If you have website you will get unknown people and companies both calling an emailing offers of all types. All too often these cold contacts are not hones in part or whole. They could be generalized as “scammers”. Here is a common scenario as it relates to SEO services and marketing for improving Google search ranking for your website.

“We Noticed Your Website Isn’t Ranking for…”

The Scam: A company sends out a friendly email claiming that they “noticed your company isn’t ranking on Google for some of the important keywords for your company.”

How It Works: For some companies, there is nothing scarier than not showing up on Google for keywords they think they should be ranking for, even if they haven’t done any work to earn that ranking in the first place. This scam goes right to the heart of that fear.

Why It’s A Scam: For starters, it’s a mass spam email sent to a giant list of companies most likely obtained through shady methods. Second, you’ll notice that the opening email doesn’t specify the so-called keywords your website isn’t ranking for on Google. That’s because they don’t know, and they don’t care. They won’t until you reply in a panic.

I have also seen scammers employing a fear tactic that highlights “technical SEO issues” but they intentionally keep it vague.

Legitimate SEO firms hate this scam the most because their clients love to forward it over to them with a panicked, “What the heck are we paying you for if we’re not ranking for important keywords?”

The Outcome: You end up hiring an SEO firm that uses scare tactics to obtain new customers. Again, they could be a shop that provides honest SEO services, but if they have to use methods like this to acquire new clients, do you really want to give them your money?

The Alternative: Once again, do your homework. Don’t hire an SEO firm that obtains new business by way of spam emails.

Reprinted from this article on the searchenginejournal.com https://www.searchenginejournal.com/top-seo-scams/416351/