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If any professional SEO company claimed that 40% of their clients have been adversely affected by a Google update, then you can be pretty much rest assured they aren't doing things by the book! It really is a tough time for SEO companies at the moment, as they already had a bad reputation as an industry, and stuff like this hardly helps

If I outsourced my SEO, then I assume I'm paying for expert specialist knowledge, that is at all time current, and any techniques or optimising employed is both transparent, and fully above board.

Unfortunately, it seems most of the time, you are simply handed over to the office junior or a $2 per hour overseas worker who can barley speak English, or at least that's my experience

See? That's what happens when you don't have a sacrificial goat. The Google Gods go hungry and take it out on you.

Seriously though, any percentage is not good (IMHO), if any of an SEO company's clients are hit by an update, it just shows that they used shortcuts. There are jobs being done at fiverr, marketing forums loaded to capacity with people selling SEO "products", and most times, its really just not worth the money you pay for it. In most situations, you have these companies outsourcing to these people and it can't always be controlled. Nine times out of ten you're stuck with links in bad neighborhoods, spammy comments placed on blogs and all the money you paid for a quality service has gone down the tubes.

SEO is not an art, its a lot of reading in the beginning and a lot of updating with trends etc. But its something anyone can do if they just follow the right guidelines.

And get a herd of goats... you can never go wrong with those.

Awwwww, I've christened this one Page Rank

I used this company and had a nightmare with them. They did not complete there end of the contract and didn't communicate very well. They didn't take responsibility. They didn't do all the work they said they would do. When I complained the didn't deal with the complaints efficiently or effectively. We had to keep chasing them for responses to issues. They avoided doing the work but were keen to take money. I would never recommend them to anyone.

We have been suckered in by this company too. They have wrecked our Google rankings and charged us