I mentioned this in a post some time ago but for those wanting to learn SEO the proper way from a master, I am three weeks into a course from Freshbananas.co.uk and I am really impressed.
Ray Field, who wrote the course, did a lot of work on two of our sites in 2012 and 2013. We have had the usual problems with SEO companies in the past - being charged week after week for site optimization, link work, etc., only to discover much later that Google penalized us heavily because of the way the work was done. So, we were pretty anxious when Ray started, especially as, at £450 per day, plus the cost of new links, plus the cost of disavowing hundreds of links to keep Google happy, it was the most we have ever spent on just about anything!
After just two or three days our sites started to rise up the ranks for some keywords, and after a couple of weeks business was really on the up. Many keywords on the first page of Google and a few at the number one spot, one of which is still hovering between position one and two 12 months later and is still bringing in lots of sales.
So, three weeks into the course, which costs £250, and our newest site is doing really well. I don't know if it will do as well as the previous two sites but at a cost of £250, compared to around £35,000, it looks promising.
I can't stress how good this course is, it's cheap, it is aimed at the layperson and it is also highly recommended by many people on ukbusinessforums.co.uk. Forgive me if this is too much like advertising but I get nothing for it and it really is too good to miss.