If an SEO company guarantees a consumer with a 'specific' position then that is just simply BS. No SEO company can do that unless they're in ties with Google. While some of them can actually do such, that is most likely coincidental. Word to the wise: Learn to do SEO yourself and you'll save lots of time in spending lots of money from SEO companies.
Yes obviously some smart SEOers have got the right way to get the keyword ranking done within that period. I seen myself for one such keyword which was having tremendous amount of competition, but it was on the first page within couple of months. The secret is behind the way you do your optimization and submission to various directories
Depends on the person really. Would you do some SEO yourself the hard way? That would obviously waste a lot of time thus, learning SEO yourself is best if you want to do it the optimal way.
I would say that no one can actually give you guaranteed rankings because its totally in the hands of Google Google don't even share its algorithm with anyone, 'Guaranteed ranking' is more of a hard-coded sales pitch It needs a lot of time + patience + hard work to learn and do search engine optimization but again its worth learning it
These are just marketing promotional. They always have some hidden conditions and may be can use some non-ethical way which is known as the Black hat SEO. So I wouldn't suggest to go for them personally.
That's simply a BS affirmation But most SEO Companies/Seo freelancers are full of BS Such thing doesn't exist
If they are going to use only white methods, then it is not possible to guarantee such things. With SEO it is rather difficult to make very specific predictions. I know some companies charge you only after you see the promised result. That seems to be honest, however such companies can miss half the revenue (if they use white methods only) ...