I have clients and potential clients email me all the time after they receive emails from people saying, “Your site isn’t doing well in the search engines, here is an example…”.

Well, let’s review an example. Let’s say there is a boat and jet ski rental business in Daytona Beach, FL and they show up on the first page of Google, Yahoo and MSN for:

• Daytona Beach boat rental
• Daytona Beach boat rentals
• Daytona Beach jet ski rental
• Daytona Beach jet ski rentals
• boat rentals Daytona Beach
• jet ski rental Daytona Beach    (I could come up with more, but I think you get the picture)

So, this business is doing well with their keyword phrases in the SERPS, but they get an email saying, “I looked at your site and your site is not showing up for “Florida Boat Rentals” or “Orlando Jet Ski Rentals – Hire an effective SEO company!”. Well, I am sure if those terms were not in the optimization plan your site won’t show up for that, but I must ask, why would they be in the plan? I live in Florida and I don’t know anyone that looks for a boat rental anywhere in Florida. They look in their local area. I live in Sarasota, if I wanted to rent a boat I wouldn’t look in Tampa or Orlando! I would look in the Sarasota, Bradenton, Venice area.

My point is, when you get these emails saying you aren’t showing up for a phrase think about if it is a term that will really matter to your business. If someone wanted to ride a jet ski in Orlando I doubt a Daytona Beach business would be their first choice.

Don’t Be Fooled!

If you agree with the email please email it to your SEO provider and ask them about your concerns, but keep in mind that often these emails are meant to deceive.

Melissa – SEO Aware – Sarasota