I know that almost every blog out there throws up a myths list every so often. The amount of misdirection, fluff, and inaccuracies surrounding SEO makes it difficult for a SMB’s to really figure out what SEO is and who they should hire to help them. Below are several areas to look out for when trying to find an SEO company.
We’ll Optimize Your Site (and Nothing Else)
I’m not saying this isn’t a part of SEO, but starting a campaign certaintly doesn’t start or end at this point. I find a lot of clients will give me a list of keywords they want to use, and I often have to go back and tell them they are wrong. I realize that the client knows more about the industry, but they don’t take the time to research how that industry relates to organic search. So before you start slinging wild phrases across your site a thorough search should be done. Additionally, you may be working on your site but SEO also encompasses going out of your site to create content and links that help you to rise in the SERP’s.
Keyword Stuffing
A long time ago, in a galaxy that housed the earth, there was such a thing as a meta tag used for keywords. You would be able to use this tag to stuff a multitude of key terms in much the same way a turduken is prepared. It was a magical time where by doing this would help you rank exceptionally well. Google has caught on to this and the keyword tag offers no weight anymore.
Google Adwords has a Direct Correlation to Organic Ranking
Don’t fall for this one. PPC data can be useful but other than that there is no contributing factor between Pay-Per-Click and organic rankings.
SEO is Not a One Time Service
I think a lot of SEO individuals might disagree with me on this one. Now, I understand for highly competitive markets an ongoing campaign is essential. Not everyone deals in high level markets, though, and a lot of SMBs are centered around small niche demographics. You really don’t need to have an ongoing campaign in those cases. A strong campaign against pretty weak competition and generally keeping an eye out on your rankings for your key words/phrases should be enough. Most SEO people won’t tell you that.
We Will Submit Your Site to Over X number of Search Engines
How many search engines can you name off the top of your head? If you’re a normal person I’m guessing about three. The reality is that there are really only three major search engines with Google bringing the majority of those searches. There was a time when one would have to personally submit a site to search engines. This is another outdated practice that you don’t have to do.
Masking Text
This is a super old technique that is depreciated. Basically you plug in a ton of keywords but utilize the same color as your background for your font. So while traffic to your site cannot read the horror of crap hidden on your site a spider would. So, in theory, the spider would relate that the site is talking a whole ton about the chosen key word/phrases. In reality Google penalizes this tactic and considers it a spam technique. So instead of ranking well for the term you masked Google considers you a spam site and you’ll drop in the rankings or get blacklisted from Google.
Guaranteed SEO results
In no way can an SEO state that you can be number 1 in the rankings. There are a ton of agencies out there that state this on their site. The old adage of “if it sounds too good to be true, it is” holds true here.
So now you’re outfitted with areas that an SEO firm shouldn’t be doing or offering. In another post I’ll go over what you should be looking for in a good SEO company. Have you had any experiences with any of these myths being presented to you? Let me know how you handled it in the comments below!
