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I'm scared.. Should I be?

by Blaine Smitley
21 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Here's the situation.
I do websites for small business trade type companies. Roofers, Painters, Builders, Auto Shops. It's hard for these sites to compete with the major national franchise sites for the top keywords.


The sites are good, onsite SEO is near as perfect as I can make it. But the big companies have the budgets and staff to keep me out of the top spot on the first page of googles serps.


I've been reading here in the warriors for hire section about some of the back linking services provided and must say that I'm impressed with what I'm seeing regarding the amount of backlinks provided and how they're gotten.


Till now I've pretty much been doing it manually for these sites, and mainly getting the back links from the small free local ads such as yahoo, bing, google, merchant circle, yelp, city search.... And the list goes on and on.
But I see where the big franchises have huge amounts of backlinks, and know that I'm falling short in comparison to them regarding backlinking for these sites.


So here's the gist of it. I think I may want to purchase backlinking campaigns for these sites.. But am hesitant because I read here on the forums where you're not supposed to do the campaign for your "Money Site" because it would run the risk of being sand boxed by google... To do it through link wheels and 2.0 type sites cuz we don't want the "Money Site" sand boxed.



I have no money sites, and am not an Internet Marketer. I just want my clients phones to ring with people requesting their products and services, so am hesitant about google seeing thousands of newly established back links to their sites and then sandboxing them. And most of the sites I've built for my clients are only around 3-6 months old.


Here are my questions...
Does the age of my sites matter before I start a back linking campaign? Should I wait till I start some type of automated back linking campaigns? If so what would be good rule of thumb time wise?

Because these aren't affiliate selling type sites should I do very small back linking campaigns? A thousand links in a month for a mom and pop painting company seems excessive to me. What would google think?
Am I needlessly worrying about something that doesn't matter? Should I just go ahead and throw caution to the wind and purchase a campaign for one of the sites and see what happens?
#scared
  • Profile picture of the author outwest
    Do some fiverr gigs start out slow with 200 social bookmarks, gradually move up I would not blast with 1000s of links but those fiverr gigs discussed in some of the threads work
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    • Profile picture of the author Blaine Smitley
      Originally Posted by outwest View Post

      Do some fiverr gigs start out slow with 200 social bookmarks, gradually move up I would not blast with 1000s of links but those fiverr gigs discussed in some of the threads work
      I've looked into the fiverr gigs, and was thinking a few small campaigns for these sites would be the way to go.
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  • Profile picture of the author IM Ash
    DON'T PLACE A REAL BUSINESS AT RISK by falling for the hype in the "warriors for hire" section. Quantity doesn't equate to better rankings, in fact, if done wrong: it can cause more harm than good.

    You need to brush up on your SEO knowledge before you purchase a single backlinking service.
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  • Profile picture of the author megawarrior
    The websites you are trying to rank (i.e. the ones you are building for clients) are the "money sites" in this context. You should seek quality backlinks to your money sites, then you'll be fine. It is advised to avoid spammy, 50k Scrapebox blog comment blasts type of backlinking campaigns directly to your main site. Such blasts are fine for your 2nd-tier (Web 2.0) links because they are already established domains with PR, so it won't harm them. And also we do not care much if the 2nd tier pages did somehow get sandboxed.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mantasmo
    Build quality backlinks. Let me give you some ideas, others will chime in I'm sure...

    1. Buy some blog posts on high PR blogs (private blogs, make sure to use small networks that survive multiple PR updates).
    2. Buy a few PR5 homepage links if you can.
    3. Contact other blogs/sites in similar niches for guest posting. Offer $25-$75 per post.
    4. Submit to high PR directories. You can score some very nice PR4/5 links this way.
    5. Manually comment on high PR blogs in your niche (and similar niches). This is pretty powerful if done right (but also quite time consuming).

    You can also try building a small site network around your clients site. But this might require a bigger budget.

    Don't send large blasts to a clients site.
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  • Profile picture of the author TopKat22
    Hmmm, I find that ranking locally for such companies is relatively easy depending on the which keywords you are trying to rank for.

    And I would do it myself, not hire someone. Plus, most the people you hire, the backlinks disappear very quickly.

    Post some quality articles for syndication and you tube videos that include your local city and state in the title and keywords and that get you a great start.

    Also, put those other sites in the Google keyword tool to see what keywords they are ranking for and include those in your tags and titles as much as possible.

    Also, look them up in Alexa and see the top 10 sites linking to them and get backlinks yourself on those sites, if you can by commenting.
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  • Profile picture of the author outwest
    Well the fiverrs are not ALL good but I went from 2 wayyyyyyyyyy down about 3 weeks ago since I lost 20% of my backlinks on one site, this was due to my not renewing a few domains, dumb on my part, (had nothing to do with fiverr)

    My resort had been number two prior to this but stayed way down like number 7 for long time

    then
    I did that fiverr gig for linkwheel powerhouse forgot the link and about 2 weeks later i was up to number 2 again. Not saying that did it, but
    I still do not have those 20% backlinks I lost so something helped

    http://fiverr.com/volarex/build-a-li...-search-engine
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  • Profile picture of the author paulgl
    Local small business is all about google maps/places/local.

    If you aint on that, you aint $#!^

    Even more so, as google morphs results for the searcher.

    Backlinks don't matter. Websites don't matter. You
    don't even need a website.

    Paul
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    If you were disappointed in your results today, lower your standards tomorrow.

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    • Profile picture of the author Blaine Smitley
      Originally Posted by paulgl View Post

      Local small business is all about google maps/places/local.

      If you aint on that, you aint $#!^

      Even more so, as google morphs results for the searcher.

      Backlinks don't matter. Websites don't matter. You
      don't even need a website.

      Paul
      All of these small business's need google, yahoo, bing, merchant circle, local sites that are maxed at 100% completion. And I provide that service as part of my basic website package, along with listings in the 20 local online directories.

      But these companies still need good websites with individual service pages for the small outlying cities they're associated with and do business in. They can't have more than one google local ad and I always make it for the biggest city they're associated with. Also Google local gives extra weight to a company that has a link from their local ad to their stand alone website.

      Google local already rules the small business internet world... Honestly, I think they will eventually try to monetize it some day. How I don't know, but they're very focused on it these days... I fear that it's just a matter of time.
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    • Profile picture of the author Mantasmo
      Originally Posted by paulgl View Post

      Local small business is all about google maps/places/local.

      If you aint on that, you aint $#!^

      Even more so, as google morphs results for the searcher.

      Backlinks don't matter. Websites don't matter. You
      don't even need a website.

      Paul
      Paul is correct, I didn't pick up on the local, small business part... You need to educate your clients about this as well.

      edit: nvm, I see you have this part covered.
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      • Profile picture of the author Blaine Smitley
        Originally Posted by bnetwork View Post

        Paul is correct, I didn't pick up on the local, small business part... You need to educate your clients about this as well.

        edit: nvm, I see you have this part covered.
        Covering it can be a bear. It's tough to educate the clients about the importance of getting ratings. I actually provide a "Rate Us on Google Local" link from every page of the site I build. After that I point it out to the client and tell them to offer a 5% discount of something to service customers for a rating.

        So many small business owners are so focused on the work that they forget the marketing part and just don't seem to get it. On the other hand I have one client that's picked up 7 google local ratings and 37 likes for the facebook page I made him in just 3 months... Soon I'll see him in the top google local spot cuz he gets it! I guess the biggest difference in him and most of my other clients is age. He's only 24 where most of them are in their 40's and 50's.

        It still shocks me how so many business owners of my generation just can't get their mind around internet marketing and the success or failure of their business's ability to maintain or grow their customer base.

        It's just frustrating!
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  • Profile picture of the author Blaine Smitley
    Great advice from all of you and it's much appreciated. I suppose what I wanted more than anything was reassurance that what I was doing and thinking were correct.

    Thanks for taking the time out on a Sunday to provide me with a few minutes of attention.

    I suppose I will keep doing what I'm doing and be a little more patient. Maybe a few small Fiverr campaigns with one site just to see how it goes. I have a few that I own and lease for a percentage of the jobs that come in through them, so they would be the ones that I would throw caution to the wind with. After all I own them, not the companies that are leasing them.

    Thanks again to all of you!
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    • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
      Originally Posted by kid carson View Post


      I suppose I will keep doing what I'm doing and be a little more patient. Maybe a few small Fiverr campaigns with one site just to see how it goes. I have a few that I own and lease for a percentage of the jobs that come in through them, so they would be the ones that I would throw caution to the wind with. After all I own them, not the companies that are leasing them.

      Thanks again to all of you!

      Looking to Fiverr for SEO for real companies is a bad start. You can post caution to the wind for your own sites and it may on some occasions work for a little time but they are garbage links most of the time. Its one thing to run them to an adsense site but I would hate to be the SEO guy explaining to a plumber depending on business to feed his family that he won't appear in Google anywhere getting traffic for a few months when you get him either a penalty or his site goes into siberia due to the algo bouncing him/her down
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      • Profile picture of the author TopKat22
        Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

        Looking to Fiverr for SEO for real companies is a bad start. You can post caution to the wind for your own sites and it may on some occasions work for a little time but they are garbage links most of the time. Its one thing to run them to an adsense site but I would hate to be the SEO guy explaining to a plumber depending on business to feed his family that he won't appear in Google anywhere getting traffic for a few months when you get him either a penalty or his site goes into siberia due to the algo bouncing him/her down
        I agree. I wouldn't even bother spending $5 for these backlinks.

        Like I posted before, they generally are crap and go away in a very short time, some times only hours or days.

        A few really great backlinks is all you really need if the site is well optimized and you do some key you tube and article stuff.

        I am always amazed at the sites I index over huge companies with only 5 - 10 backlinks, some times less. However, i don't even concentrate on just page rank.

        Google can change and does change their rules all the time and everyone else is trying to get page one too so get targeted traffic to your clients in those other ways I mentioned, too.
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        • Profile picture of the author Blaine Smitley
          Originally Posted by TopKat22 View Post

          I agree. I wouldn't even bother spending $5 for these backlinks.

          Like I posted before, they generally are crap and go away in a very short time, some times only hours or days.

          A few really great backlinks is all you really need if the site is well optimized and you do some key you tube and article stuff.

          I am always amazed at the sites I index over huge companies with only 5 - 10 backlinks, some times less. However, i don't even concentrate on just page rank.

          Google can change and does change their rules all the time and everyone else is trying to get page one too so get targeted traffic to your clients in those other ways I mentioned, too.
          So Thanks again!

          Your opinions mean a lot to me. I have older sites that absolutely dominate the serps and the local rankings. It took me a lot of effort and patience to get them there, and they stay there with very little effort on my part. Just add a page every month or two focused on another long tail key phrase and that's it.

          Reflecting on a few of the comments here I have to conclude that.. I've been right all along and that there are no magic bullets for top rankings.

          This is something I've been struggling with for months now. Do it or don't? Sacrifice one of my new leased sites or not?

          Now I'm thinking not. Given a year and maintaining what I'm doing with them and they will be at the top, so I think I will just keep plugging and being patient. After all, although I own the leased sites, I've still put in a lot of hard work on them to make them look good and come up well. I'll just keep doing things the old fashioned way. After all, once I'm there I'm there, and will be really hard to push off the mountain. And if I'm pushed off it won't be that hard to get it back. Chances are if I do get pushed off, it will be by somebody doing something spammy and it will only be a matter of time till the Big G kicks them off for me.. I've already seen it happen to a large company in my area. I watched their back links increase at lightening speed and their fake google local ratings coming in like rain, till they were coming up #2 right under me in local and organic.. Then one day they were gone to the depths that no site likes to be. Their google local presence was totally gone. It's taken them a full year to get back up to the first page of serps.

          Sometimes we ask questions and hear something we don't want to hear. But as long as it's the truth I'm good with it

          Thanks Warriors!

          I think I'll take the money I was going to waste on a linking campaign and take a beautiful woman out to dinner next weekend.

          Life is good!
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          • Profile picture of the author outwest
            Originally Posted by kid carson View Post

            So Thanks again!

            Your opinions mean a lot to me. I have older sites that absolutely dominate the serps and the local rankings. It took me a lot of effort and patience to get them there, and they stay there with very little effort on my part. Just add a page every month or two focused on another long tail key phrase and that's it.

            Reflecting on a few of the comments here I have to conclude that.. I've been right all along and that there are no magic bullets for top rankings.

            This is something I've been struggling with for months now. Do it or don't? Sacrifice one of my new leased sites or not?

            Now I'm thinking not. Given a year and maintaining what I'm doing with them and they will be at the top, so I think I will just keep plugging and being patient. After all, although I own the leased sites, I've still put in a lot of hard work on them to make them look good and come up well. I'll just keep doing things the old fashioned way. After all, once I'm there I'm there, and will be really hard to push off the mountain. And if I'm pushed off it won't be that hard to get it back. Chances are if I do get pushed off, it will be by somebody doing something spammy and it will only be a matter of time till the Big G kicks them off for me.. I've already seen it happen to a large company in my area. I watched their back links increase at lightening speed and their fake google local ratings coming in like rain, till they were coming up #2 right under me in local and organic.. Then one day they were gone to the depths that no site likes to be. Their google local presence was totally gone. It's taken them a full year to get back up to the first page of serps.

            Sometimes we ask questions and hear something we don't want to hear. But as long as it's the truth I'm good with it

            Thanks Warriors!

            I think I'll take the money I was going to waste on a linking campaign and take a beautiful woman out to dinner next weekend.

            Life is good!
            I dont know where you got the idea you dont need to pay for backlinks. If you do them all yourself you are very disadvantaged compared to other sites that do that. So now you think you dont need that? LOL
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          • Profile picture of the author TopKat22
            Originally Posted by kid carson View Post

            Sometimes we ask questions and hear something we don't want to hear. But as long as it's the truth I'm good with it

            Thanks Warriors!

            I think I'll take the money I was going to waste on a linking campaign and take a beautiful woman out to dinner next weekend.

            Life is good!
            Great idea! Have fun and keep doing what you know works. If I ever found a way to get quality, long lasting backlinks that stick faster and easier and for cheap, I'd post it on here.

            There was a Warrior doing that once and I told everyone about it, but he took it down and now charges his normal prices again. But if I found something like that, I'd be telling everyone.
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  • Profile picture of the author CBusiness
    i'd say not really but do more reading of replies above. i'm somewhat newby
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  • Profile picture of the author Primalbrah
    What i would do is create some quality backlinks by buying some blog posts.

    Thats how i did it.
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  • Profile picture of the author VPan
    I'm glad you found that white hat techniques worked for you. However, when it comes to targeting keywords against the "big" competitors, remember you always have the option to focus in on local online marketing strategies.
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