http://thehodge.co.uk/2013/03/11/seo-scumbags/
I saw this on Hacker News a while ago and it’s a viewpoint I tend to agree with, having witnessed a lot of shysters who think they “know SEO” come into small businesses and promote their business by spamming blog posts and forums.
I hear you.
I find it incredibly annoying when I hear from clients, who are requesting ftp access for some dodgy seo company, because they’ve been drawn in by some cold-calling snake-oil salesmen who need to ‘optimize meta tags’ or other such BS on a site that is perfectly constructed already…
To save repeating myself warning about these dodgy SEO companies, I’m in the process of creating a guide website that explains in plain English to non-technical web site owners how to avoid these cowboys, what the warning signs are to look for with these companies and how to tell the difference between ethical SEO activity and scam SEO.