Saw a client go from 200 visitors a month to 4,000 in 6 months. Pure SEO or just lucky?

I've got two clients in Portland. Same industry, same city. One did the whole white hat thing - blog posts, backlinks, the works. Took a year to see any real movement. The other one just paid for some shady PBN links and was ranking in 3 weeks flat. Both got hit with updates eventually but the PBN guy made bank before it crashed. Which approach actually wins in the long run? Has anyone seen a clean SEO strategy beat the fast lane for real?

3 comments

3 Comments

rowan_ross15d ago

White hat took a year" - buddy of mine did the slow road and it still works years later.

finley_roberts2715d ago

Why'd it take him so long?

milalewis14d ago

oh come on, a year for white hat SEO? that's basically admitting you were doing it wrong for 11 months and finally figured it out in month 12. i've seen people slap together a half-decent site with basic on-page stuff and some decent content and rank fine in like 3-6 months. the whole "slow road lasts forever" thing sounds like cope to me. google changes its algo like every other week now, so nothing really "lasts" that long anyway. your buddy probably just got lucky with a niche that nobody else cares about.