UK SEO companies
Update, Joe @ SEM Consultancy has pointed out that I need to update this. Sorry Joe, just don’t have the time.
Bigmouthmedia PR 7 Alexa 22k
David Naylor PR 6 Alexa 8k
Neutralize PR 6 Alexa 70k
Searchengineoptimising PR 6 Alexa 77k
Southbourne PR 6 Alexa 134k
Xseo PR 6 Alexa 300k
Fendigital PR 6 Alexa 351k
Daedal PR 6 Alexa 900k
SEOptimise PR 5 Alexa 64k
Site removed for offering services that give seo a bad name
Refreshmedia PR 5 Alexa 187k
Kruse PR 5 Alexa 228k
Viperchill PR 5 Alexa 233k
Websearchworkshop PR 5 Alexa 236k
Cornishwebservices PR 5 Alexa 266k
Yorganic PR5 Alexa 341
Netbooster PR 5 Alexa 588
Searchengineserious PR 5 Alexa 739
Emarketingservices PR 5 Alexa 1,114k
Broadcaster PR 5 Alexa 1,386k
SEOco PR 4 Alexa 100k
Goseo PR 4 Alexa 144k
Mrweb PR 4 Alexa 211
Ehlonline PR 4 Alexa 400k
BWservices PR 4 Alexa 450k
Koded PR 4 Alexa 463k
Click Detective PR 4 Alexa 720k
Optimiser PR 4 Alexa 744k
UKseo PR 4 Alexa 1,000k+
Bold Internet PR 4 Alexa 400k
Searchenginerankingcompany PR 4 Alexa 980k
Web Spectrum PR 4 Alexa 2,000k
Search Latitude PR 3 Alexa 88k
Fusednation PR 3 Alexa 109k
Search Logic PR 3 Alexa 300k
Eflaunt PR 3 Alexa 400k
Inventatech PR 4 Alexa 904
Beyonder PR 3 Alexa 1,722k
UK-SEO PR 3 Alexa 2,446k
Impact Media PR 3 Alexa 2,000k
Webpageone PR 3 Alexa 2,000k
Greenlightsearch PR 2 Alexa 290k
Professional Internet Consulting PR 2 Alexa 820k
Vertical Leap PR 0 Alexa 99k
Ishirinc PR 0 Alexa 300k
Sites are ranked by PR and Alexa ranking.
Only companies that specialise in search engine optimisation have been listed. Although some exceptions have been made, David Naylor being one.
Search terms used to find these links: uk seo, british search engine optimisation, uk search engine optimisation.
If you know of an individual or business who is not on this list, please let me know in the comments below. I will only add those offering SEO services only, web designers will not be added.
So what does this data mean?
Should you chose an SEO service based only on this data? Of course not. It’s intended as a loose guide to SEO services in the UK at this time. A snapshot if you will.
Should you employ an seo company with a low pr and a low Alexa ranking? Absolutely not. If an SEO company cannot get links, cannot get people to visit their website, it does not bode well for your own chances.
Most web designers offer an SEO service but I would argue this is hardly worth the effort. A teeny bit of SEO may get a few pages cached and allow you to rank for your domain and obscure search terms, but I doubt revenue earning keyword rankings will be aquired.
If you are serious about your online presence, you should employ specialists. The return on investment over a period of a year will easily pay for such services.
PR is a factor of time and a new company may not have time under their belt to rank. But surely they know all they have to do is to buy a high PR domain and 301 redirect to the new domain. Probably only cost a few grand.
If I were to set up an Enterprise Search Engine Optimisation company targeting blue chip clients, I would buy a crusty old domain with a bunch of backlinks for upto ?10,000. It would be the only spend in the marketing budget.
I would also publish a blog that offered useful and relavant information. I would use SEOmoz as a guide. This would encourage incoming links from sites in my sector. Any client scanning the blog would see current information being published that detailed best practice for an SEO service.
Free tools would also be available to the search industry to encourage links, goodwill and prestige. Along the lines of seobook.com and webuildpages.com
I would publish my photo on the website, yes I know that it may scare some people, but a personal image helps people connect. I absolutely would not put generic stock photos anywhere on the site, it shouts out amature.
I would offer linkbaiting and social media optimisation services. Any SEO company who is not current with such practices may not be current with other best practice. At the very least I would partner with any of the new linkbait services popping up and sub-contract them.
Design is important, image is important. The design of the web page is the first thing a client will see, it must be exciting and cutting edge. The site which caught my eye was SEOco, the design stood out from the rest of the crowd and the increased leading in the font made it a lot easier to read. This is a personal judgement and has a lot to do with fashion or percieved value.
The fact is, the lower down the list you go the worse the design gets. And yes I know the design of this site is not tip top, but I’m not pitching myself as an Enterprise level search engine optimiser. At least not at the moment.
Employing an seo consultant is all about return on investment. Will the cash you pay for seo services produce a decent enough return to be worth the effort? This is the question to ask yourself before employing an seo company
======================================================
Update
360 Innovate PR 4 Alexa 1,888,000
Any UK seo company who would like to be added to the Update part simply drop a note in the comments.
February 7th, 2007 at 4:25 pm
Assuming an SEO company is well established (over a year?) what would you suggest the minimum PR you should accept would be?
I’m surprised the PR of companies like Neutralize is so low. I’m a web designer that knows a bit about SEO, but makes no claims to be an expert, and I’ve never really made a concerted effort to raise my page rank – and yet I’ve got a page rank of 5 on portfolio site, Web Design Cornwall, which has only been up for a year.
Neutralize have been up since 1999, I think, and yet they’ve only got PR 6. How is that possible?
February 7th, 2007 at 4:49 pm
I think generally the low pr of the industry is because a seo company is not as linkable to as say an Angelina Jolie Fan site.
Most of the sites not to produce fresh information, which is why I suggest that all SEO companies should have a blog producing interesting and useful articles.
I know some of them appear to producd news, but it’s of the, “yeah so what” variety that does not attract links.
A lot of the sites are more like glossy brochures designed to attract dim witted corporate types. Most of these sites do not even have blogs let alone any social media optimisation element.
SEOmoz and SEObook both run blogs and they are both at PR 7. I wonder if a lot of these companies are scared of giving away the golden goose so to speak. They may think if they give away “free” information no one would pay for their services.
Very short sighted.
SEOmoz and SEObook also indulge in the black art of linkbait, hmmmm and they have a PR7. I wonder if there’s a connection?
Also, the leap from PR 5 to PR 6 is a lot longer than from PR 4 to PR 5. Going from 6 to 7 is an incredible leap and is demonstrable of dominating your industry.
Of course this is all theorising based on my experience as Google does not release much info regarding PR.
It is interesting though, taking a look at enterprise search engine optimisation companies and see that a lot of them are just not up to scratch.
February 8th, 2007 at 9:22 am
Great list Lyndon, I’ve just posted about this on my blog and ruined the good one-way link! :D
One other site which should be listed is Freshegg.
February 8th, 2007 at 2:25 pm
Funnily enough, I just got a call from an SEO company, based in St. Agnes, Cornwall, who (when I checked) had a page rank of 0.
I won’t link to them, but the site is smart-traffic.co.uk.
They’ve been going 6 months and their excuse was that they’d been so busy working on their clients’ websites that they hadn’t had time to optimize their own.
But even the on-page optimization on their site seemed pretty poor.
For example, the title tag was the same on every page and they had the following in the meta keywords tag (give that that won’t have much of an effect anyway).
CONTENT=”get more customers to my website,get more business to my website,increase sales online,smart traffic”
February 8th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
Nice Entry, we are a PR5 with 250k alexa
February 8th, 2007 at 3:50 pm
Yeah I just gave them the once over and maybe they don’t use their website to get clients. I’ve heard that some SEO’s don’t have websites.
I presume a lot of SEO companies get their clients from personally networking, pressing the flesh at Chamber of Commerce Thai Food nights. And of course the cold call. Brrrrr.
February 8th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
“Should you employ an seo company with a low pr and a low Alexa ranking? Absolutely not.”
There are many SEO companies that use their client’s sites to link to their own without the client knowing. Others just spend extraordinary efforts in gaining links to boost their PR. I would rather they spend that time on my site as their client.
Any SEO company worth employing should have a reputation for success. This reputation is not dependant on their website, but the work they do with their clients.
February 8th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
Thanks for your comment Rupert, however I disagree.
To me, a website of an SEO company is part of it’s brand. No matter what of our opinion of PR and Alexa, they are metrics that are freely available to the public.
When that metric is applied to the brand it has an effect.
If you are of the opinion that the list makes absolutely no sense then answer me this. If you could have any of the companies work on your website for free who would it be?
My hunch is that it wont be any of those in the lower half. Personally, I would chose Dave Naylor.
Is it a coincidence that he has a high PR and a high Alexa. Does he spend all his time on beefing up his own ranking, or is he that high because he is bloody good at what he does?
Would you employ a mechanic whose car always broke down?
Or a plumber whose house was always flooded.
I stand by what I said, if you cannot get a good PR and a good Alexa rank for your SEO company, then that reflects on you.
Of course, 50% of SEO companies will be in the lower 50% of any top list, so I would expect 50% of SEO companies on that list to disagree with me.
Have you noticed when people don’t get invited to the party they always say it’s rubbish anyway. :)
February 8th, 2007 at 5:59 pm
You make a very good point. I would be worried if my mechanic had a car that continually failed to work; but I would be equally concerned if my mechanic gave me a second-rate service because he was too busy waxing his own car.
If I could afford Mr Naylor, then he would be my top pick too, but for different reasons. He is a name I know and his reputation preceeds him; his writings have been of great help to me in the past and I know (without resorting to manipulatable statistics) that he is very good at what he does.
It is not a coincidence that David Naylor has a good PageRank, but I doubt he spends much effort in getting it; his PR value is ‘honest’ if you like, in that it comes to him rather than him seeking it out. Some companies on that list take some interesting measures to get the PageRank that they have.
There are a couple of companies in the top five that I wouldn’t touch with a barge-pole. There are also a few companies that I would consider (by reputation) in the bottom 30% or that aren’t listed at all.
I am not saying that these statistics are irrelevant (maybe I should have been clearer); what I am saying is that reputation speaks louder than numbers and that people shouldn’t be put off by an SEO company that doesn’t have the best-ranking website out there. David Naylor has the reputation and the numbers; many others have one but not the other.
February 8th, 2007 at 6:19 pm
Rupert, I pretty much agree with what you say. One should not go on PR and Alexa alone, but put the top half of this list against the bottom half in an SEO contest I know who I would put my money on.
If they are not on the list that only means they were not within the parameters I set. It in no way suggests they are crap SEO, it just means that they are not on the list and nothing else should be infered.
I’m intrigued who you wouldn’t touch with a barge pole. There are some “BIG” companies who I think fit that bill. If you want to tell me msn me at lyndonantcliff at hotmail.com ;)
February 8th, 2007 at 7:15 pm
Thanks for the listening, and praise for the originality of the post, you’ve got yourself a new feed subscriber :)
February 8th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
Isn’t Search Latitude a PR5?
http://livepr.raketforskning.com/?u=www.searchlatitude.com/
February 8th, 2007 at 10:53 pm
It is if you check it on
http://livepr.raketforskning.com/?u=www.searchlatitude.com/
All domains were checked on the same tool, the Google toolbar and the Search Status tool.
These say it’s a PR 3.
For purposes of the test the data produced is a result of the same method.
I leave it to you to interpret the data how you will.
February 10th, 2007 at 8:22 am
Ishirinc PR 0 Alexa 300k> http://www.ishirinc.com/seo/index.asp
is not a UK company
March 19th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
FYI – Vertical Leap has a PR of 5 and not 0. Checked from the Google Toolbar which I believe is what you are using to determine this list?
March 27th, 2007 at 12:17 pm
Thanks Matt, at the time it was giving a 0, shows that you should only trust the little green bar so far.
March 28th, 2007 at 1:14 pm
Are you going to be updating this after PR updates?
March 28th, 2007 at 2:01 pm
I think it would be interesting to expand this list to all UK seo consultants.
I would also like to apply editorial controls and weed out the ones I feel are offering a poor service. I might start a UK SEO directory, but a straight directory would be boring and I am sure has been done elsewhere.
It does mean more work though, megh!
Will someone please design a widget I can add a bunch of urls to and it spits out the PR and Alexa instantly, add backlinks, whois and age and it would be a winner.
I mean it can’t be hard to do, if you are one of those hairy programmer types.
March 28th, 2007 at 4:12 pm
I think us at Site Visibility have been keeping to low a profile!
I definately think there’s room for almost market place of SEO consultants, where there can be a sort of peer review so potential clients can see who the UK industry highly regards and who they think are scamsters a bit like the http://www.whoisagap.com but for SEO.
Well Volunteered though…
April 12th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
Cornwallseo I’m impressed. Well done with your efforts. It’s good to see people at the far end of the country (From Kent) can also participate in the SEO industry.
Personally I wouldn’t get too hung up on Google PageRank or Alexa. In the end its the value of the traffic you generate for your clients that really counts.
April 12th, 2007 at 4:32 pm
I agree, PR and Alexa were only used for this list as they are universally recognised. People can read into it what they want.
Still, I like looking at my own Alexa ranking. Coupled with other data it has its use.
It’s getting to be a cliche, “but Alexa Data can be skewed.” Sure it can, and if you know that you can apply it to your assesment of the data and come out with something useful.
April 27th, 2007 at 8:32 am
These guys are terrible at SEO. All their resource is based in India and they dont have a clue. Beware… be very aware!!!!!
April 27th, 2007 at 8:33 am
Vertical Leap are not a good SEO company at all. They dont even call it SEO! Their Tag says forget SEO, its all about Managed Search Engine Marketing – LOL
May 6th, 2007 at 5:46 pm
Hi,
What’s the chances og having my company added to the list, I noticed that you said web designers will not be added but I have driven the company to offering SEO and SEM as a proper service and our business model is now seeing these ourselves offering seo friendly websites.
Plus over the last 3 months I have worked my butt off to see us gain top ranking for the following keyword phrases:
seo company
uk seo company
seo company scotland
seo evaluation
May 6th, 2007 at 6:35 pm
Well the list followed strict parameters and was part of a test detailed above. However I don’t see why I cant add an update bit.
I keep meaning to get round to building a Directory of SEO, yeah I know, ironic as I have just slagged off old skool directories.
I do have some ideas about giving it a little web 2.0 magic
Paul well done, you are 2nd for seo company in Google UK
May 8th, 2007 at 5:42 am
Hobo (http://www.hobo-web.co.uk/) PR 7 Alexa 201,005
May 8th, 2007 at 11:36 am
Hi Lyndoman,
Thanks for the update – much appreciated – just one more wee tiny thing we have a PR of 5 not 4.
Thanks Again,
Paul
May 26th, 2007 at 7:51 am
Hobo and Paul, the pr was given at the time I performed the test. If I start updating each time there is a change… well, it’s just too much work and I’m just too lazy.
However, I will be doing an update where I will list all UK SEO companies with the updated PR.
People reading this post should realise the data is out of date.
June 3rd, 2007 at 10:42 pm
[...] companies offering an SEO service in the UK. I have taken a stab at this before with this list of SEO companies, based on specific search [...]
June 5th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Just starting up in the business and learning as fast as we can. We would be grateful if you could add us to your list, cheers David
June 12th, 2007 at 12:08 pm
Datadial – PR6 – http://www.datadial.net
Just to join in the discussion – I certainly wouldn’t base a decision to hire an SEO company based on their PR/Alexa ranking etc.
If you’re looking to hire an SEO ask for the ranking of current clients, and call the clients up to make sure they’re happy and that they were delivered what they were promised. Any company with nothing to hide will be quite happy to hand out a couple of current client numbers (with their approval of course!)
July 5th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
E-Gain Online Marketing – PR4 – http://www.e-gain.co.uk
Got to agree with Matt, regarding his point on hiring an SEO company based on their Alexa ranking.
Word of mouth in my opinion is one of the best ways of generating business, outside of online sources, as well as thorough evaluation of practises, reviews etc.
July 7th, 2007 at 4:54 pm
When looking for an SEO company don’t be fooled by a companys guarantee of top placements. We did, and it hurt!
Finally found http://www.webpresence.tv, would reccomend them. Just very honest, unlike others we have tried
July 7th, 2007 at 4:57 pm
The link above isn’t working, try http://www.webpresence.tv
July 13th, 2007 at 5:51 pm
Hi, is it possible to Add Webpresence (www.webpresence.tv) to the SEO company list?
We are a UK based SEO specialists.
Many thanks in advance, Lee
July 16th, 2007 at 2:43 am
Also have Hobo Web (http://www.hobo-web.co.uk) to add to the list – PR7.
Scott :)
July 19th, 2007 at 6:35 am
Our SEO training services can be provided to groups ranging from one or two key staff to hundreds depending on the timeframe and the level of specific.
Also i have : http://www.websitedevelopmentcompany7.com
August 10th, 2007 at 1:09 am
You could add me :)
http://www.digeratimarketing.co.uk
August 10th, 2007 at 7:16 am
Ok, will add everyone soon. I’m actually going to be doing something a little different, hence the delay.
August 10th, 2007 at 11:31 pm
We’re a web design company that specialise in SEO, what’s the problem with web companies? All our staff (including programmers, copywriters and project managers) Go to at least one SES event per year and have to attend training sessions in SEO on a weekly basis. Our SEO is therefore joined up from the coding to the copy writing to the business model. It’s worked really well on our own companies products, giving us loads of visitors that convert into customers (not just those that are “driven” there). Our website isn’t particularly well optimised because we don’t have the time or the inclination to get up there for SEO just so other SEO companies can check us out and try to leapfrog us. We get almost all of our business from referrals by people who’ve made a lot of money out of us.
I know what you’re saying about SEO firms needing to get a high PR and all that but I would argue that these firms are more interested in their own ego’s rather than their clients needs
August 10th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
PS Our site is IceBlue.co.uk (blatant hypocritical attempt to squeeze a link in!)
August 10th, 2007 at 11:37 pm
PPS. Have made a little competition on my blog http://www.icebluemd.co.uk/seoblog.html to sort the men from the boys in the UK SEO industry!!
Just a little bit of fun, winner will be decided on 1st December 2007
August 14th, 2007 at 9:06 am
Nice post. Nice to be able to see the majority of UK SEO firms on one page – good job.
PR and Alexa ranks are indicative of how well ranked an SEO firm is but, the true test is to run is a SERP report for the companies listed. There’s not much point in having a high PR if you don’t list on page-1 of Google for your services.
See – BigMouthMedia – the reason they do well in business is because they rank well for phrases like ‘search engine marketing’ and ‘online marketing agency.’ Punters that need SEO don’t necessarily type ‘SEO’ into a search engine….
…..think about it….. & optimise your web business to what your prospects are after. It works for us.
August 27th, 2007 at 4:09 pm
Am away to build myself a wee tool to produce these lists for market competition for search phrases. Just need to go and mash up some existing tools I had but never use. Great idea
September 26th, 2007 at 6:05 pm
[...] UK SEO companies [...]
October 30th, 2007 at 12:00 pm
Hey Lyndon,
Hope you’re doing well. Perhaps you could add us when you get a mo? It’s http://www.rapidblue.co.uk :-)
November 9th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
Hi we are a dedicated seo company based in Norwich, could you add us to your directory please http://www.affinityi-marketing.com
Many thanks
Melissa
November 9th, 2007 at 4:39 pm
Could we please be added to your directory as we specialise in search engine optimisation.
November 10th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
Hi Lyndon, here is another UK SEO Consultancy. If you could add us to the list it would be much aprpeciated. Thanks Gary.
December 9th, 2007 at 2:07 pm
For UK SEO law firm our website is about search engine international service at http://www.webandrank.com not list yet…….. thank you for your time.
cheers
December 11th, 2007 at 8:48 am
I wish people would stop getting hung up on page rank. I work with an SEO agency Knowallmedia, both our page ranks fluctuate between PR4 and Pr5. The fluctuation makes absolutely no difference to our actual page rankings and traffic.
Knowallmedia have a server that has been hosting websites since 1998 (Colbalt blue thing). Its IP address has never change. Just hosting any website on the server automatically (within 3 months) gives it a page rank of 2.
Its my opinion that Google started Pr as a serious way of ranking websites and then had to alter course as blogging took off to such a large way that it had to rethink the whole process of judging a website by links to
January 15th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
That is a great list. I would have to agree with you about the original purpose of PR.
March 15th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
Hi there,
Some very interesting comments on here. We also would like to be added to your SEO list.
Thanks very much,
Judith
owner/seo & internet marketing specialist
April 15th, 2008 at 10:00 am
Thanks for the list. We are looking an seo company and have talked to a few on the list who didnt mention that their ranking was so low!
May 29th, 2008 at 11:54 pm
What if an SEO company have a low Pagerank but have managed to get extremely high pagerank for their clients.
Also how important should pagerank really be as a measure of SEO success?
We are a web design company offering web design and SEO services for msll businesses. Our domain name is fairly new, about 7 months old so we only have a pagerank of 3 to 4 for our website pages. Considering our domain name is fairly new and we have not yet received a DMOZ listing, will our pagerank of 3 really be a measureof our true abilities?
Inspite of our page rank we have page1 rank in bit Google and Yahpp searches for about 4 or 5 keyword phrases and receive on an average 3 clients a month purely fro, Google searches.
As we only have a page rank of 3, does this still imply that we lack SEO skills?
August 2nd, 2008 at 1:29 pm
I think with the current trend of constantly changing the goal posts when it comes to the google pr system doesnt help with seo efforts.
August 4th, 2008 at 6:20 am
Then id think they are making themselves a good amount of money and portfolio :P
PR is not an accurate measure of a companys success, as they may have other sources such as word of mouth etc.
September 29th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
Gravytrain specialises in working with companies that are in need of strategic planning, enhanced user experience web design, Search Engine Optimisation, measurable online marketing and advertising activities and efficient e-business performance.
January 7th, 2009 at 8:37 am
Mindurge, a leading interactive media agency providing advanced services for Search Engine Marketing, Strategic Planning, Ecommerce Consulting, Web Programming.