Customers are Winkers

[dashu1]

God I need a good moan.

Title says it all really.

After another winker who didn't pay their bills and is now playing silly buggers I've got another.

We worked on his site for about 2 years, he's been no.1 in Google for well over 12 months, we've tripled his conversion rates and probably more than quadrupled his traffic, worked on a shoestring, and even done work for free.

He has been a nightmare and rarely ever paid his bills on time, and in fact hasn't paid for ages.

So I made the decision - no pay no work.

His site has dropped like a brick since we stopped working on it and now - after all of the good will and working for next to nothing (and actually for nothing at times), and him owing us a small fortune - he's asking for all the money he's ever spent with us back - or else.

His site has serious issues post Panda/penguin/some black and white animal, which he's failed to rectify any of it despite numerous warnings.

WHAT A WINKER!

Anyway, I've told him to fook off.

The moral of the story, if there is one, is DO NOT do things for free or try to be nice to customers whatever they claim, because you will not get it reciprocated back the other way.

They're WINKERS the lot of em (well not really but I'm feeling a bit Alf Garnett).

I'm seriously thinking of trying and if it works adopting the old build links to site X that you set up and own, and then redirect that to the clients site for future SEO.

Then if they don't pay just unhook the 301 and let them go down like a lead balloon.

I'm off to watch t'Walking Dead now.

End of rant.

Sorry.

Bye.

 

[OhNoNotHim]

"We stopped working - It dropped like a stone"

Not really a great testimony for an SEO company.

 

[D600]

Like your idea of the 301 redirect.

Customers think that these days every seo company guarantee results and will moan if google does something to their rankings. Just need to be clear when making your offering to customers so they understand what you are offering and don't promise things which are out of your control, not saying you have btw

 

[roweash3]

I completely agree that being nice to customers (or people in business) gets you nowhere. Nice guys finish last. I am currently in a similar situation...

(I hope you don't mind me using your thread to write my own story haha)

I used to work as a web developer for a small company (2 other people), but over the Christmas period I was told that they couldn't keep me on for financial reasons (which is fair enough). I started working as a freelancer for them, on the basis that they would find me the customers, go to all the meetings, and collect the payments, and I would just stay at home and do any website work they had, on a project-by-project basis.

I was working for another company (25 hours a week), working as a freelancer for myself, and also doing this (with my old company) on the side.

Last month, my own work was picking up, and I decided I didn't really have time to do it all, so I told my old boss in a nice way that I just couldn't do it anymore. Little did I know the other developer (my replacement) had also recently left...

My old boss doesn't have the skills to do the websites himself - so he stupidly went onto one of these '1&1 Easy Web Builder' websites that you see on the TV adverts, and inadvertently overwritten all the work that I'd done on his personal website...

He asked me to get it back, but wasn't willing to pay for my services, so I said I couldn't do it for free. He's now demanding wages (from last year) that he paid me to be returned, threatening law suits, etc... It's kind of ridiculous really.

 

[JMOT]

Nobody drops like a stone when you stop doing SEO. It takes time.

What causes you to drop like a stone is tripping one of Googles filters. However thats neither really yours or your clients fault in reality... its just Google screwing you up.

It is however testament to the fact that SEO is now a shit business. Client & agency side.

 

[D600]

Roweash good luck to your old boss cos he won't get far by the sounds of it!

 

[roweash3]

Roweash good luck to your old boss cos he won't get far by the sounds of it!

Haha I know. I don't think he's stupid enough to really try with the law suits and such, I've already received some free advise from an employment solicitor. He's just trying a few scare tactics.

 

[dashu1]

Nobody drops like a stone when you stop doing SEO. It takes time.

What causes you to drop like a stone is tripping one of Googles filters. However thats neither really yours or your clients fault in reality... its just Google screwing you up.

It is however testament to the fact that SEO is now a shit business. Client & agency side.

I agree it's not easy, the game has definitely changed.

To clarify, we stopped working on it, then a month or so later Googles update hit, his site wobbled a bit at that point but that was it.

The first drop was only initially a drop from from top 3 on page 1 to the bottom half of page 1.

About a month later it dropped to the top of page 2.

Then a few weeks later to the bottom half of page 2.

A couple weeks later it slid onto page 3, now it's completely disappeared by the look of it for his keywords.

One of the problems with his site is that he's trying to rank for various keywords for every town in the UK for his products - so you have thousands of pages on the site that are identical except the name of the town is different.

So you have pages called: Keyword 1 Aberdeen, Keyword 1 Bradford, etc

Then Keyword 2 Aberdeen, Keyword 2 Bradford, etc.

Then he's got the same thing but the brand name is different:

Brand 1 Aberdeen, Brand 2 Aberdeen, etc.

If you took those hundreds of pages off it'd probably remove 97% of the site.

Also it transpires he's been going through the site changing the meta titles, etc, jamming them full of lists of keywords to try and rank for them all without telling us, but according to him that's our fault because we didn't spot that he was doing it!

Sounds a bit like Roweash3's boss!!

 

[kate-brownhill]

Nobody drops like a stone when you stop doing SEO. It takes time.

funny you should say that. About 4 months go, we experimented with a new sales tactic. The idea was simple. Find 10 local companies that could really do with some basic seo. Send them an email with their current position for a well searched term for their niche. And tell them that we are going to show them what we can do for them for no cost whatsoever. If, after we get their term to number 1 they still not interested, we simply remove the links we built for them. (easily done). Anyway, one accountancy firm reached number one from our work (no other seo work on the site at all) and after receiving no replies to any of our emails, we removed the links. majestic confirms tha there are no more links pointing to the site anymore but 4 months later he is still rankin number 1. Git. Keep in mind that he was not in the top 1000 for the term before we started.

 

[Edwin]

funny you should say that. About 4 months go, we experimented with a new sales tactic. The idea was simple. Find 10 local companies that could really do with some basic seo. Send them an email with their current position for a well searched term for their niche. And tell them that we are going to show them what we can do for them for no cost whatsoever. If, after we get their term to number 1 they still not interested, we simply remove the links we built for them. (easily done). Anyway, one accountancy firm reached number one from our work (no other seo work on the site at all) and after receiving no replies to any of our emails, we removed the links. majestic confirms tha there are no more links pointing to the site anymore but 4 months later he is still rankin number 1. Git. Keep in mind that he was not in the top 1000 for the term before we started.

If they never agreed to the links being built in the first place (i.e. you received zero response to any emails) then that's basically negative SEO (build some incoming links, then take them all down in one fell swoop) which I would have thought was a very dangerous practice for you to be getting into.

On the other hand, if they agreed to the "no success no fee" deal and you went ahead and built the links, that's a completely different story. But if you acted without their permission it potentially amounts to sabotage by SEO.

 

[cc976a]

There is another side - excellent customer service and going that extra mile is the reputation needed to build a business.

There will always be your timewasters and I'd recommend getting rid of them. They will take up too much unnecessary time and not do your business any good.

It's best to set up T&C on any contract that makes it clear the terms, responsibility and payment agreement.

I had problems with a company that went in to administration just before completion of site and lost around £1k - I always collect % values and initial deposit so had already collected 80% of the value. I could have lost lots more, important to take deposits (to denote seriousness and ability to pay) plus regular payments in indtallments for such services to ensure you minimize your risks

 

[kate-brownhill]

No, they agreed in advance although the reply we received was literally one sentence confirmation so we should have guessed it was a waste of time. Sending a company an email to tell them you are going to ‘influence’ their site without waiting for any confirmation opens you up to a world of legal trouble if anything ever goes wrong. However, they did go quiet after the positions were achieved so we were well within our rights to remove the work carried out. This was clearly laid out in the original email.

 

[retired_member33]

There are some great customers out there as well!

I recently sold a domain to a bagpiper and he has offered me tickets to a few rugby games including the Heineken cup final

True gentleman, send the cheque including an accompanying letter, very oldskool.

 

[dashu1]

There is another side - excellent customer service and going that extra mile is the reputation needed to build a business.

There will always be your timewasters and I'd recommend getting rid of them. They will take up too much unnecessary time and not do your business any good.

It's best to set up T&C on any contract that makes it clear the terms, responsibility and payment agreement.

I had problems with a company that went in to administration just before completion of site and lost around £1k - I always collect % values and initial deposit so had already collected 80% of the value. I could have lost lots more, important to take deposits (to denote seriousness and ability to pay) plus regular payments in indtallments for such services to ensure you minimize your risks

This is a good point, the wife had been telling me for ages to dump him because he was a pain in the arse - on the phone at least twice a week, emails every other day, and the annoying thing was he kept asking the same things over and over again and never actually implementing what we told him.

Almost like he'd keep asking the questions til he got the answer he wanted to hear.

Our great clients we've had for ages never contact us, they just let us get on with it - I guess they know that since they're at the top it's all going as it should be.

Anyway, the idea of getting money up front is a great idea if they'll go for it, but I guess the good guys are worried about the boot being on the other foot - they pay up front and get nothing.

I heard a great story from a lady at the bank who was trying to sell me a credit rating system, which i didn't buy into.

She said a painter and decorator used it to check the credit rating of companies who asked for work doing.

If they had poor credit ratings then he figured they had come to him because no one else would touch them.

He doubled his usual quote for the work and asked for 50% up front, then if they didn't pay the other half it didn't matter, he'd been paid what he wanted already, if they did pay it then he's quids in.

I thought this was a genius idea for anyone, let alone a painter!

 

[namealot]

Building a customer relationship has nothing to do with working for free and it’s a recipe for disaster it devalues your worth, confuses the boundaries between billable and non billable, They don’t tend to listen will ask the same questions until they get the answer they want it cost them nothing ? … You’ll get into the habit of agreeing or not giving there questions real thought just to get them out of the office, off the phone etc, This also effects other paying clients there not getting your attention etc. It makes you look unprofessional.

With clients that can’t afford or are going to be a pain with payment (If you can’t screw it down in the contract then try discounts for early payments) the charging them a hefty upfront smacks of desperation, makes the likely hood of ever finishing a project slim, stunts the potential of your business to grow (no one ever see’s your finished works) makes recommendations and repeat business unlikely so always having to hunt even harder for new clients.
In a first initial contact with a client your often not able to charge that’s when you should get the question that you need or want answered and the signature on the contract then the rest naturally follows… Devout time out of the meeting for that if its and hour then 15 20 mins (You’ll have plenty of time to answer all there question etc when its billable? ) It is a fine balance you don’t want to look like you’re just after there money but also you don’t want to sit down and answer all there questions for free and they end up not using you…


I'd say the key part is a good contract too start...