Google SEO - 'Myths Vs Facts' Thread

What is the biggest 'myth vs. fact' point that you have observed while practicing SEO? Do share it here in this thread.

This may not be THE biggest but is definitely one of the biggest point that will be there is my list:

"You/We can rank any keyword on 1st page of Google by SEO."

This is mostly advertised by many SEO gurus (probably to get a new client). I have a simple logic against it - for a competitive keywords, there are surely more than 10 SEO gurus trying to get the first page ranking. So someone gotta lose... many more would lose than win ... that is if we believe that there is indeed a 'methods' to get top 10 rankings in so many days ... Never heard that from any authentic/ official Google source ... !

Feel free to share your Google SEO 'myth vs. fact' point.

Cheers!

 

Hmm now you start this off with total confusion

Firstly, SEO is what gets any page on to page 1. However what you call SEO and what I call SEO I guarantee will differ vastly.

I think one of the biggest myths RE SEO is that the search engines are anywhere near any good. I think another myth is that any more then about 2 or 3 % of those doing SEO actually understand the ultimate goals of SEO. I could name perhaps a dozen SEO's who are really any good and can sustain results that I could not beat quite easily. However for me I cherry pick and so you could say SEO is just my part time hobby that happens to be a nice way to make money and so I can pick and choose my clients.

I would rate only Aaron Wall as an SEO who I would have a hard time competing against and Aaron Wall only as no other SEO is as good

Anyway there are so many myths and bull around SEO. Doing SEO for a company and charging them money to fail and end up in page 2 is IMHO a scam in it's self. But most can't afford to say no sorry you won't gte page 1 for that or this or that is not doable for whatever reason.

For most it is a case of mortgages must be paid so people take on work knowing full well they will fail the company they work for as they need the money. Myself I have never done SEO for anyone who is not on page 1 for what they paid for, and only doing SEO. I have no intention of ever taking money to fail with page 2 results as that is just failure to me. But then I am realistic on what can and can't be done.

If you can't get page 1 then TBH IMHO people don't (or shouldn't) have the right to charge someone to fail them as you are in effect, in my books, ripping people off. There really is very little point in page 2 SERPS.

I think the biggest myth is that you need PageRank to outrank other sites when in fact if you really do SEO properly you can make Pagerank irrelevant in the equation.

 

As we know SEO is nothing but understanding algorithm of search engines.

And it is true that understanding algorithm of SEO is not possible, however, in reality it is not so, some people who are guru who understands it, not 100% but at least 90%, thats why they have confidence.

 

Are you serious about this statement? There are SEOs and Internet marketers that make more money in one week than Aaron in one year. He is more like a celebrity SEO expert. There are some guys that you never heard of because they don't care if anyone knows they do SEO. They don't even call themselves SEO marketers.

I guess that is one myth. Believing in things that millions of people read. Be a good businessman.

The fact is that SEO is moving towards personalized path. Your email, Google+, everything is connected.

 

Being a good SEO is not just about making money only though as, as you say there are likely many "Internet marketers" that make much more money, however that does not make them good SEO's. And the subject was SEO not internet marketers.

 

Making money is the big part of SEO and probably the main driving force behind it. My point was that there are SEO's that need no public eye.

BTW I read SeoBook from the day one. Never found anything extraordinary in any of the first few books. Stopped reading several years ago.

 

some good points here, just a request - pls keep the discussions in this thread relevant to the title.

another myth about page rank is that you need lots of quality backlinks to get a PR. This (and I am saying it from my own experience) may not be necessarily true all the time. I had bought some domains with a PR and no backlinks andt they were able to sustain their PR (for over an year now) without any further work done on them; absolutely nothing has been done on them, but they still have the same PR. And I am not talking about one or two ... there are many.

Now how important is PR is another quest altogether

 

@ webinsane - that is yet another myth I suppose - there is a 'seo book' for learning it

 

@webinsanse Each to his own. Making money is "one" part of of SEO though. I guess you can't name these mystery SEO genius's though as they are so great at hiding their genius. Can't say I see many marketers hiding in such a way though...

They usually thrive on ego.

 

That would be a good idea I nearly said we are going off topic talking on other points.

 

Here's the BIGGEST myth of them all.........

SEO IS DEAD!

or, just a funny ass statement?

Holla!

 

Biggest Myth

"Backlinks don't matter"

Anyone that says this clearly doesn't understand SEO at all. There are garbage sites constantly sitting atop the SERPs, in highly competitive niches, solely because the operator knows how to spam these sites with the proper backlinks.

Granted, they only last until Google does a manual review and then they get de-indexed, but it pretty much proves how dependent the Google search algorithm is on backlink profiles.

 

Backlink PR is outdated technology that Google keeps hanging on. Social media is the proper way to do results, but we are not there yet.

 

Here ia a big SEO myth >

Google cares about search results and the integrity of their results for the end user ...

And as for social media that's even worse than the crappy PR (PageRank) system and only being promoted by Google as important as they are running scared over Facebook and so want to make SN important with their launch of the crappy Google + things.

 

Have you been reading that dumbass Ken Crogue article >
The Death Of SEO: The Rise Of Social, PR, And Real Content


an article only able to rank where it does because it happens to be on Forbes.com, even though it rabbits on with utter blither blather nonsense that makes very little real sense?

As "SEO is dead when words stop getting used to find things" so yes big myth indeed there!

 

The SEO is Dead thingy reminds me of a Joke :
God is Dead - Nietzsche, 1883
Nietzsche is Dead - God, 1900

However, I would disagree on the theory that Google does not care for integrity of their results for the end user . The fact is that we have search engines before & after Google but Google is undisputed the king of search engine and the reason for it is highly attribute (if not absolutely) to the fact that its foundation is laid on users feedback. True, that it has to compromise here and there for commercial reason, but then that too is must, if one needs to survive in the market. So far I have used it, I have to say I get what I am looking for almost every time. I can not say the same for yahoo, bing or any other search engine.

 

Here's a myth you often hear, and which bothers me: "Just write good-quality content on your website and people will find it and reward you with links, shares, etc." Nonsense!

The reality? — Yes, of course, we need to write high-quality content. But we must ALSO get it "out there" to the public to enable them to "find it". And we do that via social media, white-hat link building, and other proper methods of publicizing your material.

 

Wait wait wait.... You mean, no such thing as you "build it and they will come"?....LMAO!

A League Of Their Own!

 

A story I heard told about Frank Kern (may be apocryphal) that he said he had... "A guaranteed way to get a top 10 ranking for any keyword at all."

....

Frank apparently went on to say, "Forget SEO. I'd just buy one of the sites that was already ranking there."

 

I think one of the biggest misconceptions is that "professional" SEO services are worth the thousands of dollars that they demand per month. I realize their services can be of use, but there's nothing they are doing that you yourself can't do with just a little hard work. Plus you can save a ton of money at the same time. Being lazy will cost you money in this line of business.