk about "free-for-all" links, or deceptive link popularity schemes, or submitting your site to thousands of unrelated search engines or directories hasn’t read the Google handbook and again you should RUN! These methods used to provide great results but today are essentially a useless exercise! In the best case scenario they will have little to no affect on your ranking long term (possibly offering a short term improvement in rankings) in the major search engines – but in the worst case scenario by adding your website to a directory that has been banned or is completely unrelated to your website this could deliver a result that you likely would not consider to be positive – again you could get banned!

• What are the most commonly reported abuses of SEO companies?

  "Shadow" domains that funnel users to your site by using deceptive redirects is probably the most common. Shadow domains are typically owned by the SEO company who claims to be working on your behalf. However, if your leave their service, they can point the domain to another website which is commonly the Chiropractor across town. If that happens, you essentially paid to develop your competitors SEO which is actually owned by the SEO company.

  "Doorway" pages is another ill favored practice which places a page loaded with keywords on your site. The SEO says this will make your site or the specific page more relevant for more keyword searches. Wrong!! Typically, individual pages are only relevant for a few select keywords. Even more problematic is that doorway pages usually contain hidden links to the SEO's other clients. This drains your link popularity or link juice as they are calling it today and routes it to the SEO’s other clients, which often includes sites with undesired content. It is always best to know who are your SEO’s other clients?

• What are some other warning signs?

  Here are a few classic warning signs that you have a high risk SEO and should produce that feeling that it is time to RUN:

  • If the SEO owns shadow domains…RUN!!
  • If the SEO puts links to their other clients on doorway pages…RUN!!
  • If the SEO offers to sell keywords in the address bar…RUN!!
  • If the SEO doesn't distinguish between actual search results and ads that appear on search results pages…RUN!!
  • If the SEO guarantees ranking, but only on obscure, long keyword phrases you would get anyway…RUN!!
  • If the SEO operates with multiple aliases or falsified WHOIS info…RUN!!
  • If the SEO gets you traffic from "fake" search engines, spyware, or scumware…RUN!!
  • If the SEO has had domains removed from Google's index or is not itself listed in Google…RUN!!

  If you feel that you were ripped off or deceived by an SEO you should report it so that they don’t continue to rip off the next guy!

  If the rogue SEO is in the United States, then report them to the Federal Trade Commission. The FTC handles complaints about deceptive or unfair business practices, visit: http://www.ftc.gov/ and follow the link to "File a Complaint Online," or call 1-877-FTC-HELP, or write them at:

  Federal Trade Commission
  CRC-240
  Washington, D.C. 20580

  If your rogue SEO operates outside of the United States, which many of them do, please file it at http://www.econsumer.gov/.

If you are looking for a Search Engine Optimization Company that specializes in Chiropractic and that is committed to only using the highest in industry standards for predictable long term success we can highly recommend Promotional Chiropractic Websites. They will get your website to the top of the search engines and help to keep you there! If you would like to learn more read our other articles on Search Engine Optimization.