SEO Worldwide SEO Worldwide, SEO Marketing, Internet Marketing Internet

Here is a detailed account of our encounter with SEO Worldwide of Cheyenne Wyoming. On May 5th of 2011 this company
contacted our home business. The individual, Mark, stated that SEO Worldwide was able to promote our business by using code language, keywords etc. so that it would appear as the first ranking on Google search for any number of search
terms. Mark spent nearly two hours on the phone with my husband while I was at work convincing him that if he paid $3,000 that my husband’s website would shoot up to the first website listed for a whole host of various related search terms. My husband believed all of this and told Mark that he was interested but needed to discuss this with me first. Mark told my husband that the only way that he could work with him is by taking his credit card number to reserve this number one spot on Google otherwise he was going to continue his calls to other similar businesses in our area and offer the same services to them and thus my husband would loose his opportunity. My husband agreed. Mark said he would send him the credit card authorization which would “reserve” SEO’s services as well as a second document with the our businesses website and log in information, which would be required in advance in order to complete the services they claimed to be able to do. For example, according to SEO they required our website login information so they could enter all of their code that would allow users to find us using a list of related keyword searched. 

Mark sent him a document requesting a great deal of information regarding our company and business website as well as a credit card authorization form which had the amount of $1,999 and $999 on it. These are important numbers to note as $2,999 and $1,999 are the daily and individual purchase limits for most consumer credit cards which do not require the creditor to call the card holder and verify the purchase. The authorization didn’t include ANY terms of service. It was simply a single page of text that outlined the company’s name and address, my husband’s name and address, and a statement that my husband was authorizing payment and that the payment was non-refundable.

Of course not included on either document was any statement detailing the verbal agreement that Mark made with my husband over the phone that this credit card information was being given to them merely to “reserve” my husband’s
number one spot on Google. My husband completed the credit card authorization form but didn’t complete or return the other document.

When I returned home that evening my husband explained this new business venture to me. First I cried, then I tried to explain to him how Google works and that you cannot simply “buy” the top spot on Google and that no SEO company can make it happen for you either. He still didn’t believe me so I went to the BBB website. I read him the complaints and found a couple others on other websites as well. Then we called our credit card company and found out that…SURPRISE…SEO Worldwide had already put the charge through. We immediately denied the charges and our credit card company put a temporary hold on the charges until the credit card company completed an investigation into the matter.

My husband then called SEO and told them that he didn’t want to work with them based on the complaints lodged with the BBB. Mark told my husband that he couldn’t cancel and that the payment was non-refundable. After 30 minutes or so of being transferred from one person in their office to another being told that he couldn’t cancel and that they could sue my husband, have him arrested etc., my husband finally just hung up the phone.

The next day we provided our creditor the credit card authorization, e-mails, and a letter detailing the phone call. We emphasized that SEO hadn’t provided any service as we canceled our agreement before they had the opportunity to do so. Also, we noted that we never completed the document giving them the information necessary to complete their service.

However, a month later we received a packet of evidence that SEO had provided our creditor that they had completed service. This is the most egregious and offensive part of the whole matter. SEO simply Googgled our company, print screened
everything they found and claimed credit for it. They provided print screens of our website, Google listings, online advertising listings etc. All things we had running for years at this point, many of which we were paying to keep up on the internet at the time we received this packet from our creditor. We explained this to our creditor, won our case and our creditor declined payment to SEO.

We receive calls from SEO to this day. Each time, it is one of two women, calling from numbers that appear as “blocked” on our caller ID.

The same woman will call using a different name multiple times a month. They continue to threaten to sue us. We have logged complaints with the Wyoming Attorney General’s office and the BBB but neither will do anything because the fraud
wasn’t fully propagated.  If you would like to contact me directly because you are dealing with SEO, leave a message
here. If you work for SEO and want to engage me in some silly argument, don’t bother.