Just as a quick aside...
I was just doing a quick Google search to evaluate some of my SEO changes which I have been mentioning here in this blog.
As part of this, to find some info, I googled my name. Its always a disapointment to come up as the top listing as I have heard it said that this = ubersadness.
Anyway, so I click the first result. It comes up with a page from a guy we used previously for our SEO. His name is Richard Dennison and he runs/works for/owns (I don't really know what he does to be honest as, as it turns out, he talks bollocks) a company called WSi New Media. I'm not going to link to his site as I don't want to give him the time of day.
Before I get really into this I will give some back story.
In the last revision of our site we needed some SEO work doing. I had known Rickard from a previous relationship as he had worked as a business advisor for the (now defunct) Business Link South Yorkshire. He left their employ and became a freelancer under the WSI banner.
So he suggested himself for our SEO work.
As part of this he had suggested that I use a shopping cart style system which he could sell us and maintain. I forget the price but I think it was about £6k. Now a massive ammount of money so I asked for a demo. It was a total piece of shit. So I refused. I should have run a mile right then but as he had offered good advice when working for Business Link and he was doing some consultancy work for then still. I didn't want to upset them, so we decided to have Richard do some SEO work.
Long story short it took about 3 months and then about another 2 months before I could work on the site again following his contractors messing some stuff up (Frontpage Extensions - yeah yeah I know but Microsoft Frontpage was easy for us to start with).
We got the site back up and back in a manageable state. A year after this Richard acts as a consultant for a barcoding project I am doing. In/Out easy as pie. Money in his pocket. Little contact with us. I didn't want any TBH. But the project got done. (We had also doe a switch to Sage Line 200 which he was a consultant on at the initial stages too).
Early this year I had been looking at competitors sites etc. I stumble across a site belonging to a guy who I have had dealings with previously. Another door supplier in Sheffield. I knew of this guy as I had been a whitness in a court case that Sheffield Trading Standards had had against him (or at least this company, maybe not the guy/owner etc.). The case was eventually dismissed as Trading Standards ran out of money from their prosecution budget (the case kept gettign adjourned and they had to keep paying for expert witnesses).
I notice he has a new site and recognise its shitty nature. 'I know this stuff' I say to myself. So looking deeper I see that Richard Dennison's company WSi New Media has built this guy his new site.
WTF springs to mind? I have had a relationship with you for about 6 years, using you as a consultant, a supplier etc? and you give knowledge I have given you about my market to my competitors? How nice.
So anyway, Dennison is out of my professional life from now on.
I hear through the grape vine that his company is struggling. 'No fucking wonder', I think, 'if thats your business plan.'
Next thing. Earlier in the year we launch our new site and I start with the SEO stuff again. The guys at Ardes.com have a meeting with a consultant about SEO. Guess who it is. The feedback I get from their meeting is that 2/3rds of what he was spouting was rubbish. 'I could have saved you your time', I say. I could have told them all about it had I known who they were meeting.
Back to today and finding my name in Google.
In this screencap you will see a quote apparently by me giving WSi very high praise. I never ever said a single word of that stuff. On the same page are a couple of other companies who's directors I know. I have asked them their opinion of their 'quotes' and in both cases I get a 'not me' answer.
My point is this: why does a company have to make up quotes about itself to sell its services? Wel... I think we all know the answer to that.
