ok. so.. I churned out a website a few months ago for a relatively local client. At some point, simply as a courtesy, I checked on the status of their SEO for them. Turns out the company in question had been paying an SEO firm in Denver for quite some time now. So, if found it a bit odd that the site only had one useful backlink. Depending on the tool you can find say 20 or so but most links are from random nonsense in China. inurl: or link: basically returns their website and one link lol.... After explaining the word "nothing" to the client for a few days I spent a bit of time with her so she could ask the firm the right questions while they basically fire them. I have been doing this sort of thing for over a decade now but I have never seen a firm say something so incredibly criminal, let alone stupid. In response to "where are the backlinks you are referring to", this was their response... I just thought I would drop that here for everyone's amusement. Happy Friday lol
The business model of these consulting firm is such that consultants do not keep track of the larger code and they tend to focus on their next big fish. Its a job they do.