Ever notice how there are approximately 129,347 different diets, programs, pills, products, and scams for weight loss?
Heck, you probably have someone on your Facebook friend list who’s become a “representative” for some multi-level-marketing company and the latest fat-loss fad product (stomach wraps, magical diet pills, etc.) they’re hocking.
Even though 99.9% of these flash-in-the-pan remedies don’t work, people buy ‘em up by the millions. The prospect of a getting a killer beach bod while exerting zero effort is just too tempting to pass up.
Deep down, though, everyone knows—but won’t admit to themselves—that there’s really just one simple three-step process to losing weight:
- Lay off the Big Macs.
- Hop on the treadmill.
- Repeat steps 1 and 2 until you get the result you want.
This method is GUARANTEED to work, but it takes time and energy. That’s why everyone always flocks to the latest bogus “solution” that promises instant results.
It’s the same with SEO.
Contractors don’t want to put forth the required time and effort to get good results. So they fall for all the gurus promising magic solutions that launch your site to the top of Google Mountain with no effort or time.
In the back of your mind, though, you know it’s a load of crap.
But in case you don’t, I present 3 SEO “Magic Pills” that are actually poison for your rankings:
Magic Pill #1: Keyword Stuffing
Shoving a bunch of keywords and geographic locations on a webpage might get you immediate results, but your ranking will gradually decrease as Google realizes that no one likes your website.
Example: “We are expert replacement window installers for Dallas TX, Fort Worth TX, Richardson TX, Mesquite TX, Garland TX, Plano TX, Irving TX, Balch Springs TX, and Farmers Branch TX.”
Would you ever say this to a prospect face to face? No. They’d never buy from you.
It’s the same with your internet prospects. If your website reads like it was written by Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation, people will click away faster than you can say “Captain Jean-Luc Picard.” As a result, your rankings will sink at warp speed.
Bottom Line: Prospects who visit your website are humans, too. So don’t write for Google; write for PEOPLE (while tossing in the occasional keyword in logical places).
Magic Pill #2: Spammy Links
Having a ton of outside sources linking to your website SOUNDS like a great SEO-boosting strategy. But it only works if the places linked to your website are worth a dang.
Read the comment section of this webpage for an example of links Google hates. This is called “forum spam,” and Google will destroy you if they catch you doing it.
For a comprehensive list of link spam, click here.
Bottom Line: Quality links to your website = good. Spammy links to your website = bad. REALLY BAD.
Magic Pill #3: Emphasizing Quantity Over Quality
Having 400 blog posts on your website is useless if they are poorly written, boring, thin on content, and irrelevant to your market.
If you spend less time on your blog posts than it takes to nuke a Hot Pocket, you’re who I’m talking about. If you want a smorgasbord of examples, Google just about any type of service in your town. You’ll see a ton of keyword-stuffed blog posts with wafer-thin content.
Bottom Line: Google will hurt your rankings something good if they discover your webpage content is awful. (And Google WILL discover it sooner rather than later.)
To sum all of this SEO talk up:
To achieve true SEO success, you have to do things the RIGHT way.
There is no “magic pill” that takes you to page one instantly. If someone tells you otherwise, remember all of the worthless weight-loss products that deliver ZERO results.
The truth is that it takes at least 6 to 9 months to start seeing quality SEO results.
When MYM is in charge of your SEO, that’s about the amount of time it’s going to take. We do NOT promise you overnight SEO success. What we do promise is that we’ll use ALL of the right methods to get you to number one.
This means:
- writing engaging content.
- creating relevant back links (and Disavowing the bad ones!)
- inserting the right keywords in the right places. “nerd coding” your website to take advantage of Google’s latest algorithms
- ensuring your business listings are consistent, (and that duplicate listings are suprressed!)
- optimizing your Google My Business page and other social media details are optimized
- marking your website up with “schema” (a special language that Google reads on how to show your website in search results to get more traffic.)
- auditing your website once per month to catch any broken links, broken pages, or error codes in your site
- creating high quality service area landing pages so that you can rank for cities other than where your office is located
- and so. so. much. more. (Here’s a mostly complete list of the things we do for our SEO Clients).
Sure, this takes time. But it’s the ONLY way to get the results you want.
The good news is that it takes no effort on your end—kick back and let us handle the hard work for you.
Check out more details about MYM’s Search Engine Optimization.
P.S. For some amazing client SEO success stories, click here, here, here, here, and here.
© 2017, Rich Harshaw. All rights reserved.
