First Page on Google - First Search Consultancy

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milo

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Jan 1, 2009
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  • #1
    Has anyone ever used or heard of a company called First Search Consultancy? They charge £200.00/year and guarantee first page Google result for 7 phases (or list of key words) within an entire county. For example if anyone searches Google for children’s entertainer, disco, party venue etc in any town or village in Kent such as Mobile Disco Ashford – I’m guaranteed to come up on the first page.

    They want my log in details for my hosting account o do all the meta tags etc. Is this normal?

    It seems like a good deal tome – what do you think?
     
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    Subbynet

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  • #2
    Hi,

    I'm always wary of SEO companies which make guarantees. Nothing is guaranteed.

    £200 isn't going to buy you many hours of anyone's time. Lets say they have no overheads and are paying themselves just £5 an hour (Thats under the National Minimum Wage), your £200 would buy just 40 hours. (1 week)

    That means you'll be lucky to have anyone working on your site for 3 hours a month over the course of a year.

    Now, all this is immaterial because £5 an hour just isn't a realistic wage, no one will work for that. Then you have overheads, so you can easily see that your £200 will ultimately buy around a day or two (max) of time with a proper SEO expert. Those 3 hours might easily be cut to under an hour a month.

    If this was me, I'd rather save my money...

    Just my 2 cents...
     
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    cycloneuk

  • #3
    It would be quite easy to rank if the keyword had a county added on for example, childrens disco kent, you could do that yourself imo with very little seo knowledge, any place that offers guarantees i would avoid.
     
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    360interactive

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  • #5
    I agree with Cyclone, getting those keywords for specific counties will not be hard, and with a few hours reading up online you could do it yourself. £200 is not a lot of money when it comes to SEO, this should be an indication of how little time and effort it would take.
     
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    milo

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    Jan 1, 2009
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  • #6
    But it’s not just a county – It’s any town, village or area within the county.

    I can’t find any bad reviews and they don’t look like a Disney company, so I’m going to give it a shot I think. I should imagine they only have to do the initial work on the meta tags etc and they probably have software to do auto submissions for the search engines so they shouldn’t have to spend too much time on it.
     
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    360interactive

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  • #7
    milo said:
    But it’s not just a county – It’s any town, village or area within the county.
    Click to expand...

    Well then that would make it even easier to obtain the rankings, the more specific you become, the easier it will be.

    It's only £200, and if you have a good feeling about them, go for it. Just make sure they don't try and sign you up to some sort of recurring payment, or a 5 year deal or something of that sort. I've been mis-sold in the past and been tied into a monthly £200 payment (I went legal and got out of it) so just be wary.
     
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    seasonsonline

    seasonsonline

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  • #8
    From what I've heard from my web designers & other business associates, paying to get to the top of Googles ranking pages is a myth! These so called SEO companies can only really do what you can do yourself with a little research/hardwork, determination & patience!

    Take a look here http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35769 Google have not so long ago published info (it took them a long time to do it) showing how to make a website as SEO friendly as possible! These things can be done either by yourself or your web designer. If your site is being put together by web designers they should know this.

    The only thing you can pay Google to do is put you in the "sponsored links" for relevent key words, usually based on a "pay per click" set up.

    Finally, there is some great ways to self promote your site which can be found on this very forum. Here:- http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=32162

    I'm not saying I'm some kind of expert on this matter as I've only had my own site for a couple of months now, but I'm pretty sure what I've learnt and been told is reliable.

    Good luck!
     
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    360interactive

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  • #9
    seasonsonline said:
    Finally, there is some great ways to self promote your site which can be found on this very forum. Here:- http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=32162
    Click to expand...

    Fantastic, I never even knew that existed.

    I think we have to keep in mind though that for small projects and niche sectors, people can have a go themselves.

    I know for one if I wanted to come up top in Google for 'Holiday Rentals' I would need help, and that's where these SEO companies come in.

    It's just a shame they're so hard to find amongst the cowboys.
     
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    Subbynet

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  • #10
    milo said:
    But it’s not just a county – It’s any town, village or area within the county.

    I can’t find any bad reviews and they don’t look like a Disney company, so I’m going to give it a shot I think. I should imagine they only have to do the initial work on the meta tags etc and they probably have software to do auto submissions for the search engines so they shouldn’t have to spend too much time on it.
    Click to expand...

    Milo save your money... Meta Tags don't do anything these days, no one uses them. Much the same for Auto Submission software, its a waste of time, these sites will find you! (And they only need to find you once!)
     
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    UKSEOAgency

  • #11
    please - what ever you decide to do - ensure they follow these guidelines

    http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35769
    http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=40349
    http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35291

    So many people buy without first checking any of this - in the third one it states:

    No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google.
    Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a "special relationship" with Google, or advertise a "priority submit" to Google. There is no priority submit for Google. In fact, the only way to submit a site to Google directly is through our Add URL page or by submitting a Sitemap and you can do this yourself at no cost whatsoever.
     
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    bcmedia

  • #14
    I spoke to the FSC today and grilled their head of tech for about 30 minutes. He was able to answer all my questions and I was nearly impressed. However I decided to call up some of the companies that they claimed to SEO.
    Two companies given to me as examples of work done by FSC had never heard of FSC and the third said the service he received from them was terrible. 9 months to do a small website, with a re-occurring yearly fee of £1600. Once they had his money, no-one contacted him until the following year, to renew his hosting (for £1600 :O )
    Avoid like the plague!
     
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    cardinalblack

    Free Member
    Apr 30, 2009
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  • #15
    ***************** AVOID FIRST SEARCH CONSULTANCY *****************

    I was MIS-SOLD a FIRST SEARCH CONSULTANCY package by a salesman who LIED down the phone to me.

    This company have decided not to honour the promises he made verbally and by email despite my repeated efforts.

    I have paid the best part of £400 for NOTHING.

    PLEASE DO NOT FALL INTO THE SAME TRAP.

    Best wishes,
    An extremely enraged First Search Consultancy 'Customer'.

    ***************** AVOID FIRST SEARCH CONSULTANCY *****************
     
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  • #19
    OldWelshGuy said:
    getting to number 1 is a race, and while you can't guarantee to win, if you know your PB is 11.0 and the best of the others in the race PB's is 12.5, then it is fair to 'assume' (not guarantee) you will win the race.
    Click to expand...

    Whats a PB.? and how much for 2 dozen.?:|

    If you examine the competitions site's .Then make sure you have a stronger mix.

    Then its pretty sure you will win ,not absolutely guaranteed as one may have to call the AA at the first fence.

    As there's always the possibility of some old nag no one fancied doing the business on yer.:rolleyes:

    Earl
     
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    S

    SalesDNA

  • #20
    1- Make sure the guarantee is in writing and with dates

    2 - It is relatively easy to do your self but takes a lot of time and effort.

    3 - The price seems ridculously cheap but if they guarantee it. My suspicion is they won't. Pay on arriving at your agreed spot ie breaking the front page.

    4 - Being on the front page is meaningless. It's inquiries and business. Nothing else counts.


    I would disagree the Title Meta Tag is the most important thing you can do for SEO other than links.
     
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    OldWelshGuy

    OldWelshGuy

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  • #21
    sirearl said:
    Whats a PB.? and how much for 2 dozen.?:|

    If you examine the competitions site's .Then make sure you have a stronger mix.

    Then its pretty sure you will win ,not absolutely guaranteed as one may have to call the AA at the first fence.

    As there's always the possibility of some old nag no one fancied doing the business on yer.:rolleyes:

    Earl
    Click to expand...

    Sorry Earl, I forgot how old you are, and how it slows your reading speed down, so I am typing this bit slower ;)

    PB = personal best. In other words, if you know how good you are, and have evaluated the opposition, then you can guarantee to yourself to be #1 .

    And as for guaranteeing the #1 spot, not even Google can do that ;) http://www.google.co.uk/search?sour...8&rlz=1T4GPTB_en-GBGB290GB290&q=search+engine
     
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  • #22
    OldWelshGuy said:
    Sorry Earl, I forgot how old you are, and how it slows your reading speed down, so I am typing this bit slower ;)

    PB = personal best. In other words, if you know how good you are, and have evaluated the opposition, then you can guarantee to yourself to be #1 .

    And as for guaranteeing the #1 spot, not even Google can do that ;) http://www.google.co.uk/search?sour...8&rlz=1T4GPTB_en-GBGB290GB290&q=search+engine
    Click to expand...

    you do not seriously think google would put themseves first on there own search engine.:D

    One has to have a bit of decorum.:rolleyes:

    Don't worry to much about me age just been riding a Can am spyder at our demonstration day.

    http://www.atvquadshop.co.uk/spyder-images.htm

    A mean machine not for the feint hearted.

    Does wonders for the bowels.:eek:

    Earl
     
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    seasonsonline

    seasonsonline

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  • #24
    sirearl said:
    Great stuff ,so why are you not No1 for "costume jewellery" or "fine jewellery".?:|

    Earl
    Click to expand...

    I just noticed this reply, so even though its been a while I thought I should give a response.

    There are certain keywords and terms such as "costume jewellery" & "fine jewellery" that are very very competitve and google base a lot of empthasis on the age of the site and respect etc. Our site is still relatively new but we are seeing ever improving results, based solely on hard work!

    I dare say if we had money to burn (and throw away) then we could pay to get pretty close to the top through (some) SEO companies that use dodgy links on multiple sites.- This could eventually bite us in the bum, and ultimately risk getting us removed from googles results all together.

    Since our launch, we have seen great results from just following good honest advice and doing the tips suggested by others, as I mentioned earlier in this thread.

    Actually, If you do a UK google search for sparkly costume jewellery, sparkly jewellery, ethnic costume jewellery and wedding & prom jewellery then we're in the top10. For other search terms like prom jewellery etc we rank pretty high. Not a bad result for a few months online!
     
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  • #25
    seasonsonline said:
    I just noticed this reply, so even though its been a while I thought I should give a response.

    There are certain keywords and terms such as "costume jewellery" & "fine jewellery" that are very very competitve and google base a lot of empthasis on the age of the site and respect etc. Our site is still relatively new but we are seeing ever improving results, based solely on hard work!

    I dare say if we had money to burn (and throw away) then we could pay to get pretty close to the top through (some) SEO companies that use dodgy links on multiple sites.- This could eventually bite us in the bum, and ultimately risk getting us removed from googles results all together.

    Since our launch, we have seen great results from just following good honest advice and doing the tips suggested by others, as I mentioned earlier in this thread.

    Actually, If you do a UK google search for sparkly costume jewellery, sparkly jewellery, ethnic costume jewellery and wedding & prom jewellery then we're in the top10. For other search terms like prom jewellery etc we rank pretty high. Not a bad result for a few months online!
    Click to expand...

    You would be well advised to pay one of these SEO shysters
    As having rankings for keyword terms that no one searches for will not do you a lot of good IMHO.

    Although your approach of targeting keywords related to your products in line with the current strength of your site is correct.

    Earl
     
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    seasonsonline

    seasonsonline

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  • #26
    sirearl said:
    You would be well advised to pay one of these SEO shysters
    As having rankings for keyword terms that no one searches for will not do you a lot of good IMHO.

    Although your approach of targeting keywords related to your products in line with the current strength of your site is correct.

    Earl
    Click to expand...

    Cool!:cool: . So you think that no one searches sparkly jewellery, ethnic jewellery, wedding & prom jewellery???- You're definitely wrong.
     
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    seasonsonline

    seasonsonline

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  • #30
    sirearl said:
    I may be wrong but if you have more than 20 searches a day for those terms I will eat yet another one of me hats.?:)

    Earl
    Click to expand...

    Ok, well let's say we got 20 search terms for that and 20 more for Big fashion earrings, big costume earrings, sparkly earrings, prom jewellery, cheap wedding & prom jewellery etc etc etc.

    Oh, and let's throw in summer fashion 2009 (ok, so we're only 10th but out of 18,000,000)......

    We have great SEO for product keywords as well. E.g, large brown flower ring, value pack hair slides etc etc

    Combined with our ever improving conversion rate (see previous thread),- without wanting to blow the old trumpet I think we're ticking along pretty well for a new site.

    As far as good SEO is concerned, patience is definitely a virtue and writing "Good honest content" helps. As said before, yes for sure I've no doubt that by paying an SEO company you can undoubtedly improve page rank. However, there are many companies that will use any method necessary to secure their monthly payments, getting you to the top of the list, but at the same time jeopardizing your business in the long run. That's all I'm saying,- it's what I've learned from numerous different sources.
     
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  • #31
    milo said:
    Has anyone ever used or heard of a company called First Search Consultancy? They charge £200.00/year and guarantee first page Google result for 7 phases (or list of key words) within an entire county. For example if anyone searches Google for children’s entertainer, disco, party venue etc in any town or village in Kent such as Mobile Disco Ashford – I’m guaranteed to come up on the first page.

    They want my log in details for my hosting account o do all the meta tags etc. Is this normal?

    It seems like a good deal tome – what do you think?
    Click to expand...

    Dont do it, I used to make this mistake, It is a waste of money - Give me you URL now, and I can have it at the top of google for FREE this afternoon.
     
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  • #32
    buyfromtheuk said:
    I cannot type the URL as I don't have the 15 posts but its buyfromtheuk.co.uk with the bits in front. Thank you very much for your help.
    Click to expand...

    I was kind of hoping to be able to find enough unique comibnations of words on your site to search on them words and find one of you URL at the top of google.

    I had a good look at your site for about 20 mins, it is going to need a lot of work, it is not really at the SEO stage - you could probally get better results with more work on the site.

    You need more content not links a description of each page and category, proper meta and content information.

    You have also used categorys and sub categorys in the URL which does delay things a lot. For example firewood belongs to the timber category for the menu, but this does not mean it has to be like that in real life. Why not have /firewood and /timber - just that the menu says top > timber > firewood.

    I would plan the design of the site a bit better, for the menu structure and the URL structure, and they tie that in with the meta and content information.

    If it was possible to actually find one of your pages from google, when you get there, then you dont actually have a logo on that page so it is not clear where you are.

    This is my advice, dont worry about SEO for a while plan the site and try and have a better navigation system
     
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    Country Services

    Free Member
    Nov 6, 2005
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  • #34
    My company had a telephone call last week from a person looking for a company to design their Marshal Arts website.

    The person phoning us, spoke to my customer services assistant and asked her if it was true that First Search Consultancy had designed our website. First Seach Consultancy had given my business as an example of their work.

    A somewhat curious claim since our website was designed inhouse, in Front page, has awful code, and is badly in need of a complete overhaul. Whilst somewhat flattered that someone might wish to use us as an example, I can only conclude that either the person phoning was completely unhinged, or, First Search Consultancy are

    1. Dishonest
    2. Unable to recognise a well coded website.

    Pippa
     
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  • #36
    buyfromtheuk said:
    Can someone please explain what the 'meta' content is a where do I find/add it?
    Click to expand...

    If you use this website as an example, click on the edit > view source in the browser menu, you will see the HTML source for this page. There are 100's of meta values but the ones we are mainly refering to is keywords and description. They are on lines 8 and 9 of the view source for this site.

    I think the value of the meta information is now a lot less than it was 5 years ago, but it does still serve a good SEO purpose. The other major tag though not strictly meta tag is the title tag the words inclosed in the <title></title> in the html.

    The description will mostly be printed as the description when your website is displayed in google and yahoo. It also enables the description and keywords to be used a a weight in the search query.

    Though I still do this, I am not that convinced that google and yahoo consider it that important now adays. I concentrate more on the actual content of the pages, which in the end is what google and yahoo should be measuring.

    http://www.google.co.uk/search?sour...&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GZAZ_en-GBGB261GB261&q=malia

    I am top in google click the link above and note the description in google. and below is my meta tag for that page

    <meta name= "description" content= "GreeceMonkey:- Malia. Crete Malia is one of the wildest resorts in the whole of Greece, it is visited by all of europes young people. With well over 140 clubs and bars, this is not a place to missed for the young and not so young party people.">

    I think if you are going to do the meta tags properly, then I would definalty recommend you do them differently for each page, either manually or using a database.

    Hope that helps a bit, message me back if you want to know any more

    G
     
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    K

    Kay

    Free Member
    Feb 8, 2005
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  • #37
    Aaargh, I'm amazed that people will believe these kind of guarantees. Google could change its algo tomorrow. Nothing is certain. It's simply not true, or ethical, to make promises which you can't keep. Oh, and another thing - if someone advertises a guarantee that you'll be in the top ten, what happens if they get eleven customers?
     
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    W

    wise

  • #39
    One of the best things you can do, and is overlooked by most, is to simply register your business with google maps / directory.

    At this point they let you put in key words which then get tied against your address. We have several companies that appear before the google search results , with a nice address, tel number and map to find your business.

    At this point then you can start to build your links, SEO and content.
     
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    buyfromtheuk

  • #40
    I am near the top for 'great british business directory' but nowhere for 'uk business directory' yet I have used 'UK' more than 'great british' can you make any suggests to keep the 'the great british' ranking but move up on the 'uk' rank?
     
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