The Biggest Myths in SEO
It’s not often that I turn fire on SEO. It is an industry with detractors and a fair few rogues crawling around. However, it is also massively misunderstood in some quarters; largely due to the lies that I will now cover.
Lie 1: SEO will guarantee you a top Google ranking
Quite simply nobody can make that claim. If there was any way that I could 100% guarantee that you could get to number one for any term on any search engine, I would be a wealthy man indeed. In my book, Get to #1 On Google In Easy Steps, I talk about the methods of working towards the top spot, not the absolute assurance that you can reach the summit. It is possible, many people achieve it in fact, but there is no way that doing SEO arbitrarily will have you leapfrogging all competitors.
Lie 2: SEO is a scam
Again, not true. SEO works, that is why so many agencies offer it and why so many website owners continue to adhere by the rules. Nobody will claim that you can’t do the work yourself, after all it is just a series of best practices passed down by search engine rules, but that doesn’t make it fraudulent. SEO experts have taken the time to understand the processes and can help those who either can’t or don’t have time to learn it for themselves.
Lie 3: SEO ruins the search engines
A complete nonsense. When you could just cram a site full of keywords and have it appear at the top of Lycos or Yahoo, yes, SEO was a bit of a sneaky cheat used by some. Today things are very different.
As already mentioned, SEO follows a system of best practices. To be successful you must adhere to the search engines rules, which are largely targeted towards increasing visitor satisfaction (particularly in terms of content, speed and navigation). Bad sites don’t often get to the top of search engines, especially not for competitive terms. If your website is garbage, SEO might be fruitless.
Lie 4: It’s easy at the top
If you do manage to perfectly optimise your pages and squeak into top position in Google, that isn’t the end of your efforts. You can’t take your foot off the peddle just because you’ve reached your optimum level. SEO is a continuous effort and requires regular attention. Search engine algorithms don’t stand still and neither will your competitors. If your site starts to appear as though it is static and unchanged, the search engines will be more than happy to replace you with someone being proactive and adhering to their requirements.
When you were trying to get top spot, you had to work really hard and hone in on the ultimate keywords for your site. If there is someone equally dedicated further down the list gunning for your top spot, you may well surrender it if you fail to maintain efforts. SEO isn’t a ticket to lifelong dominance; if only it were.
