Services that claim to get you ranking without making alterations to your page are a bad idea. Services that actually work on "fixing" the content, layout, tags, etc. of your page might be worthwhile if you can't do that yourself. Depending on the size and scop of your projects you may want to consider purchasing or downloading 3rd party tools to help you do it yourself. There is an HTML editor I like a lot for small projects called XsitePro. For projects larger than 50 to 75 pages it bogs down so much it's not worth using. And Yes I have paid for SEO services and was sorely dissappointed. And I won't tell you how much ... but it was substantial enough. They were NOT located offshore; rather california based. I believe the money is better spent on tracking software and targeted well written PPC. If you look at your projects and do not believe they are worth spending PPC money on then they are probably not worth spending on an SEO firm either.
i got low budget for my site. also after i read all advices from other DP users, I decided to do DIY SEOs. and i think i did an OK job. (top 10 in few keywords from abut 2m results, and at about 50th for 30m results XD)
I don't usually buy seo services... instead just do it yourself... write your content focused on keyword phrases and then go out and build some links to the site.
I taught myself SEO and did everything with my own 2 hands. Now I'm #4 for my main keyword. Cost of this for me: $0
Yes but if everyone did it themselves I'd be out of work - Now truth - I actually give away more advice then I get contracts but just a word of advice.. if someone says "I guaranty top 10" then run as fast as you can if your keywords bring up more then 1 mil in competing sites. If they say I can increase traffic and what you do with that is your job. Then you have a honest seo guy. No one knows what "Google the engine" will do not even "Google" the company. I have built sites with exact same methods but with different niches and received great rankings with one overnight and had to burns gallons of midnight oil to keep the others head above water. sometimes the only difference was one was a single key word vs a plural form of the same word. The only thing that separates a good SEO person from a bad one is the good one succeeds more (<- notice more not every time!) and his sites stay in the serps longer when they do take (of course then google changes something SEO can burn any budget! 100 or 100,000,000 per month I look at and advise 6 - 7 client sites a day but only optimize 1 or 2 a month only because most people either want it now or they have such a "pretty" site it couldn't rank for "Chicken Fried Cow Patties" (sorry Mr Moe ) Basic SEO Clean urls, keep relevant pages together and cross linked, use original fresh content , unique titles/page names, and build links. In truth there isn't much more needed on most small sites.
The basic rules is that Guarantees are not a stady in seo .... Companys claiminmg guaranteed stuff are fishy .... And yes if they do it themself i will be out of work olso