One of the main challenges of SEO is its absence of clarity. The search engines never reveal their algorithms, and hence SEO is actually a game of the best practices. You can always experiment by trying out which SEO strategy works best for your website, but eventually, your overall SEO strategy will be a combination of art and science.
Common SEO Myths
- Guest Posting is Bad: This is the newest in the list and details the ways in which people have misused the art of getting guest posts to get links to your website. However, it is foolish to translate this idea into the concept that any guest posting is bad. Guest posts work well if you are looking for SEO, but they are bad if SEO happens to be your only goal. Any SEO impact can be a side effect than your primary goal.
- Page Rank Matters: The infamous PageRank of Google, named after its co-founder and CEO Larry Page is the 1-10 ranking of the total popularity of any website. If the number is bigger, the number is higher. Previously, this was what bothered the SEO experts. Today, the algorithm is not affected by a single indicator. PageRank is as important as context matter and relevance.
- Website Submission to Search Engines: The recent myth is that websites need to be ‘submitted’ to the search engines. This was the case, say 10 years back, but today if your website has any connection with another one, it will be discovered by Google. Being indexed is very different from getting a higher rank, although that first step is not helpful anymore.
- Google Wants Keyword Rich Domains: In the past, Google appeared to put an extreme emphasis on keywords in your domain name, such as the URL. This is not the case anymore. The focus has shifted on website relevance, more than the presence of keywords on the domain name.
- Google’s Search Results are Broken: The most popular myth here is that Google has a problem with their search engine, but this claim has no semblance with reality. Their market share in the US is pretty steady at 67.6%. Globally, in most countries, their market share remains at or above 80%. Indeed, there is no major threat being faced by Google’s search business.
- All You Need is Videos: While a few websites do well with a lot of video content, you should think about their limitations. For one, their audience is limited. If videos are blocked at the workplace, businesses can potentially lose clients. While videos play an important role in conversions, make sure they are backed with non-video content too.
- Good SEO is Trickery: While some SEO experts try tricking Google, this is not the best way to provide good and lasting SEO. In good SEO, you need to create a relevant and informative website, with great user experience and encouraging the distribution and sharing of good content for generating organic publicity and links to your website.
There are many reasons that provide a good argument for investing in internet marketing techniques to provide a boost to your company. Unfortunately, many people believe that internet marketing is not going to work for their company due to the many myths that they choose to believe. Once those myths are out aside, it is possible to create a marketing strategy that is both practical and beneficial.
Myth: Social Media Is Unnecessary If the Target Audience Is Older
The fact is that seniors are active on the internet more than ever. Facebook seems to be their preferred choice when it comes to social media networks. You can reach your targeted customers through internet marketing.
Myth: A Mobile Version of the Website Is Unnecessary
You need to ensure that your website is supported by mobile devices. The use of smartphones and other mobile devices have increased in recent years. A good number of your prospective customers might be using mobile devices to visit your website. If they are unable to view the website, they will not take the effort to use desktops to visit your website.
You need to make sure that your website can be viewed in the proper format without any errors irrespective of the device used to view it. At the same time, you should use only one website. You should not have to host another website simply to enable your customers use their mobile devices for visiting your company online.
Myth: Email Marketing Has Lost Its Importance
You can still use emails as an effective marketing tool. However, you will need to use it in a different way than before. You need to create an email list on your own by inviting your customers and website visitors to subscribe to your email lists. The emails that you send will have to be designed in a more attractive manner.
Good and quality calls to action, effective subject lines and other similar methods need to be incorporated so that your email marketing campaign remains successful.
Myth: A Logo Is a Brand
A logo is not your entire brand identity. Instead, it is just one specific part of the brand identity of your company. The brand identity itself is a more complex entity. In simple terms, the brand identity can be considered to be the perception that the world at large has of your company. It constitutes the personality of the company. Every single action you take as a company has an effect on the brand identity.
The brand identity of your company can have a tremendous influence on the opinions that your potential customers harbor about your company. It can also influence their decisions regarding the purchases. Your websites need to have your logo certainly but it should also be designed according to your brand identity. The colors, the text, the tone of the content are just some of the things that should be designed with the brand identity in mind.
You should conduct thorough research into the marketing technique you want to use. Doing so will help you understand what the myths and the realities of the marketing technique actually are.