About 1-2 times a month, Jayde Online, publishers of the popular Site Pro News and owners of Exact Seek push rather hard their service, and a few fall for it as they make some pretty good claims:
- Flat Fee
- Featured Listing
- Low Cost ($3-4 a month)
- Top Ten Exposure
- World Wide Placement
- AdWords Replacement
Yes, you read that right, they advertise as a Google AdWords replacement. The problem is, they don’t really spell out where that placement will be, and the site has been hammered in the last few Google PageRank updates, falling all the way down to a PR3, which is below average quality for a site, and really low for a directory. And unlike AdWords where you can actually GET traffic, the same can’t be said when you use ExactSeek’s service.
How do I know? I tested it.
I tested on dozens of sites. The result? A trickle of traffic and no conversions. And I’m not talking about just sales here, I had no REAL signups for free newsletters or free offers. Oh sure I had lots of “traffic” from automated bots, but those were flushed with my captcha verification.
My advice is spend your time and money somewhere else. This isn’t a good place to be.
Tags: exact seek, jayde online, sitepro news, website traffic
The main reason I started the SEO Revolution was out of frustration. Frustration at all of the lies and misconceptions that are posted in forums, given as advice in teleconferences, and even taught in live workshops. "So why didn't all of this work?" " Why wasn't my site successful?" " Why am I still stuck in a rut?" 
Well I have read all of the posts here and especially the one’s between Jerry West and MS. I will do a little more research before I do anything. I have added our URL to many search engines manually and we did begin to see more hits with less bounces. Thanks for providing this forum.
Thanks for this post. I’m glad it comes up #2 in Google search, right under their ad! I’ve submitted my sites on Jade on the free end, but never really had any traffic from them. I was checking out their offer I received in my inbox, and figured it was not worth the time and money. Thanks again for testing this out and then posting the results.
Fresh. I like where you are coming from.
I agree with Mainostoimis. Since Google is dropping their page rank it might not be worth the chance. However, it could be a low price way to see what keywords work best for a limited time. Is there any low price alternatives that deliver on what they promise?
Well regardless of the warnings here, I figured I would give them a shot because I had a good keyword. On google the keyword “tattoo” gets over 2 million searches a day. So I figured even with a smaller search engine the keyword should still produce some results. Well I was wrong I get about 2 views per day with that keyword on exactseek. and I have the top paid spot for it
Anyhow I would like to see if this little comment works better
My site is a body art related social website.
the url is
http://tattooconnection.us
and if you try exactseek I hope your results turn out better than mine.
take care:
chad
PS
my search engine listing on exactseek will be up for another 3 months if you would like to see the placement vs the 2 views per day, to kinda give you an idea of their search traffic.
just go to exactseek search and type in tattoo you will see my placement, the placement is good so the results of low clicks are either my search terms or their low traffic.
Thanks for the original post and all the follow up comments. This has been really insightful.
I was seriously considering signing up with them, but now I’m seriously not considering signing up with them.
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Work is too serious joke a little!
I actually tried them out and got the same results, not 1 single sign up
There are too many sites offering the world for almost nothing. Thanks for the review save me wasting my time and mostly importantly money and trying to get the debt traffic I need. Anyone know of anything thats legit apart from adwords?
Does anyone know if exact seek go by any other names?
I’ve spent thousands on Google Adwords and received zero return so I could make the same case against them as you do against ExactSeek. My advice – stick with Google – you deserve a monopoly. This is a quote from MS! To me, this person has a serious point. It does appear that Google have been allowed to orchestrated a monopoly, in regards to the internet. And it continues. Mr. Bill Gates was sued and some more stuff, when he attempted the same thing. “Teach the inhabitants to speak our language, and in a short time we will control the environment(world). We will penalize an independent thought or ideas–back links, marketing techniques etc, etc. World Wide Watch out! Google to next Gofer…
Oh! and for the record. I will try exact seek and learn for myself–independently. Because this is still a free market economy…
Again, Google had very well watch out of “Freedom of Speech” violations–restricting certain words to be searched out on the Adwords Tool!! Mind you; these same words, may or may not be used on someones personal website.
You sound like a troll for ExactSeek. There are no comparisons between ExactSeek and AdWords. ExactSeek offers no real traffic. You didn’t make money with AdWords because you either targeted the wrong keywords or your offer sucked.
Yes, True… Getting a dozens of emails from them .. saying an alternate to adwords…. But how can they give us genuine and quality targeted traffic like adwords …. They dont have any source for that it seems….
Thanks.
I’ve never paid for submission to any directory. I firmly believe good quality content is key.
James
I appreciate the heads up! Just saved me $24.95.
Exact Seek might not be the best in terms of quality backlinks, and mind you it most likely appears as an automated script in the eyes of google.
That being said, I am running a few tests on some of my sites in the male enhancement industry, and I’ll let you guys know if any results are yielded.
Thanks for the information. I know a few other sites that tried this and they did not see any benefit. It’s great to get true feedback on these topics.
I’ve used them in the past and it seems like I got about 50 clicks over three months. That was from their statistics. Not sure if they were valid or not. Seems like reviews are mixed.
Thanks for the warning! I was about to try it out, this is the 5th review of them I have come across that reckons it isn’t worth it.
I can’t imagine why someone would bad mouth a company for pushing. I was pushed to order and I’m glad I was, so wahts the problem. We cannot think for ourselves any more?
JB
It isn’t an issue of nothing “thinking for yourself” anymore John, or bad mouthing a company … it is about reporting bad marketing marketing practices. When you compare your service to the traffic Google AdWords can deliver and all you bring in it “bot clicks” someone needs to protect the consumers out there that would fall for the pitch.
Oscar,
According to testing, most of the clicks you receive are “bot clicks” meaning, they aren’t from a real person. The issue isn’t how many “clicks” you receive but how many sales. I have yet to speak to a person who received a sale from advertising on ExactSeek.
Thanks for this article I was just thinking to try that offer. I not use them now.
Thanks for this info sir! I’ve got an email from entireweb promoting their ppc alternative for as low as $3-$4 bucks per month & I’m hooked!
But after a few search & reading online reviews, I must say that I was saved from wasting my money advertising on exactseek after reading your article…Thanks for sharing mate!
Thanks for the info.
I have used quite a few PPC clients, but the best for acutly results is google.
Just the the old sayimg ‘If it’s to good to be true, it usally isn’t true’
Be careful out there
I did try this. I figured for $12 for 3 months there’s not much too lose, but I haven’t seen any increase in sales whatsoever (in 6 months) and am cancelling my subscription before I am charged again. I did notice a few hits from small odd directories, but not enough.
Nearly think of signing up with them.
Thank a lot for this info, crafty little what nots nearly had me – although I would love to know if by signing up with them, would your $12 get you a back link on over 100 sites or am I missing something or would Google see this as spam anyway?
Again thanks for this info, I will do some more research and see what you get for your money.
It was recommended that in the event that I might pass away before DMOZ gives me a listing, I might submit to the above directories. The only significant traffic I have noticed is that of my inbox which needs to be flushed daily.
There is just no substitute for hard graft and good content. I suppose that is the way that it should be. Is there a case for getting these paid links for Ask, Bing or Yahoo? I don’t know.
Bing seems to have no pulse regardless. I would guess that you have to pay them for clicks before they will notice you.
I will say this, I used google for some time I got almost no vsitors an basically no sales but some click were $1.75, I tried exactseek first with poor results too, but then I changed the strategy a tried different keywords not by product or service but for audience and boom I started getting about 50 to a 100 visits daily per keyword, these must be real visitors because I can track the vistit lengths and visitor paths with my tracking software, some visits last for 0 seconds to 2 hours, here a typical day composition 0 to 5 seconsd 70% 6 to 20 seconds 10% 20 seconds to 5 minutes 15% more than 5 minutes 5%, how much it would cost me with google?
What is an easy way to cancel an existing ExactSeek agreement?
Just a wild guess … contact ExactSeek customer service.
Mario,
And how many sales did you make from those visits? My guess is zero.
I just signed for a 3 month stint wish i had found this yesterday. Hmmm
Many thanks for the article – had an email about this today offering 3 months for $12, it sounded too good to be true. Guess it is.
I tried it and I’m getting now about 36 clicks in 6 weeks time. But I seriously doubt the quality of those clicks.
Will have to look into my Google Analytics to find out if the clicks are converting or not.
Thanks for sharing this with use. I was seriously considering using this as one of my paid traffic methods, but will have a rethink now.
I’m not sure it’s a scam but I guess like everyone else they are a business and trying to promote, maybe there’s not enough people using it.
I wish i had come across this site earlier, I have just taken out a susbrition for this package, ah well it s only for 3 months. i will see what happens if i see that it is a scam as you all say it is then i will cancel my subscription through paypal.
Wow, I had a feeling and I’m so glad I found this before I bought their service. Thank You so much!
thanks, I was about to try this service
Thank you very much for publishing the information on exactseek. I thought that was a bot system with lousy traffic, but had to verify it first.
Joe that is so funny… Very true though..
Our organization VitaHound labs operates several sites with the core subject of dog nutrition, for the past three years we have successfully developed a mix of high and low cost PPC type services we utilize do generate orders from our sites. Our marketing team can employ an PPC ad on Google bidding 1.50 for say dog health and generate 1 or 2 orders within 10 clicks with a bounce rate under 35%, this take little effort and results are immediate. Every few months one our marketing people will succumb to the Exact Seek promises and will attempt to get results from their network. The same ad we run on Google will run on Exact Seeks Network using the same key word dog health, because of the low cost we will generate hundreds of referred traffic a month with literally 0 orders and a bounce rate of 70%.
thanks ,you saved me,i was going to pay them today ,and then i found your subject
almost of this kind of websites is scam ,so what is not scam ?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I also got this email and was very hesitant enough to even google this scam.
After reading most of you comments, I too have tried using adwords. The fact is, the pay per click is a very slow way of working your way to the top. If you think about it realistically, how many of us click the sponsored links on the sidebars in Google search? I don’t! I grew to avoid those because I find most are irrelevant to my search keywords.
My suggestion for using adwords, pick one set of keywords. Don’t pick random keywords that are barely even related to your site. It’s a waste of money to have “traffic” come to your website that don’t increase sales or member registrants.
Another option. Got a specific topic? Google that topic forum! Forums are a great way to advertise your products. Take my site “outdoor-fishing.com” for example, you’ll get way more exposure at a better price with an image banner!! Do the math folks and sell your products smart!
Just my 2 cents…
I tried ExactSeek for a simple affiliate promotion site, CashGameContests.com and was quite pleased with the results. If you go to ExactSeek and search “games” or “online games”, my link is listed properly. I have seen it in both the #1 and #2 spot, as well as the #6 and #8 spot. The traffic stream is not tremendous – (about 100/mo for “online games” and about 350/mo for “games”). Conversion rate is better than expected. For $36 a year, its definitely worth trying out.
This article is spot on. You rank #1 on Google for the term exact seek by the way.
Don’t waste your money with exact seek – you’ll get exactly zip from ‘em.