SEO Success Stories: Doug Heil - a success?
In gathering a list of potential SEO Professionals to profile here on Everything about Search (Marketing) for SEO Success Stories, I use resources like Wikipedia’s Search Engine Optimization Consultants page. I feel like whomever is listed on the page probably has enough respect from her/his peers or many others feel as if they are notable SEO professionals in the SEO Industry. Originally, I found Doug Heil in the Wikipedia.org list, but when revisiting it today for research on this SEO Success Story post, Mr. Heil appeared to be removed.
Conducting further research, I found out why this infamous SEO consultant who’s been around for a while, was removed. Basically, I’ve learned Heil doesn’t stray too far away from controversy. In the SEO 2.0 Blog, author Tad Chef doesn’t mince words and basically decries War against Heil for offending him. Chef basically says Heil is an old dinosaur and that Heil hasn’t updated his theories or methods. On the Web Professor, Scott Horne writes that Heil can’t even rank high for many decent search terms questioning his abilities to truly advise people in the world of search engine marketing. In Threadwatch.org, you can see people banter back and forth about ‘whether he is noteworthy or not.’
This man named Doug Heil runs an SEO consultancy out of South Carolina for over 10 years according to his company’s website IHelpYou.com. He also provides a forum which again seems to be plagued with controversy including arguing between Heil & another heavyweight in the SEO Industry Danny Sullivan (note: you should go to the comments to find the actual thread). According to Compete.com, Heil’s IHelpYou.com is visited by about 12,000 visitors a month. Also, Heil says he works with “osfore” on his website. When searching for that, I noticed this site: http://osfore.com
Doing further research, all I find in contrast to research on Clay, Sullivan and other SEO Sucess Stories are comments on many SEO Blogs by Heil…mostly just criticisms of other peoples’ opinions. My goal in creating this series of posts and profiles was to describe how some of the SEO Players in the industry achieved the status that they have attained over time. As a result, I would have more to say about the success of the SEO Consultant, but I don’t have much to report on Doug Heil except he’s successful in stirring up controversy. Since my efforts online to research more about him have been somewhat unproductive, I’m contemplating writing him directly to see if he might want to do an interview. 
This will be an ongoing (hopefully) series of profiles and the “dirty details” (& sometimes “clean”) of some of the larger people in the Search Engine Marketing or SEO world. I love biographies. To me, I learn from stories of how people become who they are or were. Thus, my digging and exposing of how some of the SEO consultants that are more well known now have become ranked higher than their counterparts.
Tags: Doug Heil, SEO Success Stories
Stumble It!
June 17th, 2008 at 6:25 am
Please take note that we have since then agreed on a “truce”. Mr. Heil likes to speak out on issues, sometimes before a thorough consideration, but it’s up to him.