SEO - Content Writing Advice - Web Design

Once in awhile, there comes an E-Mail with a number of baffling recommendations that warp even the most experienced SEO’s mind.  I was dealing with one such client yesterday.  As SEOs, it’s in our best interests to develop common methods of increasing rankings, while at the same time not limiting our practices in such a way that limits website versatility and website performance.  It’s also in our best interests to ensure that myths and half truths like the below do not continue to manifest themselves as website improvements to help improve website performance in the SERPs.

Let’s get into some of these additional myths and downright fallacies shall we?

Multiple Domains = the incredibly amazing highly ranking website!

Recommendations:  One of the best ways to boost SEO is to tie multiple keyword domains to one set of content.  You have one main site and other do what is called a 301 redirect to that main site.

Wrong!  This is not going to do much unless the 301 redirected domain name is already an authority site that will pass link juice to the main site.  If you have domain names that have no value, and haven’t been worked on ever in terms of building an authoritative website presence in the first place, 301 redirecting them isn’t going to do jack for your rankings.

Changing the Meta Keywords tag helps increase rankings!!!

Recommendations:  The individual proceeded to then provide recommendations on modifying the Meta Keywords tag and adding more keywords to an already comprehensive Meta Keywords tag anyway.

How does this myth continue to perpetuate when Google has officially confirmed its invalidity? Complete bunk.  Google not only doesn’t put much weight on the Meta Keywords tag, they don’t count this tag at all.  View the video by the leader of the Google search spam team, Matt Cutts, on this link: Google doesn’t use the keywords meta tag in web search at all, ever, zip, zilch, nada:  http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/keywords-meta-tag-in-web-search/

Oh, man, I love this one…

Atten-hut! Google can’t index images!!!

Recommendation:  All of the items above would be better if they were actually text instead of images.  Google cannot index Images and Alt tags do not have the same effect as a strictly CSS/JavaScript navigation system.

All the items above WERE text and have been text on this particular client’s website since the beginning.  A recently-revamped layout even provided the client’s contact information in a much easier to view spot for better access! Shows how much they were paying attention!  Regarding the scripts while that kind of modification will lead to some improvement, it’s not necessary to improve rankings.  Where this will help is in reducing the size of the html file to nearly nothing, since how fast a page loads is a website ranking factor.  With the company’s websites, though, we cannot modify code that was part of the initial building of the templates anyway.  There has still been no problem getting them ranked high on Google.

And, if Google can’t index images then I wonder how all the images on images.google.com came about?  Here are some tips on how to get Google to index images:  http://webtalks.blogspot.com/2007/04/google-image-indexing.html

The correct terminology to use is that Google doesn’t recognize images while crawling the page, and they simply tend to show up as a blank space.  This is where alternate text comes in – to help Google identify what is actually in the space where the image is supposed to be.  The image file name in the referenced URL is really all that Google is going to see and keywords in the file name is what it uses to index the image (that and the alt text for the image).

BTW, one final aside:  there is no such thing as an alt tag.  It’s supposed to be referred to as the alternate text attribute of the image tag, since alternate text is an image tag attribute.  But, then again we’re simply getting into semantics here.

Careful! A lump of coal in your stocking is in your future if you use white links!

Recommendation:  The links use the color value #FFFFFF (white) this is very bad SEO wise as Google sees that value as trying to trick users so they do not index them.  There is overuse of the (strong) (Bold) attribute within the body text.  If you make these a CSS class of keyword it will serve you better.

There is nothing wrong with using white as the link color so long as the link color maintains appropriate contrast with the page background.  The problem with using white comes into play when you use a white background as well, which constitutes invisible text, which can then be construed as tricking the user or raise a red flag as Google spam.

There was no overuse of the (strong) tag in the specific website that we’re discussing.  In fact, there is no conclusive evidence whatsoever that using CSS over the (strong) tag is better for SEO.  It’s strictly a preference.  Using CSS over markup to style text is a W3C valid method of coding.  While it is a good idea and can be a fantastic thing for a website (I used to preach the gospel of the W3C myself for SEO purposes – just ask my co-workers!!), it is, at its simplest, a method of coding.  Google doesn’t currently implement any kind of coding standards within its algorithm, and there is no conclusive evidence that utilizing W3C valid code increases rankings.  In addition, Matt Cutts himself (again) provides his own viewpoint, that, while validation can be a good thing, currently the Google algorithm does not give any preference for any site that has valid code (only those who have a smaller file size – where this clean code can also come into play) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPBACTS-tyg

Quite honestly I am appalled that some of these recommendations have been made without researching them a bit further.  It’s not rocket science – all the answers are on Google and doing a little digging can make your life a whole lot easier.  If you’re going to go up against a professional SEO, at least make sure that 1. you’re also a professional, or 2. you are somewhat aware of the material that you’re discussing and how it will impact the specific website that will implement the recommendations, 3. you are familiar with basic terminology and how search engine ranking algorithms work.

It really doesn’t help clients to continue spreading false information and information without enough detail to help them make the appropriate, correct modifications that will result in better SERP performance. It continues to amaze me that even further information is provided to move the client into such a direction that will, at the very least, not even do anything for rankings. It’s important for any SEO to be diligent and understand everything that they are going to make a recommendation on so that they provide the appropriate recommendation and provide accurate information that will help the client accomplish their end goal: to help make money with their website.

As an SEO, I have often run into scams that perpetuate themselves throughout the real estate industry.  Oftentimes there are those who have no idea they are scams and end up paying through the nose for them.  Unfortunately, if you’re not experienced enough to understand what is fact and what is fallacy, then how can you protect yourself when you receive the eventual sales call that you’ll inevitably receive?  By paying attention to some of the most common scams and claims that you’ll run into of course!

The “We Can Get You To The Top Of Google in 24 Hours” myth.

Well, that’s only partially true.  Great organic results, REAL results that are going to affect your bottom line take time.  They take a long term, disciplined approach that builds your authority and trust with Google.  There are some SEO methods that can achieve something close to this, but what you’ll most likely end up doing in the long run is getting your site banned from Google forever by the use of such techniques.  Then, you have to start over completely.

The “We have a special contact at Google” myth.

There is a public help line that Google provides to all webmasters.  There is nothing special about this line.  No third party is ever going to have a special relationship with Google.  Unless they work for the company.  Then they wouldn’t necessarily be a third party now would they?  Some individuals tend to utilize this line as a way of sounding exclusive to get you to buy into their services.  Don’t fall for it – realize that every webmaster who knows what they’re doing can find this number.

The “You must have a 25% keyword density to get high rankings” myth.

No matter how many time I peruse the blog posts and discussions on SEO boards, I am amazed that this myth still exists.  There is no such THING as keyword density people.  Let’s say we have 2 sites where everything is equal except keyword density.  That is, around 7 paragraphs of text on the home page, navigation menus, and other graphical elements are all the same.  The only thing different in the second site is that it has a 35% population of keywords within each paragraph.  Which do you think is going to rank higher?  The one that appears more natural to users.  There are possibilities of the other one ranking higher, but it’s likely to be filtered out of the search results as spam.  The main thing is to ensure that you have content that’s written as naturally as possible, to avoid raising red flags to google that your content may possibly be spam.

The “Meta keyword tag” myth.

Matt Cutts (head of the anti-spam team at Google) himself has talked about the Meta Keyword tag no longer being used.  I cringe whenever I see Meta keyword tags on websites approaching 200-500-1000 keywords in their Meta Keywords tags.  First of all, go light on the keywords people!  You probably only need about 10 of your keywords in there for the search engines that still care.  In fact, you probably don’t even need that because spending time on this is going to be counterproductive in your traffic building efforts.  Just pepper the Meta keywords tag with about 10 of your top keywords to keep the lesser search engines happy and move on.

The “Invisible Text” myth.

I still run across sites that have 100s – 1000s of keywords on the home page that are hidden with colors the exact same color as the home page background.  If the site hasn’t yet been banned/sandboxed/penalized by Google as a result of this practice then you’re likely to be banned soon.  This is a form of spamming and Google will hang your site out to dry if they find out about this practice.  If your site is one of the offending sites with this method in place then you’re just asking for penalization.  Get rid of the invisible keywords, and instead concentrate on blending keywords in naturally with your content.  You’ll end up getting better results that way.

The “Add Content And They Will Come” myth

Well, this one has to be one of the top ones I see.  SEO isn’t just about content writing or writing correct metas.  SEO is about integrating various methods to achieve higher rankings on the search engines.  So, content writing plays a major role.  Link building plays a major role.  On site updates play a major role.  All three categories of work work together in a complex stew of technologically enhanced goodness to develop higher rankings and higher lead conversions.  Just adding content to your site won’t do it unless you’re targeting a non competitive key term.

We can get you to the top of Google for $80/mo.

Not bloody likely.  What these guys are likely talking about is targeting keywords via pay per click campaigns.  The $80/mo. is spread out over keywords that are not likely to bring very many clicks but will likely get you to the top of Google quickly.  Unfortunately, what they don’t tell you is that these keywords are very often worthless and probably only bring in a few clicks, if any at all.  If you want to pay for a serious SEO package, look to spend quite a bit more than that to get your money’s worth.

The “Immediate Results” myth

There are certain individuals in the SEO sales space that promise the world for a measely few dollars a month and you will “immediately” see results.  The immediacy of these acertations tend to range from the small 24 hours to 2 months.  While 2 mos. Is more realistic, what results typically mean is that someone is going to expect leads to start converting like wildfire around that time.  It’s possible if a. you have a non competitive keyword, b.  the keyword has high traffic volume, and c. you have conversions up the wazoo as a result of those keywords.  More often than not, however, it’s more likely that you’ll end up disappionted.  Real results take time and effort to achieve – they don’t come over night.  Whenever you pursue an SEO endeavor, it’s important to exercise patience.

The “Financial Panacea” myth

I have seen this expectation time and time again.  SEO is not a cure-all for financial situations.  Picture this scenario.  Client signs up for SEO services.  After a month or two they start wondering about results.  Then I’ve always seen the following:  1.  The client will claim that we promised to cure all their financial troubles and 2.  They expect money to start rolling in immediately as a result.  Unfortunately, this is far from the truth.  SEO done the white hat way, without BS  schemes and black hat methods involved, is a disciplined, long term approach that is designed to achieve and keep high rankings stable for years to come.  They don’t come easy or even overnight.  It’s important to keep your expectations and emotions in check and realize that, even while a lot of hard work is going to be going into your website, it’s not a financial panacea.

The “Copy and Paste Content For Higher Rankings” Myth

The largest and perhaps most prevalent myth I have run into in my career as an SEO is the fact that many people believe that plagiarism is purely acceptable.  There are those who will do nothing to copied content.  They’ll go to wikipedia or another website and copy the content that’s there word for word.  They’ll typically sprinkle some repetitions of keywords in the content, but they won’t re-write it.  This is the single biggest mistaken myth that you can fall into the trap of.  The reality is that Google (and all the other major search engines) frown on plagiarism.  There is not really a penalty per se, but rather it’s how the search engines actually work.  They will filter out content they believe to be duplicate and return only the most authoritative, unique content they can find for the keyword that’s being searched for.

The reality is that higher rankings and solid SEO foundations take time.  There is no single quick fix or magic pill that’s going to fix your performance in the SERPs overnight.  However, through hard work, effort, and the consistent execution of a long term plan, it is possible to achieve a competitive edge in the search space.  Eventually, you’ll be able to get to the top where you’re competitors are and develop a strategy to destroy them.  In the meantime however, happy SEOing and continue to work hard on your site while keeping these myths in mind.  They may save you one day from making a mistake that can cost you your entire search engine existence.