source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pranavsingh/999580726/
Remember, myths are not true. In no particular order:
- myth: SEO is a sham
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
- myth: Black Hat SEOs are Unethical
src: 7 SEO Myths Dispelled | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
- myth: White Hat SEOs are On The Side of Good
src: 7 SEO Myths Dispelled | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
- myth: SEO requires continual tweaking to keep up with changes in the search engines’ ranking algorithms
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
vs.
myth: “£500 one off SEO fix and your website is good forever” – SEO and search engines move forward all the time, so should you website.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: Once Gained, Easily Maintained.
src: 5 Most Annoying SEO Myths | Blog | Econsultancy
myth: You Never Need to Redesign Your Site.
src: Page 3 – SEO Myths
myth: Google is always changing its search algorithm
src: Common SEO Myths – Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5)
myth: Search engine technology is moving too fast: I can’t keep up!
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
myth: Rankings are absolute.
src: 7 SEO Myths Dispelled | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
myth: SEO is a one-time event.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
myth: SEO is a one month process. Do it and get it done!
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: SEO is a once and done project: when website is optimized then job is done.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
myth: If you did all the ten things for SEO, there is no beating you and you’ll remain on top forever.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
Scott’s Take: Yes, you need to keep redesigning your site and keeping it fresh with your users. However, the fundamentals of Search Engine Optimization has not changed since Google has won the market. That does not mean it will not change in the future. In fact, Google now employs Personalized search. So, the results you see will likely be different than the results I see.
- myth: You cannot predict the success of SEO
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
- myth: SEO is easy to learn.
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
vs.
myth: You need an Expert to help you succeed in SEO.
src: Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5) – Google, Article, Content, Myths
myth: SEO is a hand off project. Let the consultants take care of it.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
Scott’s Take: The advanced topics of SEO may not be easy to learn. However, the majority (80%) of the websites are fine without the advanced topics. Consequently, I agree with you don’t need an expert. You can do it yourself. However, Just as you can paint your house yourself, sometimes, you just want an expert to do it for you.
- myth: The goal is to be number one or on page one.
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
myth: I should focus on getting great rankings rankings rather than making sure my visitors become customers.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: SEO firms that offer guaranteed placement eliminate your risk.
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
myth: Search Engine Positions are guaranteed.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: We guarantee no. 1 on Google.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
- myth: My competition has taken all the top spots in the search engines.
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
- myth: SEO mainly consists of submission to (many) search engines.
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
- myth: Unscrupulous competitors cannot directly hurt your site’s position after it has ben SEO’d.
src: 9 Web Site Optimization (SEO) Myths Debunked
myth: “Nothing that a competitor can’t do to harm you” – There are people that make a living destroying other peoples websites
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
- myth: Meta keywords are still useful (they’re definitely not). & If you want a real myth, though, it’s that the meta keywords tag matters. It makes so little difference. Only Yahoo takes any real look at it, and even there, it’s virtually useless.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: Just Put Up Meta Tags to Get Your Ranking
src: Page 3 – SEO Myths
myth: Words in your meta keywords tag have to be used on the page.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
myth: Meta description deisplayed on the SERPs is always the few lines of text you supply.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: Meta tags don’t matter
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
myth: Having Meta tags will my rankings.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: Meta tags are the key to high rankings.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
myth: Jam-packing your meta tags with as many words as possible is going to make you rank higher in search engines.
src: SEO myths de-bunked: Myth #3 – Jam-packed meta tags – S.Joy Studios
myth: Keyword and description META tags are the most important part of SEO
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
myth: Adding keywords to meta tags give you a direct push on the SERPs.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: Meta Tags have no Impact on Rankings.
src: SEO Myths: 5 Myths About SEO Busted | WordStream
Scott’s Take: Google in their documentation recommends to use meta description. So, don’t take this to mean don’t use meta tags at all, this is just meta keywords. Although, I do agree, that there is more to SEO than just meta tags.
- myth: Keyword Density is a factor in rankings (it’s definitely not.)
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
src: SEOmoz | YOUmoz – SEO Myths That Persist: Keyword Density
src: SEO myths de-bunked: Myth #8 – Keyword density
src: SEOmoz | Rewriting the Beginner’s Guide: Part 4 Continued – Keyword Usage & Targeting
src: Page 3 – SEO Myths
src: Common SEO Myths – Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5)
myth: Once you’ve settled on a keyword, use it throughout the text without variation
src: Five Myths About SEO Copywriting Debunked | WordStream
myth: Following a 4% Keyword density will help in optimizing the content.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: It’s a good idea to make my keywords invisible, such as having white letters on white background.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: Use as many keywords as you can. The more the better.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
myth: Adding more keywords to the page title will always help you in seo.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Submitting your site to search engines is a critical part of SEO. It hasn’t been since the 1990’s, but like meta keywords, this one just won’t die.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: Sites Must Be Submitted to Engines
src: 5 Most Annoying SEO Myths | Blog | Econsultancy
myth: Resubmitting your URL Repeatedly to Search Engines
src: Page 4 – SEO Myths
myth: Search engine submission doesn’t work. (notice someone says the opposite of others.)
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
myth: I have to submit my site to a search engine for it to get listed.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: I have to periodically re-submit my site to the search engines.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: Submit to as many search engines as you can as often as you can.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
myth: Submitting my site to search engines takes forever.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
myth: Submitting to search engines is the only way to get indexed.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: You should submit your URLs to search engines.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
Scott’s Take: I disagree a little with this. Submitting Sitemaps and Pinging Services for constantly changing content are still very valuable for Google News and others aggregators and search engines..
- myth: Click-through rate is a major part of search engine rankings. The engines have said publicly that CTR is a very noisy and un-useful signal, and not something they’d rely on.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
- myth: The search engines penalize you if you do active/obvious SEO (they don’t). The engines themselves promote SEO best practices, and Google’s gone as far as to endorse and promote SEO events, a guide and an SEO toolset.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: SEO is dangerous and can get my site taken off the search engines.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
- myth: Participating in PPC campaigns (and spending more) will help you rank better in the engines (it doesn’t). The engines have very real Chinese walls between their business divisions and never let paid campaign spending affect organic rankings directly.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: SEO is Influenced by PPC (not true)
src: 5 Most Annoying SEO Myths | Blog | Econsultancy
myth: Buying PPC ads will influence your organic rankings.
src: 7 SEO Myths Dispelled | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
myth: PPC ads will help/hurt rankings.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
- myth: It is all about rankings and traffic, rather than conversions.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
- myth: “Link Bait won’t get you penalised” – Maybe not today
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
- myth: The biggest SEO myth is probably that of “quality content”.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: Instead of focusing on building a quality site with good, useful information, I should try to find some “trick” to make my site rank well.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: SEO is about tricking search engines into ranking my site high.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
Scott’s take: The idea behind this myth is that Advertising and other campaigns can push less quality content above higher quality content. There is no doubt about that. However, I think this is the outlier case. More often than not, the higher quality will win.
- myth: The biggest is the duplicate content penalty. People think that just because you publish the same content as somebody else you are going to get some kind of penalty, not the case at all.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: Multiple Domain names for the same website or content interlinking together
src: Multiple domain names
myth: Multiple Domain Names Pointing to the Same Site Increase Rankings
src: Page 4 – SEO Myths
myth: Google penalizes websites with duplicate content.
src: Common SEO Myths – Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5)
Scott’s Take: Google has stated publicly, that duplicate content will be merged together and you will lose the value of the content. So, although this myth is strictly true in this example, because the first google will determine which of the duplicate content should rank, it is much better to have unique content.
- myth: The biggest myth of SEO is that everyone is treated equally by the search engines.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
myth: SEO is a level playing field.
src: 7 SEO Myths Dispelled | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
- myth: One myth I frequently see on SEO websites is ALT tag abuse. The ALT element on an image is useful, but only of the image is linked.
src: What’s The Biggest SEO Myth? | Shark SEO
Scott’s Take: Google states in their own report card and own guidelines that the ALT attribute is useful, although I agree you don’t want to just stuff it with all keywords.
- myth: The Most Annoying SEO Myth: Optimisation is Underhand
src: 5 Most Annoying SEO Myths | Blog | Econsultancy
Scott’s Take: SEO is definitely okay. Even google has a SEO guide.
- myth: One Tactic, Done Enough, Works
src: 5 Most Annoying SEO Myths | Blog | Econsultancy
- myth: Linking is Everything
src: Page 4 – SEO Myths
myth: Links are the most important factor
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
myth: Getting put on someone’s “Links of people who link to me” page is going to make Google happy.
src: SEO myths de-bunked: Myth #2 – Link Exchanges – S.Joy Studios
myth: Having tons and tons of links will surely send my rankings straight to the top.
src: Website SEO: Link-Building Myths and Illuminating Facts (Part 2)
myth: Links, links, links, and more links. The more the better.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
- myth: One Good Link outweighs content.
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
- myth: Sculpting Your PageRank
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
Scott’s Take: This is an advanced technique, and Matt Cutts of Google recently stated, if you gobs and gobs of pages, then yes, Sculpting Page Rank will work, but for the majority of people, it does not help and maybe even hurt.
- myth: You Need Latent Semantic Analysis Optimization
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
- myth: Toolbar PR is tied to crawl rate
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
- myth: You should use nofollow for any links you sell
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
Scott’s Take: Note, google recommends this. Its not required, but I’d agree that if you sell links, you generally want to nofollow them.
- myth: nofollow tags prevent a page from being index.ed
src: SEO myths de-bunked: Myth #7 – No-follow tags – S.Joy Studios
- myth: Google is the only search engine that matters (because it controls 70/80/90% of search traffic.
src: SEO myths and the power of repetition
- myth: Google not only looks at your domains whois info (and past history, etc), but Google looks at other domains that are owned by you to see how trustworthy you and your domains are.
src: Few SEO Myths I am Researching – JonWaraas.com
- myth: Use Subdomains for SEO and for your site structure.
src: Few SEO Myths I am Researching – JonWaraas.com
- myth: You need to post new articles to your website regularly
src: Common SEO Myths – Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5)
myth: You need to update your site frequently.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
Scott’s Take: I agree it is not a need. However, google does sometimes look to see if content is updated. I agree though, that google likes people who are first with content rather than newer. So, this one is inconclusive.
- myth: You need ‘quality’ backlinks to succeed in SEO.
src: Common SEO Myths – Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5)
Scott’s Take: Again, google recommends you build links in its own guide. So, agree its not a need, but it definitely does help.
- myth: You need to post ‘quality’ articles on your website.
src: Common SEO Myths – Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5)
Scott’s Take: Google’s own guide recommends to have grammatically correct articles. The benefit of quality articles is who would people rather read? a poorly written, hard to understand article vs. an easy to scan easy to understand article? I think people go with the latter, and then ultimately Google will index that way as well.
- myth: Search engine traffic is free.
src: Common SEO Myths – Free SEO Tutorial (Part 5)
- myth: Optimize your site for Search Engines, Spiders, and Crawlers.
src: Write For People, Not For Spiders
myth: SEO copywriting sounds forced and Mechanical.
src: Five Myths About SEO Copywriting Debunked | WordStream
myth: I should optimize my site for search engines above users.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
Scott’s Take: The myth here is we should write and optimize for our users’ first and search engines second. Be Natural with your writing.
- myth: Be brief – online readers have short attention spans.
src: Five Myths About SEO Copywriting Debunked | WordStream
- myth: The age of clever headlines is over.
src: Five Myths About SEO Copywriting Debunked | WordStream
- myth: When doing a list post, write an introduction.
src: Five Myths About SEO Copywriting Debunked | WordStream
- myth: Search engines can now crawl Flash.
src: 7 SEO Myths Dispelled | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
myth: A flash page means bad SEO.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Google now crawls javascript.
src: 7 SEO Myths Dispelled | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
- myth: Trading links with any site which will link to mine is a good idea.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: Search engines can’t deal with framed sites, or they penalize framed sites.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: Sites that use Javascript get penalized.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: I should try to rank well for a single-word term instead of the 2- to 3-word phrases that searchers actually use and that I actually have a hope of ranking well for.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: Most of my traffic should come from one or two search phrases, rather than hundreds, most of which haven’t even occurred to me.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: All keywords are created equal.
src: SEO myths de-bunked: Myth #4 – Keyword Equality – S.Joy Studios
- myth: Any time my rankings go up or down, I should assume that it’s the result of some change I made. Even better, if my rankings drop I should assume that someone at Google manually looked at my site and penalized it.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: Any time my rankings change, or even disappear from the results, I should consider that change permanent.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: All visitors start at the front page of my site.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
- myth: I should consider another site’s PageRank when deciding whether to link to them or whether to ask for a link.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: You should only link with sies that have a high PageRank.
src: Website SEO: Link-Building Myths and Illuminating Facts (Part 2)
- myth: The sites with the highest “PageRank” will always rank higher in the SERPs.
src: SEO 101: Myths and Facts about Search Engine Optimization
myth: It’s all about PageRank.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
myth: A higher PageRank means better chance of ranking.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: Toolbar PageRank is Meaningless.
src: SEO Myths: 5 Myths About SEO Busted | WordStream
- myth: Pretty, Keyword-specific URL’s don’t matter.
src: SEO Myths: 5 Myths About SEO Busted | WordStream
- myth: Google Favors Old Domains
src: SEO Myths: 5 Myths About SEO Busted | WordStream
- myth: Links from Article Syndication and Press Release Distribution are Worthless.
src: SEO Myths: 5 Myths About SEO Busted | WordStream
- myth: Your site will be banned if you ignore Google’s Guidelines
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
- myth: Your site will be banned if you buy links.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
myth: All paid links are evil.
src: Website SEO: Link-Building Myths and Illuminating Facts (Part 1)
- myth: H1 (or any header tags) must be used for high rankings.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
myth: Adding H1 tags to keywords directly help in SEO
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
Scott’s Take: Google does recommend header tags, and think it helps, but of course it is not a requirement.
- myth: SEO copy must be 250 words in length.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
- myth: You need to optimize for the long tail.
src: Top Ten Organic SEO Myths
- myth: Submitting your links to directories is the best way to improve your ranking.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
myth: Submitting your site to hundres of general directories will increase your rankings.
src: Website SEO: Link-Building Myths and Illuminating Facts (Part 1)
- myth: Dynamic URLs are bad for the site.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
myth: Dynamic URLs are bad for the site.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Nofollow incoming links from other sites are no good.
src: Blogging from the Brave Programmer – 10 SEO Myths to watch out for in 2010
- myth: I’ll see results from SEO quickly.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
Scott’s Take: quite contrary. SEO results often focused on the long-term horizon.
- myth: Visitor numbers to my site is an important element of SEO.
src: Top 10 SEO myths revealed
- myth: Internal Links don’t matter.
src: SEO myths de-bunked: Myth #6 – Internal links – S.Joy Studios
myth: The more internal links the better.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Google Adwords are an easy alternative to search engine optimization. Also, they’re more effective.
src: SEO Myths De-bunked: Myth #5 – Google Adwords – S.Joy Studios
- myth: If I click on my own links a bunch of times, Google will be tricked into thinking that my site is awesome.
src: SEO myths de-bunked: Myth #1 – Link Clicking – S.Joy Studios
Scott’s Take: This is a myth. However, google does use the bounce rate as a search ranking factor. So, if you click on your site and stay a while, you can impact your bounce rate a little which in turn can improve your ranking.
- myth: Leaving your website’s link in blog and forum comments is great for SEO.
src: Website SEO: Link-Building Myths and Illuminating Facts (Part 1)
Scott’s Take: Most of the links in blog and forum comments are nofollow-ed. Consequently, google does not give those much pagerank value. However, if you leave thoughtful comments, you will actually see your traffic increase. In addition, you will likely see more people linking to you. However, if you leave bogus comments, people will think you are spam.
- myth: WordPress, Blogger, Typepad, etc. Themes are/are not optimized for SEO.
src: Some thoughts on SEO | WPShout.com
- myth: You need / don’t need a plugin for SEO.
src: http://octavity.com/
Scott’s notes: Some themes come already optimized with SEO, Some themes need the plugin. Also, too many SEO plugins and are worse than having no SEO in your wordpress at all.
- myth: Using Robots.txt is the safest way to keep a page/site from being crawled.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: Adding Canonical URL tag to a page will stop the bots from scanning the page.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
myth: Using a meta nofollow header tag on the page will “block” the search engine from crawling the page.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
Scott’s Take: the safest way is just don’t post it on the internet.
- myth: Adding a plugin like the AllinOneSEO puts your blog into auto SEO mode.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Changing the crawl rate settings in Webmasters tools console will change the Google Crawl rate once and for all.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Linking to authority websites will help your reputation.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Adding a WordPress (or any) Blog will automatically fix your site’s SEO.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Sitelinks appear only for websites who have a high PageRank.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: A deep directory structure is bad for SEO.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
Scott’s Take: Google does recommend against a deep directory structure unless it is really required by your site.
- myth: All external links should be nofollowed to protect your pagerank.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
- myth: Bolding out keywords on the content helps.
src: Top 25 commonly believed SEO myths
Scott’s Final Take:
Obviously, not all of these myths should be taken as Gospel. As with normal fictional stories, there is often a grain a truth that can be found in the myth.
For 80% of the small and medium business websites out there, Search Engine Optimization should be 20% of your web activity. The rest of your activity should be concentrated on generating the absolute best, unique, and new content for your targeted market niche(s). I know one of the Myths of SEO is about quality. However, I have found in my experience that most websites are just not producing enough new, unique, fabulous content. Start there. As long as you follow the major beginner guidelines for SEO, you will be fine.
What are those guidelines? I’ll leave that for another post. In the meantime, you can look at these other important references used to verify the myths above.
Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide
Google’s SEO Report Card – Google Webmaster Central
YouTube – GoogleWebmasterHelp’s Channel
SEOmoz | Beginner’s Guide to SEO – Single Page Version
Search Engine Ranking Factors | SEOmoz