“Our Work Is Proprietary”
Some SEO companies will try to convince you that the services they provide are super-secret and proprietary and will try to assign copyrights to the work they perform for you. If you have read anything Google has to say about search engine optimization, you know there are no super-secret methodologies to ranking websites. Google is very straight forward and open about what makes a website rank well.
The reason an SEO company may try to obtain copyrights to their work is primarily because they may want to keep you over a barrel if you ever try to leave them. That means they will try to strip your website of all the work they have performed over the term of your contract and you will be back to square one.
Depending on what state your SEO company is based in, you may have limited recourse if they try to pull a fast one on you. As you may know, some states are notorious for attracting scammy companies because of lax laws. <cough – Utah – cough> Some states prohibit the assignment of copyrights from the original author to a client under ‘Work for Hire” agreements unless you purchase workers compensation and unemployment insurance prior to any work being done. (Google “California Labor Code 3351.5(c)” for a perfect example of this.)
Over the past few months we have provided many examples of scams that occur in the SEO industry to help educate you on what to watch out for when hiring a reputable SEO company. Now it is time to show you the other side of the coin: what exactly should be done by my SEO company? Stay tuned!
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