Why do people bother with SEO

38 replies
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I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is. And even if u do rank , it usually takes ages and ofcourse google very quickly buries your site.
#bother #people #seo
  • Profile picture of the author GuruGuna
    Originally Posted by buffblaze View Post

    I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is. And even if u do rank , it usually takes ages and ofcourse google very quickly buries your site.
    Some people like quick results (paid traffic) and some people like to build it slowly and steadily (SEO).

    It is just the preference.

    I spend money on paid traffic to test my product or site. If it makes me money then I would continue my paid traffic and also focus on SEO.
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  • Profile picture of the author kpmedia
    Well, a lot of what people consider "SEO" is myth and BS. So given that, I'd have to agree with you. They waste tons of time on this stupid stuff, and it never works.
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  • Profile picture of the author run
    Why not bother if it's also a kind of source to drive traffic to your site. The point is not to bother with it excessively.
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  • Profile picture of the author GGpaul
    I do SEO for my ownself (affiliate marketing) and I also work for a CLOTHING company (9-5) as an SEO analyst.

    Two completely different realms. SEO is FREAKING important. However, the way people teach it especially here in the WF is looked down upon. There are a few gems that you can pick from but it's just sad how people can follow these so called "SEO" gurus that post on the forum.

    SEO is awesome - but my company doesn't primarily focus on JUST SEO. It focuses on Digital Marketing as a whole. From PR (public relations), PPC, Social Media, Email marketing, and SEO. Relying EVERYTHING IN SEO isn't the brightest thing to do.

    But it does add an uplift to your business when you do it the RIGHT WAY, which requires A TON of work.
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    • Profile picture of the author Anteela
      Originally Posted by GGpaul View Post

      I do SEO for my ownself (affiliate marketing) and I also work for a CLOTHING company (9-5) as an SEO analyst.

      Two completely different realms. SEO is FREAKING important. However, the way people teach it especially here in the WF is looked down upon. There are a few gems that you can pick from but it's just sad how people can follow these so called "SEO" gurus that post on the forum.

      SEO is awesome - but my company doesn't primarily focus on JUST SEO. It focuses on Digital Marketing as a whole. From PR (public relations), PPC, Social Media, Email marketing, and SEO. Relying EVERYTHING IN SEO isn't the brightest thing to do.

      But it does add an uplift to your business when you do it the RIGHT WAY, which requires A TON of work.

      I'm coming from the same experience. I have a 9-5 job as a Project Manager at an online marketing agency. Our contracts average $60k and the SEO aspects hard work, but it is possible. However, we don't take nearly as many shortcuts or focus on short-term ROI as others in the forums seem to (never seen an algo update that we haven't liked) either. Those tactics are just not sustainable for our purposes.
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  • Profile picture of the author RedShifted
    Are you serious?

    First, you are somewhat correct. There are some competitive terms out there like "payday loans" that wouldn't make sense targeting unless you knew your shit.

    With that said, there are approximately 1,000,000,000 not so competitive phrases / keywords that are highly profitable.

    And last year I cleared over 6 figures mostly thanks to SEO.

    With that said, most of my sites lost ranking since hummingbitch.
    But I still plan on remaking most of the content and reoutsourcing SEO so I can have another decent year.

    But asking why people do SEO is like asking "why do people do marketing?"

    Its really an ignorant, close minded question.

    -Red

    ps. As far as it taking "ages" that just shows you don't know a thing about SEO. Most my keyword takes 8 weeks max to rank, its always consistent, and I collect huge commissions on these keywords.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mogly
    Blackhat SEO pros make bank.

    Take it from an experienced IM'er...

    If you are new to IM -- stay away from SEO. It's not worth it, and its not worth your time/money.

    Spend time creating awesome websites and then do manual outreach to other bloggers/websites, and ask them to promote you.

    Obviously its a bit more complex than that -- but trust me, that's the way to go if you really want to make $xx,xxx/month from a website.

    SEO is not going to make you ANY ROI unless you spend the money and time required to learn how to really game the search engines.
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    • Profile picture of the author RedShifted
      Originally Posted by Mogly View Post

      Blackhat SEO pros make bank.

      Take it from an experienced IM'er...
      Very true. I don't want to mislead newbs but once you go BH SEO, its really hard to go back (to whitehat). Even after being slammed into a brick wall over and over and over... its like an addiction.
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  • Profile picture of the author Alex Blades
    SEO is not a waste of time, you are just targeting the wrong keywords. There are people making 6 figures on autopilot, and companies making millions with SEO.

    SEO only sucks, when YOU suck at it.
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    • Profile picture of the author Michael Shook
      I just do it as a matter of course now for every site and every page on my sites. I don't do that Xrumer stuff, it used to work some, but that's been a while back now. But as far as being a waste of time i guess that would depend on what you were doing.

      I changed what i was doing and went with authority type sites as opposed to smaller specific niche sites. Still works great for me.
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    • Profile picture of the author hotconcepts
      Originally Posted by Alex Blades View Post

      SEO is not a waste of time, you are just targeting the wrong keywords. There are people making 6 figures on autopilot, and companies making millions with SEO.

      SEO only sucks, when YOU suck at it.

      Yes I do agree there are people who make 6 figures on autopilot and there are companies who are making millions. I know few SEO companies making millions as they have many clients who rank top. Their success rate is also 80%. It's matter of targeting right keywords.
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  • Profile picture of the author spa3212
    See guys Google wants money, I means adword then why it will allow you to be in competition with their advertisers does it make sense.
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  • Profile picture of the author mgsmith
    SEO is really helpful and important that's why people still bother. It takes a lot of time and effort but if you're doing it right you'll get the result you want.
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    Mike

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    • Profile picture of the author amcg
      Originally Posted by mgsmith View Post

      SEO is really helpful and important that's why people still bother. It takes a lot of time and effort but if you're doing it right you'll get the result you want.
      This. Anything can seem like a waste of time if not done correctly - learn as much as you can from text/other people and SEO could be very powerful for you whether you want traffic, sales or both.
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  • Profile picture of the author MaxTheMarketer
    SEO is in a nutshell about: relevancy+popularity.

    Google wants to provide relevant search results for its customers/users so it looks at how relevant your website seems compared to the written keywords.

    Therefore you want your <title>, <meta description>, <meta keywords>, <meta content>, all your <a> (aka links), <h1>, <h2>, <h3> to have its keywords inside of them.

    Inside your main content (the <p>-tags) you want to use your keywords about every 70 words or so. Now, it should also make sense, not just "fillers" to have keywords.

    Remember; people are looking for information that informs them so they can take some kind of action because at the end of the day, they are looking for concrete results, not to make us internet marketers happy.

    Another way Google realizes that "this must be relevant and good for our customers/users" is by looking at how popular the relevant content is.

    In other words; how many popular links (a popular link is a link which has other popular links connected to it who themselves have it too and so on) does the content have?

    Therefore you have two different ways to approach SEO:

    1) You purchase popular links from newspapers, magazines, etc., if you got the cash and this will make your content seem more popular and therefore Google will rank it higher.

    2) You build highly valuable content, contact bloggers, newspapers, etc., who might want to link to your site due to your highly valuable content and you will slowly but steadily increase in the numbers of popular links to your site (aka higher Google rank).

    I recommend you contact someone whose blog is relevant to yours. If you sell a guide for upcoming video games, you might want to contact bloggers who blog about games or maybe even exactly video games guides.

    On a final note; no one really knows EXACTLY how the Google search engine works because if they did, they would exploit it and it would lose its essential function which is providing relevant and valuable results to its searchers.

    HOWEVER, internet marketing and all marketing begins with your customer.

    If you try to sell something no one is looking for, it would be like trying to sell umbrellas where it never rains, if you catch my drift? ;-)

    Take Care & Have An Awesome Day, Fellow Warrior! / Max "MaxTheMarketer" K.

    P.S. For traffic purposes, I recommend you begin with PPC such as Google Adwords and use very, very specific headlines such as: "How to burn 5 pounds of fat every week without exercise" instead of newbie headlines such as "How to lose weight"; be specific and result-oriented.
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  • Profile picture of the author linkmonster
    Black Hat SEO is Worst it shows result immediately but it get penalised in future.

    I Prefer White Hat SEO Which never Die and it is best.
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  • Profile picture of the author Teravel
    Search Engine Optimization... It's a pathetic and weak concept. Let me explain.

    The main ideas behind SEO are...
    1. On-Site SEO. This is pushing keywords into your content, tags, titles, and anywhere else you can fit them. All for the sake of Search Engines.
    2. Off-Site SEO. This is usually spam postings on blogs and forums, RSS spammers, and mass pings, along with many other useless (yet automated through programs) methods.

    The entire basis behind SEO is that if you show "Search Engines" that your website is about specific terms, those search engines will then send you visitors that search for those and related terms.

    Search Engines HATE these spam tactics, which is why so many people get slammed during updates. I'm sure you've all heard of Penguin and Panda updates from Google, and the many poor saps that lost their income because of them.


    So what if you could easily avoid the problems of SEO, while still getting the same or better results... You can!

    First, your content should be focused on helping the people that will be reading it. This will reduce bounce rates, improve conversions, and help build a longer relationship with your readers.

    Second, share your content Socially! Sharing a new post through Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter can quickly bring Real People to your website! (Without Search Engines!)

    Third, let your readers share your content with Social Buttons! People love to share things they have found, which can bring their friends to your website.


    Now think about this...
    Every time you share a link on a social network, you are expanding your "Off-Site SEO".
    Every time a reader shares your content on a social network, you are expanding your "Off-Site SEO".

    In BOTH of the above statements, you are bringing REAL PEOPLE to your website at the same time as you improve your standings with Search Engines. Not only that, but the links aren't looked at as Spam, and having large groups of different people sharing your link will do more for your Search Engine rankings than all the spamlinks you can build.
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  • Profile picture of the author darman82
    @Teravel, I loves your signature...


    Last years I make a good income from SEO, At first I do SEO because it CHEAP. All you need is domain, hosting and seo tools. That's it.. no ongoing expense like paid traffic. Maybe this is the reasons that people loves to do SEO. But after I realize that we can't control it. I quit and focus on list building.
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  • Profile picture of the author GGpaul
    Like I said, SEO should be looked at like the Cherry on top. Get your traffic through paid traffic and free traffic. There's just SO many freaking ways to get traffic besides solely focusing on search engine optimization. SEO IS HELPFUL though, but you shouldn't build your WHOLE business model around it.
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  • Profile picture of the author JimmyRose
    Teravel has some valid points, but both off site and on site SEO are important and work. Matt Cutts even talks about link building. As long as you're not spamming like a boss, it's all good.

    For my own curiosity recently I used a service that did about 30 Web 2.0 submissions, PR submission and some other minor things and noticed a very noticeable improvement for such a small package.

    The thing is, the authority and real visitors were already there. It's just a slow process of building it up

    Oh, and keyword research for small niches is absolutely critical, as others have said
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  • Profile picture of the author JonahTotalCTRL
    I think SEO has it's ups and downs, but overall its a great tool if your are decent at it. If Google would stop updating their code it would be more useful then it is now.
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  • Profile picture of the author domainarama
    Ways of doing SEO which are advocated here on WF can take a lot of time and effort. And tend to be quite weak. There are lots of white hat and grey hat methods which work better and faster than the stuff you read about here. Read about building private link networks, which is much more effective than buying links on fiverr and similar places.
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    • Profile picture of the author Kevin Maguire
      Originally Posted by buffblaze View Post

      I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is. And even if u do rank , it usually takes ages and ofcourse google very quickly buries your site.
      Your doing it wrong or following false information.

      Originally Posted by kpmedia View Post

      Well, a lot of what people consider "SEO" is myth and BS. So given that, I'd have to agree with you. They waste tons of time on this stupid stuff, and it never works.
      Your doing it wrong or following false information.

      Originally Posted by linkmonster View Post

      Black Hat SEO is Worst it shows result immediately but it get penalised in future.

      I Prefer White Hat SEO Which never Die and it is best.
      And your selling what in your signature?

      Originally Posted by domainarama View Post

      Ways of doing SEO which are advocated here on WF can take a lot of time and effort. And tend to be quite weak. There are lots of white hat and grey hat methods which work better and faster than the stuff you read about here. Read about building private link networks, which is much more effective than buying links on fiverr and similar places.
      Your reading the wrong sections. Hardly any senior member in this section practices or claims to be whitehat. We all blackhat..

      Your confusing things a little, or just not hanging out in the SEO section enough.
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  • Profile picture of the author wayneh
    Originally Posted by buffblaze View Post

    I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is. And even if u do rank , it usually takes ages and ofcourse google very quickly buries your site.
    You don't have to rank well for very competitive words to make money. Ranking well for low competitive buyer keywords takes some SEO knowledge - checking searches, checking the competition etc. People on Google searching for products can be some of the best traffic to get to your website.

    If you don't bother with SEO as one of the ways of getting traffic to your site, which method do you use?
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  • Profile picture of the author johnben1444
    Originally Posted by buffblaze View Post

    I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is. And even if u do rank , it usually takes ages and ofcourse google very quickly buries your site.
    You have been doing it wrongly..

    Perhaps you should switch to adword if SEO isn't working for you..
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    • Profile picture of the author BrianMI
      Why would you NOT do SEO?

      Let's say that you own a small pet store and you just got a shippment in of the new "Cutie Patootie Dog Leash" in pink, purple, black, white, and green colors.

      You could create a YouTube video entitled, "Check Out This Awesome New Dog Leash!" to promote it.

      Of course, nobody is searching for "check out this awesome new dog leash" on google (or any variant of it), so you'd get pretty much get zero views if you named the video that way. (unless you already had a killer subscriber base on YouTube).

      If you did a little keyword research though, you might find that "Cutie Patootie Dog Leash" has a lot of searches and "New Cutie Patootie Dog Leash" has less.

      Then you notice that and "Cutie Patootie Dog Leash Review" has almost as many searches all by itself as the more general "Cutie Patootie Dog Leash" phrase which means that most of the people typing in any version of that phrase are also tacking the "review" word at the end.

      So, being the smart cat that you are, you decided to entitle your new video "Cutie Patootie Dog Leash Review - It's so Awesome!" instead. You also optimize the description for that keyword and throw a small batch of social bookmarking backlinks at it.

      Of course, you created a KILLER video to begin with which guarantees engagement by those who see it, so the first few visitors watch it all the way to the end and tell Google that this video is the real deal where interesting content on Cutie Patootie Dog Leashes are concerned.

      You just did SEO and when all the factors combine you get hella tons of views on your video, the comments blow up about how the fuzzy shih tzu you used as a model is the best and the dog leash is so cute on him, and then all of a sudden your entire supply of Cutie Patootie Dog Leashes are sold out.

      But the fun just started there. All over your site and in every one of the 5,000 videos that you've done over the last 5 years all centering around different dog products has a call to action nudging people to trade their email for your "10 Tips To Keep Your Dog or Cat Happy, Healthy, and Clean" video guide with bonus PDF booklet. So you email blast out to your list with your ORIGINAL headline (that wasn't SEO friendly) "Check Out This Awesome New Dog Leash!" and guess what...everyone does. Or at least 10% of your list does...but because your list is massive...that's okay.

      A few buy it, but a bunch more who clicked through ended up tooling around your site because they've not been there in a while and want to get Fido a Christmas present. So they buy something ELSE from you that wasn't related to the dog leash. All of a sudden, you have a ton of shippments to take care of...all from a video and an email.

      Oh, and the great thing is, the people over at Cutie Patootie LOVE your videos...so they send you free stuff all the time before it even hits the store so you can review it before anyone else. They just told you that they are shipping you the new Cutie Patootie Santa Costume for both Cats and Dogs and you should have it in a few days to review.

      Life is good...and all because you did a little bit of SEO. And relationship building. And customer service. And created killer content. And worked your butt off. And nearly had a nervous breakdown getting your business up off the ground. And sacrificed time with family for a few solid years to make it work. And endured the withering stares from your spouse as you constantly and continuously engaged with your fans/followers on Facebook/Twitter/Other Social Media just like Garry V. and.... oh wait...success isn't all about SEO then...is it?

      But to summarize....yes...it IS a part of the big picture and that's why you do SEO.
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  • Profile picture of the author James.N
    I think the biggest reasons that people go for SEO is because it's free and it's the method that most gurus/experts are selling. People don't want to spend the money on PPC and they are told its dangerous for newbies as you can burn through your budget quick.

    How often do you see a blog showing you how to go about getting from article marketing? Hardly ever compared to all the articles and posts promoting ways to improve your SEO or get ranked.
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  • Profile picture of the author ViralMediaBoost
    I wouldn't classify it as a myth but it doesn't work as well as people expect, it works for a few of my sites but not all.
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  • Profile picture of the author stodog77
    Ughhh..There is so much fail and misinformation in this thread. People who say SEO is dead or a waste of time are either a defeatist, or have no clue what they are talking about. There are still globs and globs of money to be made with SEO.
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  • Profile picture of the author gregdavidson727
    Originally Posted by buffblaze View Post

    I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is. And even if u do rank , it usually takes ages and ofcourse google very quickly buries your site.
    A lot of a little equals a lot. Most of the traffic I've received from the search engines is for a bunch of random queries. Most of the main keywords that I ranked for only delivered a fraction of my traffic.
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  • Profile picture of the author RandyChen
    Because SEO is extremely exciting to people. After putting in a lot of hard work and money into a 10,000 average search volume keywork, they are excited to check google everyday where their keywords rank thinking that they will make bank once their keywords get to rank 1.
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  • Profile picture of the author duplication
    It is best to forget SEO. Focus on driving traffic to your websites. Paid or Free I would would start with free. Yahoo answers will drive targeted traffic and also provide backlinks to your site. Why not kill two birds with one stone.
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  • Profile picture of the author EduCom
    Originally Posted by buffblaze View Post

    I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is. And even if u do rank , it usually takes ages and ofcourse google very quickly buries your site.
    If that is happening to you that your is site not ranking, it does not mean that it is impossible to rank for any competitive keywords and it take ages..It simply means that you are doing wrong..People are ranking for their targeted keywords by doing SEO and am also..
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  • Profile picture of the author kim2010ne
    Echoing the sentiments of the others that posted here, if you're having problems, then you're not doing it right.

    I've been running a very successful internet company since 1994 and everything with that company has been internet based. While much of our business comes from Word of Mouth, a substantial amount comes from SEO and a little from Google Adwords.

    Since starting our own SEO Company to help others (about 4 years ago), we have helped dozens of other companies with their SEO and Adwords campaigns. The fact that the companies have increased their revenue and much of it directly related to the SEO campaigns that we've performed, and the clients are still with us several years later, speaks volumes.

    Of course, we're ALWAYS testing new procedures, and checking what others are offering here on warriorforum while running our own procedures in house.

    SEO does work, but I guess it depends on the market and your ambition. Personally, I won't touch the Insurance, Mortgage or Legal fields - generally people want everything for nothing and the competition is steep (as they spend the money). But the combination of Optimization, Adwords and Social Media is a powerful marketing strategy.
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  • Profile picture of the author Backlinko
    Originally Posted by buffblaze View Post

    I mean its almost impossible to rank in the top 10 for any competitive keyword- no matter how mildly competitive it is.
    This doesn't make any sense.

    I mean, if it's almost impossible to rank in the top 10 how are there 10 results for every keyword?
    :confused:

    It's almost impossible to rank long term if you're doing the same kind of article directories/social bookmarks/blog comments/link package stuff that worked in 2010.

    But trust me: it's actually easier to rank now than it ever has been when you do full-on white hat SEO. There's less (challenging) competition in almost every niche.

    IMHO, now is the BEST time to be in the SEO game.
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  • Profile picture of the author fjk23
    It actually depends on the patients and the person mindset for success on the internet.
    many people say it is hard to do ... {like me } and others say its easy... I personally haven't tried ranking for seo but I hope others are doing it because there are sites on the search engines right.... or no? lol
    but what you decide to do is your choice on that. success is all over.

    hope that helped,

    - Joseph Roberts
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  • Profile picture of the author Moneymaker2012
    Obviously there is nothing better than organic traffic from google or any other search engine. But if you don't want seo just use the social media ads.
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