Since the beginning of SEO (Search Engine Optimization), a lot has changed in the Internet World. Old tactics may die out as time goes on, but what truly needs to die out are these 5 SEO myths.
1. Link building is no longer relevant: In the past few years, many “SEO experts” have claimed that link building is dead. The fact of the matter is black-hat link building is dead. Not only that, but black hat link building will get you penalized from Google and in turn completely remove you from Google search results. However, the amount of high-quality incoming links to your site is still extremely valuable. Link building didn’t die; it just became more difficult (and natural). Instead of simply building links to manipulate search rankings, it’s become about building a strong natural presence that instead brings people to your site for the right reason.
2. Nofollow links are not valuable: Of course nofollow links are not as valuable as “follow” links, however, that does not mean that nofollow links have no worth. A backlink profile, which was proved important in the prior point, would look unnatural if it did not contain a single nofollow link. What this means is those that have only do follow links are strictly building a link profile to manipulate rankings. Nofollow backlinks are much more common and natural, though they do not provide the same SEO value that do follow links do.
3. Social Media doesn’t matter: This myth is told over and over and is believed by many. The truth is the amount of likes you have on Facebook and followers you have on Twitter do not affect your ranking. However, what does affect your ranking is your consistency is posting as well as your level of interaction on popular social media outlets. This leads to users needing more followers to gain more interaction, thus gaining more referral traffic and ranking higher.
4. Google is the only search engine that matters: A long, long time ago… (okay, not that long ago), Google was the only search engine that seemed to matter when it came to SEO. Nowadays, Google may still be the most important, but it’s extremely important to optimize for Bing and Yahoo! as well. Though Google has the most users, according to research, in 2012 Bing accounted for 269 million regular users and Yahoo! accounted for 292 million. Though this is just a fraction of the amount of Internet users that use Google, it is still a large number of users to not be optimizing for. It’s important to be a Search Engine Optimizer and not strictly a “Google optimizer”.
5. SEO is dead: And now for the kicker, SEO is NOT dead! As Google and other search engines become smarter and implement more and more algorithm updates, many people assume that this implies that SEO is dead. Though black hat tactics including keyword stuffing and buying links are now disreputable SEO practices, SEO is still very much alive but simply requires more work and technique than ever, which is where a professional digital marketing agency like Traffic Jams comes in! SEO is a long continuous strategy, and is what keeps competition among the Internet alive.
Need SEO assistance so that you can tell the myths from the facts? Give us a call at (855) 599-9998 to speak with one of our digital marketing professionals today or email us at sales@trafficjams.com and we’ll reach out to you!
