Some companies and how they operate simply amaze me… buyer beware!

Author: James Sharp – Glendale Designs

Over the years we have had thousands of meetings with present & potential customers. Within every industry you can run across a supplier that just doesn’t have the experience or knowledge to perform a service. However, they continue to sell a service that in the end can really have a negative impact. It appears that with the market changing, we are running across more customers that have been lured into an agreement that would make your jaw drop. Web Design and Search Engine Optimization (SEO), seems to have its fair share of these suppliers, this is why we decided to provide you with a buyer beware article and let you make your own opinion on selecting a reputable company.

We met with a prospective customer whom had a web site designed using a content management system, where they would be able to update information within their site on a regular basis. We were approached by one of their employees that had concerns on what their supplier provided them with thus far, and what direction they were going in. But the main reason why they wanted us to meet with them was to Optimize their web site (SEO) and improve their rankings organically.

Prior to our meeting we were granted FTP access as well as access to their control panel. This is not an uncommon request; it is sort of like taking your car into a shop where they have to look under the hood of the car to determine what is wrong with it. Many times a customer will provide a temporary login and then change it later for security reasons. While viewing their site we were able to see the construction of the site, what was present and where they needed improvements as well as the shopping carts present capability and what functionality needed to be incorporated to assist with better search engine placement.

While in the meeting with the president of the company and a staff member, we presented an outline of our services and how we could assist them on improving their organic ranking. From the sounds of it, there were some major discrepancies between what they thought they received and what was actually provided to them. As with many customers, they just don’t understand the techno mumbo jumbo, so she handed us the agreement from their present supplier and started asking questions on what they received and didn’t . After briefly reading through it and logging into the admin control panel, we were able to provide them answers to many of their questions. Unfortunately, what they received was not what was committed to.

The so called custom shopping cart was nothing special, to a point where this supplier used either a $199 or $499 cart (depending on the version) and made minor changes. The so called additional functionality that this supplier was trying to sell them for an additional four figure amount was already in the cart.

To put the icing on the cake, they were being charged $480 a month for hosting their site. This was not a dedicated server, which they by no means needed, but rather a straight forward PHP project that didn’t require any special criteria for hosting. For that matter, they could have this hosted elsewhere for roughly $25 a month.

This was an eye opening, jaw dropping experience for them to say the least.