Understanding SEO starts by setting the right expectations.
When I get SEO services requests, clients often ask me to help them rank on the first page of Google in a week. I smile as I know that SEO is not a race, rather it’s a journey. SEO takes time, hard work and consistency. Now when I try to explain this, many tell me they found an agency promising instant ranking results. I smile again as I know that these agencies usually focus on PPC rather than SEO. So before we dig into cracking the SEO code, let’s start by understanding SEO first: what it is and what it’s not.
According to Wikipedia, SEO is “the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine’s unpaid results.” What does that mean? Imagine you are looking for purple shoes on Google and these results appear:
Behind these results, 2 main things are happening: (1) Google wants to show you the best purple shoes & (2) Businesses selling purple shoes want you to buy their purple shoes. So SEO is the process of making all these wants match in the search results (Neil Patel Digital). Sounds simple enough? Not really -_-.
To match these wants, Google uses 200+ ranking factors in their algorithm! And of these factors, “some are proven, some are controversial, and others are SEO nerd speculations (Brian Dean, Backlinko).”
However, while there are many factors, most can ultimately be clustered into two groups: On-Page and Off-Page SEO. Both of these groups eventually seek to communicate the three pillars of SEO: Trust. Authority. Relevance. We will cover more on this later. The bottom line here is that SEO is a complex process. So be wary of anyone who claims instant results as it usually takes time for it to work.
So why then are certain agencies claiming that they can help businesses rank on the 1st page in a week? 2 reasons why.
1. They are doing what Neil Patel calls black Hat SEO – A search engine methodology where websites use unethical shortcuts and tactics to get a site ranking higher quickly in search results. “These unethical tactics don’t solve for the searcher and often end in a penalty from search engines.” You do not want to get banned by search engines. The graphic below by Inbound Marketing Inc does a great job of explaining the difference between black hat and white hat SEO.
2. They are doing aggressive PPC (“A model of internet marketing in which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked”)
The main difference between SEO and PPC (Pay Per Click) is that PPC is traffic coming from adds while SEO is free traffic. Also, PPC is usually instantaneous (when done right) while SEO takes time. This is why many believe that PPC might be the easier choice. This table below shows that this belief is not necessarily true. As it brakes paid SERP rankings, it shows that cost is not the only factor.
We see that it is the quality score that plays a bigger role. Why? your Quality Score is made of some SEO components such as the performance of your landing page. This means that even when you pay loads of money if you don’t have proper SEO set in place, while it is not impossible, it would be difficult to rank on the first page of the search engine results. Also, this strategy is not scalable because as soon as you stop the PPC ads your rank drops for the keywords you were advertising.
So what’s the best strategy?
SEM (search engine marketing) – “a form of Internet marketing that involves the promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPS) through optimization and advertising (Wikipedia).” In other words, the best strategy involves both SEO and PPC.
To what degree? The answer depends on what you are trying to achieve. There is no one size fit all formula. SEO experts have been labeling some of these hybrid methods as greyhat SEO – “An SEO practice that’s riskier than White Hat SEO, but one that may or may not result in your site being banned from search engines and their affiliate sites(WordStream).
The Bottom Line: Every business is different so you need to fine-tune your SEO efforts strategically.
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Let’s Recap – What is SEO and How Does it Work?
- It is the process of organically matching web visitors queries and websites signals
- It is free earned traffic that affects even paid traffic
- There are +200 Factors affecting SEO which can be clustered in 2 groups: On-site and Off-site SEO. These groups span across the three pillars of SEO: Trust. Authority. Relevance.
- It takes time, consistency and hard work
- There is no one size fit all formula
We have now covered SEO basics. Next, we will dig deeper into SEO to hopefully help you get above the fold. I have created this site for that purpose solely so we will use it as a testing domain. Before we head to the next steps, it is crucial to get the basics first. So If you are still not fully comfortable with what is SEO, I recommend that you check out the Beginners Guide to SEO by Moz or watch this short LinkedIn learning clip. Of course, I am also available to answer any questions you might have!
Read next > More on Search Engine Ranking Factors
References:
https://backlinko.com/google-ranking-factors
https://neilpatel.com/what-is-seo/
http://www.inboundmarketinginc.com/blog/black-hat-vs-white-hat-seo/
https://optinmonster.com/seo-ranking-factors/
https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo
https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2013/07/16/quality-score-cost-per-conversion
https://blog.hubspot.com/insiders/seo-sem-faqs
