1) Myth: SEO is dead.
Real Deal: The old method of “tricking” search engines into ranking your site higher is dead. SEO is now currently focused on creating a user-friendly website experience that is attractive to both people and search engines, creating engaging SEO copy people want to read and link to that also grabs a search engine’s attention, and personally networking with other sites in your industry to garner more quality links.
2) Myth: We’ll get you ranked on the 1st page of Google in one month!
Real Deal: Search engine rankings are ultimately in the hands of the search engines, and although a good SEO company knows the techniques to get you ranked well, a reputable company will never guarantee you rankings.
3) Myth: If I build it, they will come.
Real Deal: Not exactly. Having a great looking site is a step in the right direction, but you also need to employ ongoing SEO techniques to your site to attract the attention of search engines.
4) Myth: Sign up and get 100 links in an hour!
Real Deal: Links from quality sites relevant to your own site can help you rise in the organic, or non-paid, search engine rankings. But paying for links on irrelevant directories or sites with hundreds of links already on them can actually hurt your rankings. Invest the time into actually contacting sites or blogs in your industry and asking for a link.
5) Myth: Meta-tags don’t have any value.
Real Deal: Meta-tags aren’t the end all and be all of SEO, but they do carry some value. The meta-title, also called the “page title,” is valuable, and the meta-description is often pulled as the short listing in a search engine results page, so it’s important to optimize both. The meta-keywords field is the least valuable, but still somewhat used by Yahoo! and a few other search engines.
