subject: Do You Believe In Any Of These 3 Seo Misconceptions? [print this page] Many Internet marketers don't really know how search engines operate, so many myths about this are often repeated. It's easy for myths to get spread around the Internet, as marketers pick up incorrect information and repeat this to others. Let us now expose a few of these myths so that you won't fall victim to them in the future.
The following list of SEO myths can help you optimize your site..
While there are many things that can help you get a higher search ranking, using a header tag is not one of them. Keeping the myth alive, people still use keywords in their H tag, even though doing so does not increase your ranking.
The fact that PPC ads will have an impact on how your site ranks in the SERPs is one common yet strange SEO myth. This fact is quite untrue. A lot of people believe that they can affect the ranking of their site in the SERPs by running PPC ads. What you need to keep in mind is that PPC and SERP rankings have no influence on each other. This is why it is a mistake to spend money on PPC based on the assumption that your site will rank better. You should, instead, be concentrating on building more backlinks, if you want to increase the rank of your site, as well as adding quality content. The best way to judge this myth is by using your common sense.
The next SEO myth to be aware of is that each page should only focus on optimizing one keyword. While there is no merit to this notion of only targeting one phrase on each page, still many website owners and writers of articles on SEO continue to repeat it. The basic premise behind this belief is that your page will rank better if it's very focused. The first reason why this doesn't make any real sense is that it's not easy to write a page about just one keyword phrase with a natural flow. You are also not using your space efficiently if you only use one keyword per page when you could be using more. What do you gain by limiting yourself to one keyword on a page when you could put a number of keywords in the same space? The more keyword phrases you have on your optimized page, the better it is. If your goal is to get targeted visitors, this is the way to do it. Your traffic seldom comes from just one keyword, but usually from several, as you can verify by doing web analytics. It's completely okay to optimize for more than one phrase and is critical for your search engine success.
The words in your Meta tag do not need to be used on that particular page. Many SEO professionals still believe in this myth and even teach people about it. The truth is that the Meta tags were created to use keywords not already on the page. The main point, however, is that neither Google nor Yahoo use these tags for ranking.
Another other myth that is quite common and you should be aware of when you are optimizing your site is that your site will be banned if you don't conform to Google's rules and regulations. This is due to the fact that most of Google's webmaster rules are a matter of good judgment. It's not compulsory for you to study them if you are certain you are in the right. Just make sure you're not doing anything the search engines would think is direct spamming/cheating. If you want to learn more then you should make sure to read these regulations at least once because they are always changing and improving.
Still another common SEO myth is that you cannot have tables in your HTML code. This is another false idea. The fact is, the search engines have no problem crawling HTML tables, and they never did. There is simply no basis to the idea that table code presents a problem for the search engines. Many web designers will tell you that having a design without tables makes it easier to rank highly, but this is not the case.
Another myth is the fact that your site needs to be updated all the time, even though some think it has an effect on your SERP rankings. While adding new content and updating your website regularly will not affect your search engine rankings, at the same time it will lead to spiders crawling your site more often. So, don't make changes that aren't needed simply for the search engines. The effect will be so insignificant, it simply isn't worth it. Simply visit some of the highest ranking sites in niches that are pretty popular and you will find they haven't had fresh content added in quite a while. It's a good idea to do as much research as you can, so you don't believe in this kind of myth. Believing in myths can cost you time as well as money, so be careful about what sources of information you consult. If you verify your facts before taking action on them, you can save yourself time and frustration.
You have to realize that it takes some time and study to make search engine optimization pay off for you. There are some good forums, newsletters and membership sites that can help you if you find yourself stuck on some point regarding SEO. Don't worry if you make mistakes, the point is to learn and improve your skills so you can get the search engines to cooperate with you.
