Good SEO is always worthwhile, because it really never hurts websites. But my perception of Google, and the Internet, is that top search results on the first page are comparable to the 1800's gold rush days. The mines of California had a limited resource, with so many people rushing to get rich, but the supply dwindling thin. Only difference with the first page of results, is that there are always about 10 or 20 slots not counting ads. But more and more companies are getting websites. I find it sort of dishonest when I hear some SEO professionals get website owners hyped-up about how the website can get top rankings. Sometimes possible, but each day, the possibility and chances become less. In my trade, maybe there were 10 main websites near Portland competing for page 1 results, 5 years ago. That's an easier wrestling match. But suppose now there are 100 sites? Suppose even the best SEO person promised the same brilliant fine-tuning of each website, if all 100 would hire that person. Could that SEO get them into the top 3 slots? The top 10 slots? It's up for grabs. It can change weekly. In 10 years, there may be 500 websites in my niche - then who will be on the first page? For that reason, I say it's a limited resource, and it's partly insane to approach SEO with expectations to reach the top and stay on top. It makes much more sense just to focus first and foremost on an informative site with good content, and place the URL on all ads, business cards and brochures.
It seems to be very easy these days to be in the top of search engines that have very completive keywords. It is all about the links and anchors, seems like nothing else matters. If you know what you are doing you can promise top positions. But be careful with certain "quick fix link building". Not all link building is created equal.
SEO pays...if u can keep rank for several years in a competitive market, you might become a rich man....
i agree with what zippy1nut said, it is easy now to rank top in search engine. But provided you must know how to do that. I have successful put my page and rank top in most of the top search engine and it brings me a lot of benefit, such as branding, marketing and of course, money as well. Cheers!!
The comparison you use is initially flawed: you can't compete a resource (and a non-renewable one) with an opportunity. Top positions at google offer opportunities. They have to be earned and continuously maintained. They are in constant flux.
Yeah, the competition is growing day by day, but that doesn't mean SEO will be dead and meaningless. That'll be new and harder challenges for SEO guys.
Or, at least, you have to use ugly methods to win. Heck, you could probably get plastic surgery with all the earnings and win handsomely too, if you wanted to.
So from what you are saying, if it were possible for me to send to - say - 100 landscape contractors (my niche), it would be "easy" for you to get all of them to rank high in the search engines. How do you plan to get even 50 of them on the first page of 10 results? Or is the "top" in your way of thinking, the first 150 or so results? That is, supposing you could be the SEO for those 100. I'm assuming you read my first post all the way through. What you wrote earlier sounds a lot like what I've heard other SEO people write. And for some reason the math does not seem to work.
Thanks someone still with a brain here in DP... Gold Mine is just "Hey! I'm here first. I'll get rich and you not" Google and S.E. are "Hey! I'm here first. I'll get rich and you not IF you stay playing WoW when you could be doing LinkBuilding and improving the SEO of your website"
It isn't a limited resource - new keywords are "invented" everyday. New celebrities, new drugs, new services, new products - all are part of the ever expanding landscape that you can make your "claim." It ain't as if once the gold is removed from the pit, you can't go back and get more - you can.
You can squeeze 100 companies into 10 results on one Google page? Are you like God or something? And of course you are not, but merely a man. A man like others who need to face the realization that Google's first page is a limited resource. If 10 or 20 results is the choice for display, that is the limit. To think otherwise, is foolishness supreme. What's worse sometimes, is when SEO's try to sell that foolishness supreme to company owners with websites. Once again, there is no way around this. Even if "maintenance" is considered. A 10 result page has a numerical limit of 10 excluding ads. A limited resource.
I am glad you think that I am foolish. I will try to be a little more respectful to you in my reply. There is a huge universe of potential keyword phrases. Indeed, if I only want "loans" as a keyword, the 10 result limit in Google is a hard limit. However, there is also "refinance loans" and "borrow money" and "get financing" and any number of other phrases that can be used to drive traffic to your site. (As a side note: remember, you are representing yourself in this forum and the internet has a long memory. When you respond to someone by calling them foolish and a potential customer finds this thread - think about how they will feel about contacting you to do business. I certainly wouldn't want to do business with you.)
Most of them read my background page eventually - the first-hand observers. Our website supplies one and half businesses with work anyway, so I'm not really concerned with that. We do get calls from other countries though for advice, because people read my postings on the internet or find our webpages on various subjects. So I'd prefer that they find every single posting. Ever notice I don't post with a completely anonymous user name? That's because what I write online, I don't mind if people find. As far as keywords, I don't care how many variations there are for practical purposes. There are limited ones that are most important. Considering my own niche - say landscape and design - only so many people are going to search for a lawn or designer. And most are going to search with a few kewords more than others. Every year, more and more lawn sites are tweaking for the various keywords. So we still get back to the 100 websites fighting for a limited spot on search pages. Someone may garner a few more scraps with another keyword. And that's exactly why I related this to mining. Some mines go out of production, or some streams were abandoned. But every so often, like after a flood, someone goes back to scrounge up some remnants from the limited or depleted resource. At least for my trade, landscape and arborist work, I defy any SEO who thinks they can get 100 related websites in our area to all rank high for the search engines in a competitive means that garners decent income increases. At best, the SEO will put the website owners through a revolving door, as a few websites displace another few websites. It's the same old game that advertisers tried in yellow pages and junk mail. It's at best a competition where one side displaces another. But in the end, the results are a limited resource, or limited flow. I've been watching my trades websites fluctuate for years now. And I don't see it being too much different from the other advertising as far as the fight or struggle for position and attention.
Disagree - One of my sites has been at the top for 4 years now. Chose your battle and work harder and more clever than the other guy and you will win
Fair enough - I cannot argue with success. As to limited resources, we can agree to disagree. I see the universe as a source of almost unlimited (practical) resources. If I can make as much money with the key phrase "tree trimmer" as someone else can with "arborist," then I see no practical reason to consider keywords a limited resource.
Thanks for reiterating something else I posted about one company displacing another. For the more part, what is available has limited boundaries. If ten companies rise, they bump ten or eight other company sites. Not exactly like a mine in that a mine usually dwindles, but very similar in regards to there being some limited amount or confines.