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SEO Myths that WILL Ruin your Business

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Article Overview

Are you confused about SEO? Have you been listening to friends or business acquaintances about all those so-called SEO myths. This article will dispel a few of those SEO myths and put the focus on doing SEO right.

A big part of my day is helping my client’s websites rank on Google.

But another part of my day is spent on the phone answering questions from people who have heard rumours and myths about SEO and want me to clarify things up for them.

They have heard from friends or colleagues that doing a certain thing to their website will help with their rankings on Google. It’s all gossip, hearsay and myth ridden.

Well, rather than keep on fielding these types of questions, I thought that I would highlight some great SEO questions I get asked and debunk some of those myths. I am absolutely amazed by some of these myths circulating out there and how these actually got into the public domain. Perhaps they were started by some SEO companies, who try to scare potential clients into using them. The theory is that they will be able to easily solve these problems. All lies…and they are about to end now. If I let them continue, then these people will think these myths are true and expect them to be part of the SEO process. They are not and here’s why.

Posting and being active on Social media will help Google rankings.

Social media has its purpose and that is to promote your business and engage with your customer base. It is one of the most common questions I get asked and all I can say is that social media activity has absolutely no effect on your search engine rankings. Thinks about it for a moment. It’s so easy to pay people to post articles, get followers, likes and retweets. all you need to do is pay someone on a website like Fiver and you could get all the social media activity you ever wanted. This is why Google does not count social media as a ranking factor. If it was then everyone would be doing this and the system would collapse. Google wants to see natural, organic behaviour and social media allow you the opportunity to spam your way to page 1 – therefore it’s a complete myth. Use social media as another marketing platform, but in so far as rankings are concerned…forget about it. It will have zero impact. If any SEO company says that posting on Facebook or Twitter is great for your ranking, then they do not know what they are talking about.

Blogging is going to help with my rankings

Blogging is great if you want to appear as an authority in your field. Posting great quality, useful, informative content that keeps readers on your website is great for promotion. But, these blog articles will have no impact on your rankings. The only way you are ever going to rank is through top quality backlinks. You can publish as many blog articles as you like, but it will have no effect on your main core keyword rankings.

For example, if you are a lawyer in Sydney and want to rank for the keywords ‘lawyers Sydney’, then the only way you will ever be found online when a search is done for these keywords is through backlinking. Writing articles related to specific areas of law that your service are a great way to help keep your customers informed – but they will NEVER help with your rankings. I always tell my clients that they should continue to publish blog content as a way of showing their customers that they are active in the online space. In fact, it’s a good thing to do. But if anyone ever tells you that it will help boost your rankings….they are just probably saying this to get you to sign up to their copywriting service.

Also read: SEO for lawyers Sydney

Again, think about it for a while. If ranking on page 1 meant publishing heaps of blogs, then everyone would be spewing out content ( no matter the quality) and again, this would destroy the integrity of what Google displays. It’s good to publish quality, content, but if you do it at ridiculous levels then this may do you more harm than good.

I write blogs all the time on this website about SEO and the do’s and don’ts associated with rankings….but these articles have never affected my main core keyword ‘SEO Sydney’…which as of today we were at the # 1 position.

Doing Adwords will help me get to page 1

This s the most common question and all I can say is categorical NO! There is absolutely no relationship between organic SEO rankings and Adwords. Like night and day, they are the exact opposite. I hear people say that they started an Adwords campaign and then all of a sudden their rankings started to rise. This is a total coincidence. If they were related then you could simply buy your way to the top. This would by Googles very nature of ranking eliminates any credibility they ever had. Google is all about natural rankings and if there is the slightest hint of buying your way up the rankings, then this would destroy the very fabric of Google. There are businesses in Australia that spend an absolute fortune on Adwords (up to $50 per click and up to $100 000 per month) – imagine the money they would be saving and the results they would be getting if they just did SEO.

Getting to page 1 is a hard slog and takes a lot of time, energy, strategy and expertise. Essentially, there are no shortcuts. This I hope eliminates this myth.

I’m scared Google is going to penalise me

Google penalties happen very rarely and only in extreme cases if you do something completely against Googles guidelines. If you have noticed your rankings slide a few pages in a short period of time, this is a good indication by Google that there is either something non-compliant with your website or there is some spammy/inorganic activity going on externally. In any case, Google will give you the opportunity to fix the problem and sideline you for only a few months. Once your issues have been fixed, they will naturally climb back.

The issue many business owners have is that they are scared to the death of Google and what might happen. They have heard all these kids of myths of what Google can and will do to your website if you are even remotely non-compliant. This is a myth and people should treat Google as a friend and not some god-like figure that they need to be petrified of. Remember, Google needs good businesses like yours to index and rank. If your business is ethical and offers a great service/product then it’s in Google’s interest to keep promoting it.

The issue here is that many businesses tend to choose really dodgy SEO companies and they land up in trouble because of what they do. If only they would have used a proper SEO company in the first place, then the words ‘penalty or rank suppression would not be in their mindset.

Content is king

Come on, think about this. If all I had to do was write thousands and thousands of words about a topic and expect this to rank on Google, then the copywriting industry would be mammoth. Copy en masse only irritates readers. I have seen some websites that have so many words on their home page that it just looks ridiculous. Be aware of what your consumer wants and cater for them. Write short, snappy precise content and this will help with your sales and conversion rates. It will have nothing to do with your rankings. Google cottoned on to this years ago. If it were that easy I would be employing a copywriter to pump out thousands of articles every year for my clients so they all get to # 1. If only it were that easy!

So the golden rule here is that content is NOT king. The only way you are ever going to rank on Google is through using an SEO company that knows what they are doing.

If any SEO company that you are talking to strategy is purely based on publishing content – then this copy better be world-class. Every article MUST be shared and liked by hundreds if not thousands of people. This simply does not happen. Imagine publishing quality riveting copy about car cleaning every week. Impossible! Copy that makes readers so glued to your site that it goes viral does not exist in 99.99% of industries – therefore forget copy as a way to get you ranked – it’s a massive myth.

I hear many Sydney SEO companies telling people that SEO is dead and content marketing is the only avenue left, as Google has outlawed link building. what a load of garbage. It’s these SEO myth makers that are going to end up hurting your rankings. Don’t believe a word they say. They are only using this copywriting angle as a disguise to hide the fact that they are absolute crap at organic link building, which is the cornerstone of SEO.

This is a real concern and I need you readers out there to really understand this point.

Backlinking is dead and buried

Where do I begin? This is a seriously dangerous myth. If any SEO company tells you that they do not do backlinking, you need to hang up on them immediately. What happens is they do not know how to do it properly. They have tried to do it a few ways and experimented with a few websites but at the end of the day, nothing happened. This is why they tell you that linking is dead and of no use. These guys make me laugh. They are only telling you this because they keep on stuffing up. This is why so many SEO companies now preach the easy path to take as a form of SEO; content writing and social media marketing.

All great BUT a waste of time. All businesses have their sales pitch, and they have every right to tell you what their thoughts are in relation to SEO rankings. What they don’t have the right to do is to outright lie to your face. It brings the entire industry into disrepute and makes our job just that much harder when we have to debunk the myths and explain how it really works on a daily basis.

It’s really a no brainer. These SEO cowboys will say and do anything to get your business and if they can show you they have written 20 articles and posted 100 times on Facebook then they must be doing their job and doing it well. After all look at all the output, they have done. WRONG! They are in fact hindering your businesses ability to grow online and get new business. They are holding you back and hampering your efforts to succeed online.

The only companies that ever succeed in their quest to get to page 1 are those that use agencies like ours to acquire quality backlinks and apply this to our strategy. Anything else is just fluff, waffle and wasting your time!

If you are serious about getting to page 1 of Google and don’t want to be stuffed around please get in touch with us here at SEO Sydney Experts. Call 02 9360 8514

steven waldberg - ceo seo sydney experts

About the author

Steven Waldberg

Steven is the director of SEO Sydney Experts and is one of the founding members ( that’s over 18 years ago). He has one of the longest careers in the SEO and content marketing industry and has written for many prestigious websites, including B & T and AdNews. If you’re serious about working with someone who will dedicate 100% of himself to your business; Steven is your SEO Expert.

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