I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, but I got spammed by an SEO consulting company yesterday. I get hundreds of spam emails per day, but this particular email stood out because it was sent by an Australian company based in my own city. A company that should have known better. (I’m tempted to name and shame them, but I really don’t want to give them any link value!)

Since we offer Internet marketing services, seeing this email made me MAD. It’s actions like this that give our industry a bad name. But I’m even more stunned at how DUMB this company is to send out generic emails offering its SEO services. There are so many things wrong with this picture, I couldn’t possibly list them all in this email, but let’s discuss three aspects that should have been obvious:

1. Sending out spam is against the law. I believe sending unsolicited commercial email is illegal in the United States and other countries. It certainly is in Australia, and has been for many years now. As a prospective client: could I really trust a company that so blatantly breaks the law?

2. Sending out spam is wrong from an Internet marketing point of view. It shows disrespect to Internet users and also makes me wonder: what would this company do regarding SEO if I did engage them? What kind of black or grey hat tactics would they use that might jeopardize my business?

3. The email itself was not personally addressed to anyone at our firm, and was a generic offer to provide SEO services. Had the sender bothered to look at our website they would have noticed that we were a COMPETITOR. One operating in the same city and country at that!

Actually, there’s a fourth issue worth mentioning…

4. Out of curiosity I visited the company’s website. The headline read: “Guaranteed Lowest Prices for Web Marketing & SEO”. Now, maybe there is a market for “cheap” web marketing and search engine optimization services. But to me, that’s a bit like a law firm advertising itself with the same line: “Guaranteed Lowest Prices for Legal Advice.”

Um… do you want the cheapest legal advice around… or do you want the best, most cost-effective legal advice that delivers the results you want? The same principle applies to Internet marketing services – especially SEO. Do you want to pay the cheapest prices… or do you want to get the best results for your money?

Cost-effective… value for money… affordable. They’re all terms that may be appropriate. But “Guaranteed Lowest Prices” sounds like their running a discount store. Not the kind of company I would want as my trusted SEO advisor…