I get so frustrated with companies who claim to offer SEO services but lack any understanding of the fundamentals of SEO…
We got a call from a potential client who recently redesigned their website and subsequently lost the majority of their traffic. In preparation for the call I pulled up their site, dug around the web to review the old version of their site, checked their backlinks, checked their code, etc. It was immediately apparent to me why they had lost so much traffic; the majority of the links pointing to their website point to pages that end in .html and their site was re-coded to .php but there wasn’t a single redirect put in place. That’s the main reason, but there are many other problems I saw on the new site as well. That made me curious about the company that did the redesign and recode so I clicked the link in the site’s footer to visit the web design firm that did the work. Immediately I saw that they promote themselves as SEO experts with a page dedicated to the service. Unbelievable. They claim to be SEOs but didn’t even bother to implement redirects when they redesigned and recoded a site?!
But wait… there’s more!
The also claim to be Google Analytics Certified partners. However, the potential client’s site has the asynchronous tracking code located at the bottom of the HTML. I thought that was strange so I checked the “SEO” firm’s tracker and, sure enough, it’s at the bottom of their code too! Analytics Certified?? Uh, no… no they aren’t. Their Google Partner page lists only one certification and it’s for display advertising.
But wait… there’s more!
They sucked the potential client into a custom CMS and don’t allow them access to change any of their code. They have to pay the firm for any changes required beyond simple edits. My article on Content Management Systems should be required reading for any small business owner.
Every redesign needs to be spearheaded by a proper SEO expert who does it for a living and nothing else. The most important factor driving traffic to a website is ranking and if your design firm doesn’t know enough about SEO, your traffic WILL be nuked in a redesign.
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Ahhh the old web design company that also say they offer SEO chestnut! We find we are constantly having to battle with clients web developers who have no clue what a search engine friendly website should look like, even though they “claim” to also be experienced in online marketing. Anything to try and turn a profit!