2. Today there is a lot of information available on the web
about how to get good search engine rankings, some
information is good and some information is bad. Over the
few years search engines have been around, some myths
have developed. Some of these myths are actually just out
dated techniques and some are misunderstandings
because the web is such a new medium. Below I have
explained the top seven myths I have seen floating around
the net.
4. This is my number one pet peeve. The ads that say for $45
you can get a top page listing with Google, Msn and
others. This is not a myth it is an out and out lie. It's
absolutely impossible to guarantee any rankings. All you
can do is have someone optimize your pages, apply an
Internet Marketing Plan to your website and hope for the
best. It is also a lot more complicated then paying for your
listing. If that's the case the highest bidder would receive
the highest listing.
6. The truth is submit your website once, if in a few months
your website has not been indexed then submit it again.
Chances are that your site will be indexed by Google
(indexed pages are pages that a search engine has added
to its list of pages it has already looked at and uses when a
searcher performs a search) and Yahoo and many other
search engines because the search engines want to supply
as much relevant information to the searcher, therefore
they need to have more indexed pages. That's the bottom
line. Also, if submitting your website to the search engines
is something you are doing yourself, then think about only
submitting to a few of the important ones that feed the
other search engines, this cuts down the time.
8. First I'll explain meta-tags. They are HTML tags that can be
used to define the HTML specifications a webpage follows,
keywords and description of the page, etc..
9. The most common use of a meta-tag in online marketing is
the keyword and description tags, which tell the search
engines that index meta-tags what description to use in
their SERP (search engine rankings page). Meta tags are
good, they definitely can't hurt. Unfortunately they are
not everything the search engine uses to determine the
topic of your site or it's ranking. There are many other key
factors you need to consider. The best thing to do is not to
cram 50 keywords in your meta tags. The best practice is
to put one or two per page with, each page having
different keywords relevant to the page. The truth is that
most meta-tags aren't particularly important and aren't
used by search engines at all. Google has already stated it
ignores most meta-tags. They can be useful to show the
description that comes up after your listing in the SERP.
11. Page Rank is definitely not God. Although, it is a good tool.
As a web designer, I like to use it determine whether I
would like to trade links with another website. Again,
there are many things search engines use to determine
rankings. Page Rank is not the only thing used to
determine your placement in the SERP. There are a load of
other factors that come into play. Basically Page Rank is
over rated by a lot of people. For example I searched
Google for "purple monkey" and the first page on the
SERP had a Page Rank of 5 and the second result has a
Page Rank of 5 and the term "purple monkey" was in the
url. The third page had a Page Rank of 7. Therefore higher
Page Ranks do not necessarily mean higher listings but, it
does help.
13. The answer is no, not all designers understand search
engines. Just because they can create websites doesn't
mean they know how to optimize them. Some designers
tend to show off what they can produce, such as a fully
flash site with all kinds of "bells and whistles" and no text
for the search engine to read. Before you hire a website
designer/developer or SEO expert ask for some case
studies of sites they have optimized.
14.
15. The truth is the more relevant links the better. You can add
your site to a gazillion free directories and it's not going to
help your SERP ranking. What helps your rankings is
relevant links. Links from sites on the same topic or a site
that would be relevant to your visitors.
17. Honestly, it's boring and time consuming. It takes a lot of
time in front of your computer and knowledge of how
search engines work. It is something you can do yourself,
but the easy and cost effective way would be to hire an
expert. SEO is one of the most cost effective marketing
strategies you can use for your business.
18. The bottom line in Search Engine Optimization is it's time
consuming, hard work and it has to be done by a human.
If you are a small business and have a little knowledge you
can do it yourself, as long you have a lot of time on your
hands. If you don't have a lot of time to waste, hire an
expert.