Seconded, with nearly 200 out of 800 relations being terminated negatively, I am sure that this business owner must have some serious doubts and is trying to find patterns.
Google always has the option to change its ranking algorithm. The more your pay, the higher your ranking. Someone clicks on your link, you pay.
It used to be Google that was different from the other search engines by putting its advertisings next to its search results instead of the search results being the advertising.
Magento's largest problem is that most people who look at it assume it is like Wordpress. Download, click install, change the theme somewhat and get started.
Very unlike Wordpress this is hard. So you either shell out cash to outside developers (a healthy enough marketplace exists) or pay the price in learning how to program it yourself.
Enough decent materials on how to do this exist but it is definitely not aimed at weekend programmers.