As Search Engine Optimization, or SEO for short, has gained in popularity, a number of myths have arisen. Like many SEO companies, the Jacksonville SEO team often has to educate clients who aren’t aware of all the changes Google made to their search algorithm in the last few years. After hearing some of these SEO myths often enough, we decided to compile the most popular in order to create a quick resource for potential and existing clients.

Clients aren’t to blame, however, because they are relying on what they may have heard years ago, or from a self-appointed SEO guru. So the perpetuation of SEO myths is partly due to the fact that many of the people carrying out SEO have absolutely zero idea what they are doing. They just see that there is money to be made and they say whatever it takes to make a sale, like ‘We’ll build (insert a ridiculously high number) of backlinks.’ Therefore, on this page we are going to put some of the most common SEO myths to bed so that you can do SEO in 2016 the right way.

  1. Backlinks are everything: Now, truth be told, in the past, links were everything when it came to ranking a website for different terms. This is because search engine spiders were not all that intelligent at the time. They are now. Nowadays, one relevant link to your website is going to be worth so much more than 100 irrelevant links. In fact, having a ton of irrelevant links point towards your website is, without a doubt, one of the fastest ways to get removed from the search engine index. This is why we work with partners to get our clients the most relevant citations possible. Quality over quantity
  2. SEO delivers immediate results: This is not true. Sure, there are some cases where you may get immediate results from SEO. For instance, if you are trying to rank for noncompetitive keywords like “green and blue polka dot hockey sticks”, you will see quicker results than if trying to rank for a competitive term like “hockey sticks”. However, if you are ranking for those unique keywords, there is a pretty good chance nobody is searching for them. Generally speaking, for keywords that bring in sales, you are not going to see any results from SEO for a good couple months, if that. It is a bit like getting back to the gym…it takes a while to get into shape, but you have to start somewhere.
  3. SEO is designed to ‘fool’ the search engines: No, it isn’t. Good SEO is not about tricking the search engines to rank a poor site highly. Good SEO is about creating a website that is beneficial to both the search engines and for the users searching your website. After all, if you create a terrible website which ranks exceedingly high in the search engines, it doesn’t matter how much traffic you get, it won’t convert well and you won’t make money. Look at our site, for instance. There are plenty of pages and articles related to SEO, and we are aiming to speak to businesses in Jacksonville, Florida, because that’s where our market is. SEO builds upon a good business model and helps your customers find your website.
  4. SEO is the quest for ranking for the top keywords: No, it really isn’t. If you are looking to rank for the most competitive keywords in your niche, you will be wasting both your time and your money. SEO is about ranking for a number of keywords which are not quite as competitive but can deliver targeted traffic to your website. If a company tells us that they want to target an incredibly generic keyword that has a lot of competition we make sure they know that they are competing with multi-national brands with annual SEO budgets in the millions, so they’d better have some serious funds to compete at that level or start targeting more realistic goals.
  5. Page Rank is still important: Nope. This is not a thing. It used to be a thing. It isn’t now. Google has stated that it barely plays a part in their ranking algorithm (if it does play a part at all). It is not a viable ranking metric any more. In fact, PageRank has stopped being updated by the Google team. Instead, more than 200 different signals are used to determine where a page ranks in the search engines for a particular keyword. Focusing on Page Rank is a waste of time.

If your company is ready to hire an amazing SEO team in 2016, give us a call today at (904) 513-0183