SEO remains one of the most misunderstood elements in the digital marketing playbook. But with Google alone receiving 2 trillion searches each year and organic results being 8.5 times more likely to be clicked than paid search results, SEO should be a critical part of online strategy for any business.
It’s time to do away with the fear; here are 5 common fears about SEO which you should definitely leave behind in 2019.
1. Google Will Penalize Me When If I Make Mistakes
Google penalties. Nothing strikes fear into the heart of a website owner or SEO specialist more than the thought of Google’s mighty hammer coming down hard and banishing them from the rankings forever.
However, this does not happen as often as you think. Unless you are a bad player of some kind, Google is not going to penalize you. What is more likely to happen is that your ranking may be downgraded--and this is only if your website’s quality is poor.
You can avoid having a spammy website by making sure your links work, running spell and grammar checks on your content, and getting a competent writer to create unique content for your website. It’s going to take more than a few mistakes to get a quality website penalized.
2. I Can’t Hope to Outrank Giants in My Industry So No Need to Try
This might be true for general queries--think vague, single-word queries like “restaurants” or “insurance”. You can’t hope to outrank the big boys in those cases.
But how often are searches that generic? A hungry person doing a Google search is not looking for the best restaurant in the world or a definition of the term; they want a suitable place nearest to them.
By properly understanding and implementing this fact, a business can outrank national and industry leaders among people who actually need what that business offers.
3. It Takes Forever for SEO to Bear Fruits. I Need Instant Results
SEO does offer instant results in the form of a quality website filled with helpful content that provides value to visitors. However, it will take more than a few days or weeks before Google notices the gem that your website is. On average it may take about 4-6 months before your rankings start improving significantly. There are many instances where a newly optimized site however will start seeing results in as little as a few weeks. You may wish to consider investigating a PPC Campaign in tandem with your SEO strategy.
4. Creating Content Is a Waste of Time
There is no better way to introduce prospects to your business than content marketing. Not only is it effective, it’s cheaper too! Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional advertising while generating three times as many leads. Quality content is the backbone of a proper SEO strategy.
5. SEO Is Too Complex for Me to Do Anyway
Says who? While search engines tweak the algorithms a little bit, the fundamentals of how to rise to the top of search remain the same: publish authoritative, high-value, shareable content and the search engines will take notice.
SEO remains a long term strategy for businesses ready for the long haul. But the rewards for sticking to the process are worth it. That’s why we are hoping you make the commitment towards it. We would love to help too--reach out to us today if you would like some help making sense of SEO and how it can help your business.
