Greenlight Search UK Warren Cowan Black hat unethical company posing as a proper Search Firm Clerkenwell "Internet" Internet
As an ex client of this dubious search firm in the UK, I want to put the warning out to any unsuspecting consumer or marketing directors- that this firm uses blackhat techniques in it's approach of marketing companies online. Unfortunately the owner (Warren Cowan) provides little explanation as to why he has had several companies blacklisted by Google and then has the audacity to list them in his case studies!
My company suffered tremendously at the hands of his developers who charged us roughly 15,000 GBP/month only to outsource his linking strategy to India. For thse of you who don't know- outsourcing linking relationships to India is a highly corrupt "black hat SEO technique" underfire with Google. After repeated attempts to salvage what was left of my reputation with Google the only answer I received for my trouble was one month of free service?
I continued my research (after it was clear I wasn't to be compensated for their monumental errors) and managed to interview a few ex-employees of the company. As it turns out, the company continues its policies of bad judgement all the way down to the employees. I heard several instances where employees weren't paid correctly and humiliated by the owners wife (who incidentally is their chief marketing officer). I hear that they drastically pay their people well below industry standards and not on an ongoing basis. This sort of "what have you done for me lately attitude can only lead it's employees to do outlandish and unethical things.
I have since had to rebuild my website entirely from scratch and lose over 9 years of organic rankings at the hands of greenlightsearch.com. Please do what you must to not make the same mistake I did in hiring this firm.
Beebo
Chelsea
United Kingdom
4 Updates & Rebuttals
Alex
Internet,United Kingdom
Employee's views
#5
Fri, September 18, 2009
As a current employee of the company in question I must say that I do not recognise any of the complainant's issues.
The salaries are competitive and the staff treated well. I have not seen any blackhat seo techniques used.
Overall the company strives for quality. I simply do not recognise the company the complainant mentions as the one I work for.
Spaggie
DNS,Europe,
United Kingdom
Not the company I recognise
#5UPDATE EX-employee responds
Mon, September 29, 2008
I am worried that the original reporter has some confusion with the company I worked at for a year and some other company of a similar name.
I do not recognise any of the characteristics or accusations the original poster has made mention of.
In my term at the company my experience is that, the senior management team are incredibly committed to providing an intelligent quality service to their clientbase, something that is indicated by their client retention year on year. I have not encountered this level of determined client service at any other Agency or company I have worker at. This commitment to service is accountable throughout the company.
During my employ, linking was never outsourced to India. I would make no hesitation in either recommending GL to be used by any company or in moving back to being employed by them, it is one of the most forward thinking conscientious I've had the good fortune to spend time at.
In my experience as an ex-company employee who was constantly driven to provide the best possible quality to the clients in my teams portfolio, I find the original report to be false and ignorant. I would go further as to suggest there must be a darker more malicious intent in it's filing.
Red_mud_rookie
London,Europe,
United Kingdom
Former client and competitor responds - Greenlight do not use blackhat techniques
#5Consumer Comment
Mon, July 28, 2008
As a former competitor of Greenlight and more recently as a client, I can reassure anyone reading this Ripoff Report that Greenlight do not use blackhat techniques or anything resembling greyhat either.
The very fact that I went from being a competitor in a former job to a client in a later job should speak volumes.
I do not wish to bring any names into this discussion so if anyone would like to verify who I worked for in both these positions, then I will be happy to give you all the information you want.
In all my dealings with Greenlight the have never come up short on customer service or in-depth knowledge of search and how to implement it effectively without bending any rules.
Ralph
London, UK
Warren Cowan, CEO, Greenlight
London,New York,
United Kingdom
We believe this post to be malicious and untrue
#5REBUTTAL Owner of company
Thu, July 24, 2008
Firstly I am pleased to say that we have had very few client losses over the last year. Out of 50 clients, we have parted with just 5, and some of those departures have been quite amicable. That said, we actually retain one of the best and most distinguished service records in our industry, we're the only agency to guarantee results, and have won more new clients in Europe and the US, and have more page 1 rankings for our clients than any of our competitors.
Our retention and low client turnover, has the added advantage of us knowing exactly who our lost clients are, and the exact circumstances of their relationship, and I can honestly confirm that none of our clients situations or experiences, past or present, conform to this negative and libelous diatribe, and we believe that this supports our conclusion that this post is a fabrication.
The case studies on our website which Beebo claims are so outlandish, have all been sanctioned, co-written, and approved by our clients, and their Public relations teams, so are nothing but true commendable examples of our work.
As for claims of outsourced link building to India, I am not aware of anything in Google's terms that states that a company is not allowed to outsource things, least of all to a growing technological country like India. Surely that would make Google something of a racist no? Anyway, despite that we actually don't do it anyway.
With the exception of a team of developers in Mumbai who we occasionally pay to maintain code for our systems, we have never outsourced a single piece of work or client work, out of the company or country, and all work is done in house.
As for claims of pay issues, all our staff are competitively salaried, bonus'd and most are share option holders too, and our finance team of 4 people have never missed a pay cheque in 6 years, so I feel this claim holds little water.
I'm also surprised that the complainant names me. As the CEO, I have very little exposure to clients on a day to day basis, so I am surprised anyone would know me directly, least of all Alicia our CMO. There are only 4 clients who know her as CMO, none know her as my wife, and no client has met her in the last 12 months since she has been on Maternity leave. (a gorgeous baby boy, thanks for asking )
This leads me to conclude that this post is a disgruntled ex employee. Something again that we have a very few of, and this small group plus the specific nature of the comments, leads me to only one such person that would able to pull this fiction together, who did know me, fell out with me, fell out with our CMO and got a very public dressing down for his bad ideas and disrespectful comments about the CEO and the CMO sleeping together, and was then asked to leave. Only this person could really pull these loose facts into this story.
Now if I have this wrong, and this is indeed a former client, then I would of course invite them to contact me directly. They seem to know an awful lot about me and so they should know I am a very reasonable person, and we have a very long history of serving global brands and delivering results.
If we have let anyone down, I would like a chance to put that right. Although going on the above, I do doubt this is the case in this instance.
If, as a reader of this post, you'd like to know more about Greenlight, I would welcome the opportunity to introduce you to our company, and our many happy clients.
You can visit our website at www.greenlightsearch.com or drop us an email at info@greenlightsearch.com .
Alternatively you are of course welcome to ask around the industry, within which many people will be quite aware of us, and our work, and will happily tell you about us.
Sorry you had to have your time wasted by this libelous diatribe.
Faithfully, to all readers,
Warren Cowan, CEO
Greenlight, 2nd floor, 1 West Smithfield, London, EC1A 9JU
T | +44 (0) 20 7253 7000
F | +44 (0) 20 7101 2899
E | warren.cowan@greenlightsearch.com
Read our blog http://blog.greenlightsearch.com