Should I refund this client? Opinions needed.
 

Last week I was contacted via Skype by someone from GFY who was interested in getting reviews written for major paysites. It was an order of less than a dozen reviews on major destinations, such as Brazzers, Digital Playground and Twistys. I told the client that I would have them to him by Friday and delivered them on Friday. The reviews were 500 words and he asked for additional screenshots from inside.

The client paid me on Friday when I delivered the reviews and thanked me. This afternoon, I logged onto Skype and was told by the client that Yoast was reporting negatively with regard to my text, suggesting that it had certain issues. These issues were:

• 52.2% of sentences containing more than 20 words,
• Subheading followed by more than 300 words,
• 11.7% sentences containing more passive voice than recommended,
• Readability being 59.6 on the Flesch Reading Ease test.

I explained to the client that readability within the Yoast tool set isn't always a great way to determine whether or not a review is written well, and that things such as readability levels are mainly to ensure that text can be understood by people who are still developing (i.e. people under the age of 18). I also cited two blog posts from independent services that suggested Yoast's SEO readability guidelines had issues and shouldn't be taken as the be-all and end-all of content writing. Here is source one and here is source two.

Additionally, I went ahead and performed a small test on sites that ranked #1-#5 for a specific paysite + review as the keyword (such as 'Brazzers review'), and found that Yoast also had issues with these texts as well. Here is a screenshot that I sent to the client to confirm these results:

https://i.imgur.com/JLiR2rY.png

So in essence, my argument is that even IF Yoast is complaining about my text in particular, it's also complaining about hundreds of other reviews that receive millions of hits via Google in traffic every week and that still rank in the top 3 positions on Google for competitive keyword pairings. Thus, the problem likely isn't with the texts themselves, but what Yoast deems to be good writing.

The client is demanding a full refund for the work, or for me to rewrite the reviews so that they comply with Yoast's guidelines. Now - I think Yoast's guidelines are too simplified for them to be useful, and that when writing reviews, I write for the person on the other end of the screen to read them, not for a robot to tell me whether or not it's good text. Constructing sentences that are compliant with Yoast's guidelines is far too labor-intensive (and not at all useful, even if the results were good), so I'm not going to rewrite them. But I also don't want to refund a client for content that is perfectly good, but that they're unhappy with because it doesn't follow guidelines that they never mentioned I had to follow in the first place.

What do you guys think? Am I an asshole here for not giving this guy his money back? Should I just refund it and take the hit? Or should I stick to my principles of Yoast being rather useless for judging text and try to explain to him why it's not a problem?

I've had very few refund requests over the years, so I don't come across this type of situation often.

Thoughts? Refund or nah?

Cheers for input.

So basically he wants it 'dumbed down' as if a child was going to read it?

Well if that isn't to difficult, I say do it, and give the customer what he wants.

I was contracted to build a website once, and had a basic framework in place and then the client came to see me and had made what he wanted in a word document. He wanted exactly that, and I ended up actually screen shotting his stuff and saving it for the web. It Lokked SHIT... I told him it was shit, I gave him multiple reasns as to why it wass shit, I told him to let me do my thing, but NO. Thats what he wanted.

So thats what he got. Happy Client, I got paid, his site never lasted more than a few months as no one was gonna join a piece of shit looking like it did, but not my problem.

I say just give the client what he wants, but if he's still unhappy, tell him to fuck off.

I would rewrite it... once. No refund tho, unless you knew it was for yoast since the beginning and blatantly didn't follow they're bullshit protocol.

Was the Yoast requirement outlined prior to project start?

I run into a similar situation with Google PageSpeed/Insights quite often. The tool itself is a good guide to use, but logic is not 100% spot on. The tool will require "dumbing down" of an element on the site in order to improve the score, yet it severely negatively impacts usability or overall goal of the site.

These metric tools are great guides to use but should never be the "end all." As humans we still need to apply our logic to get the best result based on our goals, otherwise robots will take over. ;-)

No - if it was, I would have declined the project.

I'm tending toward siding with you, based on this.

You were not made aware of the Yoast requirement as a deal term.

the trade off is how much of your business will be impacted by your decision.

can this client influence your future income, if so, it may make sense to refund and absorb this as a loss/marketing cost.

All those seo tools means shit because they are meant to be for mainstream , not for adult, therefore they cant be taken as relevant. After all, if you analyse pornhub with many seo tools, it will be reported with tons of seo errors,yet pornhub is still first with many keywords.

If Yoast guidelines were not part of the spec, then no refund. Analogically, if someone starts bitching about a website not passing w3c validator, I show them google also doesn't pass and that they won't even let you run their own site through it.

If it were me I would see if there were some quick, small things I could do to help the Yoast score. For example, shorten some sentences, maybe switch a few words to make it "easier" to read etc. See if that gives it a positive bump in Yoast's eyes.

If that doesn't work, or they aren't willing to do that and they just want a full refund, it would depend on who they are, how much money it is, how long I spent on it. In the end, if I felt like I did the job they hired me for I would probably offer them a partial refund but if they refused I wouldn't offer any.

I wouldn't give him a refund because he didn't state that you had to follow yoast's guidelines. So the fault lies with him.

as most have mentioned, you were not to know about yoast, BS guidelines, although, as CS says, he´s asking for it dumbed down...


do your big huge amazing self a favour, send him all, dumbed down and say, here, you can use this...

no refunds my friend, you´ve done work. A little extra work to keep face, it´s probably worth it :thumbsup

just do a little extra work no matter of the client, it will keep face, but the OP is in all credit :thumbsup

That really sucks when people suddenly have requirements that were never mentioned until after you have completed the job and are waiting to get paid.

It's really fucked up and happens a lot.
You can spot people who do that sometimes; they often post a thread about their programmer/writer/designer "flaking/disappearing".
Which just means they didn't want to pay and the freelancer is just ignoring them.

Turns out that I'm on his ignore list, so he probably hasn't read my poost anyway... No biggy.

But yeah, thats the point. Hes kinda saking for less, not more. Just take some shit out and make some of the longer words more basic. Shouldn't be a difficult job to dumb down...

no. doing extra work for free because a client changed the terms after the deal was done is not a blanket nor viable solution in business. it's a nightmare.

Yoast as a guideline for language? Come on. That's ludicrous.

Yoast is pretty bad, most of the information is outdated. If you were to follow shitty seo advice that should have been outlined at the start. That being said, in the service industry you have to make clients happy.

it's a sticky wicket indeed! customer service. We do a lot of business on Amazon, I am constantly gobsmacked by how many customers claim their package didn't arrive yet the tracking shows it's delivered. We have to navigate issues like that on a case by case basis. these sorts of people will rip you off AND leave a bad review!

I would fix the issues or refund. Here is why. I've worked with Yoast for the last 3yrs editing old blogs. While you don't think Yoast is that important, it is. The 52% of sentences over 20 words is big cause that means you have tons of run-on sentences. Just because the top 5 ranked have same issues doesn't mean it's all good.

If you went to a school that all got D's would you be proud that you graduated? Have some pride and fix issues or refund.

Also just cause the top 5 have issues means nothing because it is harder and harder for new sites to get listed so you need to cross your "t's" and dot your "i's" to get listed.

I agree that Yoast may not be an accurate determinant och "good language". However, sentences containing 20 or more words are rare. It rather shows lack of effective punctuation and is something I would consider bad writing. A single sentence here or there, can absolutely contain more than 20 words. No problem at all, the problem arise when that is the norm. In good writing, of high language quality, you don't have 20 words in a regular sentence.

Assuming he didn't mention any specific SEO requirements and your reviews were like your first post here (good grammar, written well, etc.), then I don't think you owe him anything.

It probably will take a lot of time to re-do the reviews the way he wants as it may require you to massively adjust your writing style.

Besides, the client paid and thanked you. The transaction was complete and then he messaged you again asking for extensive touch-ups bordering on complete re-do's.

It's a no-win situation. Either you refund and lose money and time, or fix and lose time and money.

Don't refund and you could take reputation hits, or refund and they tell people that you did it badly and take reputation hits.

You weren't told beforehand about unreasonable structure. The guidelines should have been explained in the job description.

The client is demanding a change in terms after completion. You did the work as requested in the original terms. If changes are needed, request more money. If they say no, point out you did the job before they demanded Yoast compliance.

Be sure they can't do a chargeback to avoid aggravation or get a rebuttal ready. You did the job as requested. Changes are fine with compensation.

I ran a review site. I'd edit reviews if keywords were overused or underused. Unless it was poorly written or was lacking information, I'd not reject it. Writers aren't experts at seo and the site owner needs to lower their expectations

yup, I too consider it bad writing. yoast allows up to 25% of sentences to contain 20 words.

this is a good read on the matter
https://support.siteimprove.com/hc/e...over-20-words-

I've seen blogs with 50% of sentences over 20 words and they are very ugly blogs.

but he has SEO in his sig so he should know SEO.

bottom line is this guy is advertising both writing and SEO so his writing should have better SEO.

for school work proper grammar is important (coloring within the lines and all that crap). that said some of my fav writers break all the rules and do so brilliantly.

as to the opening question, I would try not to consider whether the client will make a fuss or come back for future work. flat out, what do you think is fair to do independent of all other considerations?

having not seen the text, I personally would not care about sentence length or amount of subheaders if you write powerfully and with seo in mind. the one thing that did stick out a bit was the passive voice issue. if this text is for sales, I'd do some rewrites gratis for the client just to spice it up a bit.

ultimately though, did you provide work that you consider high quality and fair for what you were paid?

if I were you would prob do some rewrites to address the main concerns to the best of my ability or offer a token of good faith partial refund, but if you feel the client is just being an unreasonable whiner then own your choice not to refund or provide any rewrites and state why. politely and with professionalism.

(had to work an over 20 word sentence in there) :upsidedow

hate shit like that though, you start out with good intentions and it gets unpleasant? not fun for either of you. had that happen once to me (a dude I hired for some work totally tried to rip me off for thousands of work I didn't need, want or ask for, just presented me a bill out of the blue that shocked the hell out of me) and it made my stomach churn.

it speaks well that this is an unusual situation for you. excellent service providers are worth their weight in gold, as are those who as clients value excellent service.

just make your choice on how you would want to be treated, were your positions reversed. apply reason and ethics to your decision on how to proceed

good luck with it, hope y'all can come to a conclusion where neither of you walk away feeling ripped off.

The way I structure sentences can often mean I have over 20 words, but it flows and reads just fine. I use hyphens a lot - I believe it's a lot nicer to read.

For instance, here's a lengthy sentence from a review I provided:

"To check out the content, I downloaded 11 different videos and I have to say – this place is really taking sensual smut to a whole new level of interesting."

I've tried several different review methods over the years and A/B tested with clients to get the format down. I'm more than confident that my approach to writing - and my inclusion of sentences over 20 words apiece - is totally fine when it comes to user engagement.

The English writing profs that taught me how to write loved it when I wrote longer sentences. In fact, they claimed that an article written in sentences of varying length better captures the attention of the reader.

This is just an example: Patent office to a plumber, who submitted a product for unclogging pipes.

" Dear Sir, thank you for submitting your product and its secret formula for our evaluation and patent proceedings. We have evaluated the product based on your submitted criteria and have determined that some compatibility issues exist with some of the elements of your formula, namely they may not be consistent with integrity of the efluent conveyances and thus causes increased and undesired permeability of such conveyances"

When the plumber responded that he appreciated their prompt review and that he is looking forward to receiving the patent, the patent office responded:

" Dear sir, your product will eat the hell out them pipes"

:1orglaugh

'He', the client, thanked you for your work, he was your client not Yoast.

Probably just trying his luck at getting something for nothing.

↑↑↑ Truth

Arnox, your shitty customer has cost you time & money already. Look at the snowball effect of all our time spent on reading & replying to responses in this thread.

Don't do bad business by giving power to a scum that changes terms after work is complete. Cut this loser loose and don't look back. Move forward.

^^Don't listen to this shit unless you're just a fly-by-night business.

I would ask the customer to give you another shot and ensure him it will be done the way he wants it. And if he's still unhappy, offer a full refund.

100% agree!

Arnox, if you do as this nutjob suggests you'll end up doing twice the work and giving the guy a refund in the end.

Remember, this loser "customer" of yours changed the terms after you finished the work and asked for his money back. He has already shown you his word cannot be trusted. If he was a good customer he'd apologize for his error and ask you to please redo the work under his revised specs & pay you a bit extra. This person is not coming from a good place. Don't reward people that do bad business. Cut your losses and move forward.

I didn’t see the name of the guy posted. If he’s advertising as an expert, and the goods weren’t delivered, no refund.

you just contradicted yourself. The OP of this thread has both "writer" and "SEO" in his sig. Why would you say if the goods weren't delivered, no refund?

Really I don't think he needs to refund. I just think he could spend 5-10 mins per review and fix his shotty SEO text. Break up maybe 4 long sentences and put a few H2's and be done with it.

shaking my head at advocating adult language in such such a clean place. no shame

why I cannot find the version with how sick you can suck my dick disappoints me. still can bring some havoc though =)

for real though, good luck OP.

I thought the guy posting was the person needing a writer, not the writer. My bad for not rereading it.

Do my comments make sense now? Both times I answered from the wrong perspective. Amnesia gets in my way continually.

I don't think you should refund it, but the costumer is always right

Spend a couple of minutes fixing the content and that's it

Hmm Nope you posted in my thread wanting the work, Hiring Review Writers - GoFuckYourself.com - Adult Webmaster Forum

Lets put that right to start with.

By Friday then delivering on friday means your a day late in completing the task at hand :1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

I have since learnt its very rare you actually keep to completion dates :thumbsup

Firstly these other sites have been around since the beging of time, these are the sites i have to compete against to get a new domain as high as can be, they have a massive head start, for you then to go in half cocked to try and beat them is stupid.

EVERYTHING SHOULD BE DONE TO GET 100% WHERE YOU NEED TO BE NOT HALF ARSED ( Like your reviews

Everything should be done to make sure everything is 100% the ones that are 100% inside my admin, i'm ranked 2nd on google for that search term

The ones that aren't 100% green fall off into page 2 and beyond

So from my own experience All green = A higher listing and this shows true to the fact having #2 on google for that keyword, its my highest listing doing 5/10 sales a month.

The reviews shouldn't of arrived to me in the state that they did but i also should of checked that shit also, but you caught me when playing fortnite hahah


You are missing the bigger picture here, webmaster hiring writers to obtain a ROI, My own experience with yoast everything that green gets a higher listing and brings in a ROI

Everything that isn't 100% Green gets you ranked lower

33.3% of the sentences contain more than 20 words, which is more than the recommended maximum of 25%. Try to shorten the sentences.
Bad SEO score 33.3% of the sentences contain passive voice, which is more than the recommended maximum of 10%. Try to use their active counterparts.
Good SEO score The copy scores 73.2 in the Flesch Reading Ease test, which is considered fairly easy to read.
Good SEO score The amount of words following each of the subheadings doesn't exceed the recommended maximum of 300 words, which is great.
Good SEO score None of the paragraphs are too long, which is great.
Good SEO score 33.3% of the sentences contain a transition word or phrase, which is great.

^^^^^^ Google rank 13 for the keyword

Analysis

OK SEO score 20% of the sentences contain a transition word or phrase, which is fewer than the recommended minimum of 30%.
Good SEO score The copy scores 77.4 in the Flesch Reading Ease test, which is considered fairly easy to read.
Good SEO score The amount of words following each of the subheadings doesn't exceed the recommended maximum of 300 words, which is great.
Good SEO score None of the paragraphs are too long, which is great.
Good SEO score 22.6% of the sentences contain more than 20 words, which is less than or equal to the recommended maximum of 25%.
Good SEO score 1.8% of the sentences contain passive voice, which is less than or equal to the recommended maximum of 10%.

^^^^^^ Google Ranked #2 for keyword

Same numbers of sites going for the same keyword.

So posted blog experts all you want my own site experience and rankings PROVE that it does matter and to obtain a higher ROI all green is the way to go

Now i should of outlined everything better from the begin, but it was like getting one answers from you over a few days, one reply then disappear for a day.

At the end i told you to keep your money and i'll re write the reviews myself, I hire out because i don't have time, my time verus $13 for a review its a no brainer.

My time is more vaulable then $13, BUT i expect everything to be on point and kicking arse so its literally drop and go.

You totally missed the bigger picture instead of trying to out smart me you've lost 200/300 reviews for the year.

Your first reply should of been, shit sorry man let me fix these up abit better for you, because you were already a day late in sending them which you didn't say sorry for.

So you do have deadline issues 100% fact, as a first time customer i would of expected them a day earlier to show that rock this shit. First impression is late and badly done = Fail.

And that is all it needed :thumbsup

This simply is not true. Customers pull shady shit all the time.

So do shitty writers :)

Based on the fact the writer came here and asked for advice and tried to describe the transaction fairly and has been open to the advice given proves to me he's not a shitty business owner and was looking for the best way to handle the issue with you.

If you have special demands, like beeing compliant to a specific set of rules (yoast) you should have said so before placing the order. not doing so would be your mistake, not the writer's.
It's as simple as that

He not some newbie, hes being around along time

Industry Role:
Join Date: Sep 2009

So being on time would of been a great start so i didn't have to chase for the reviews to see if they were done.

Message on thursday should of read like this :

Hey man i know the reviews are ment to be with you today, im half way through i'll send you them all tomorrow * Insert time * i hope thats o.k and sorry.

That one message keeps me in the loop so i'm not chasing asking if they are done.

This is simple shit.

why are you telling me this?

If it didn't reply in one word answers, also from my asking for writers thread i asked for everything to be laid out into sections, this also wasn't done, The examples he sent they weren't as my completed reviews.

So examples of what i asked for were sent, https://www.xcopywriters.com/portfolio/

https://www.xcopywriters.com/portfol...ms/porn-deals/

The examples on Fengs site and totally different
1 of the paragraphs contains more than the recommended maximum of 150 words. Are you sure all information is about the same topic, and therefore belongs in one single paragraph?
Bad SEO score 45.8% of the sentences contain more than 20 words, which is more than the recommended maximum of 25%. Try to shorten the sentences.
Good SEO score The copy scores 63 in the Flesch Reading Ease test, which is considered OK to read.
Good SEO score The amount of words following each of the subheadings doesn't exceed the recommended maximum of 300 words, which is great.
Good SEO score 33.3% of the sentences contain a transition word or phrase, which is great.
Good SEO score 7.4% of the sentences contain passive voice, which is less than or equal to the recommended maximum of 10%.

Then my shit which is mostly Red.

Its all good tho i'll re write them all green myself :)

btw, if he said he was delivering by friday. isnt he perfectly on time when delivering on friday?
(by, not before??)



well i get it wasnt how you wanted it ofc. but you find yoast score important. i for example might follow a other seo guideling according to writing/readability. Not sure how the writer was supposed to know what YOU find important, if you didnt tell him.

When i place a job at a writer, i generally type out what style i want, what rules it has to abide by etc.

(i guess its good for both sides that this seemed to have been a rather small order :P)

If you have been around along time, yet still don't know how to handle customers

:error

But he has been around along time, his business is 100% customer based.

By friday i would expect thursday by the day you say. "On friday" then i would expect them ON friday by firday i wuld expect before

yeah, no. I've been in business for 40 years and some customers still cause me to take a moment and think about how to handle the sitch they've created.

using your thinking, you've been in business for a while yet did not specify the deal needing yoast verification.

I happen to think neither of you operated shadily. poor communication, yup, but that happens all the time in business. I hope you realize the op came here looking to do the right thing with the issue and has not disparaged you in any way.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way—in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.” —A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens

Sorry Charles, Your sentence is too long and this will hurt seo... rewrite it with more exclamation points and emojis or we wont pay you...