SEO, i.e. website optimization for search engine algorithms, has been gaining more and more popularity for several years. Despite this, many entrepreneurs who want to appear in the online world and attract new customers are still afraid of investing in SEO. Why? Mostly because of the numerous false beliefs that have grown up around SEO due to its growing popularity.
Have you heard that SEO activities take too long and paid advertising is more effective? Do you think that it is impossible to measure and quantify the effects of positioning? Or maybe you are afraid of frequent changes in the search engine algorithm and think that the investment in positioning is not paying off? Learn about these and other beliefs about SEO and why they’re not true at all.
# 1 Paid ads and advertising on Social Media are more profitable than SEO efforts.
One of the beliefs about SEO that keeps entrepreneurs from investing is comparing the effectiveness of paid search advertising (PPC) and maintaining profiles on social media and positioning. Many people believe that PPC advertising brings better results because it is able to generate large profits in a short time. In practice, in the case of paid Google ads, you do not have to expect an improvement in the visibility of the website, but we have to constantly pay for the display of ads. Moreover, in order to improve visibility, the budget should be constantly increased. Investment in SEO looks completely different – the same budget for positioning with the passage of time allows you to reach a growing group of recipients. As a result, clicks on organic search are getting cheaper, in contrast to the rising cost of clicks in Google Ads campaigns.
Each promotion channel has a slightly different purpose. While positioning is to support sales, activities in social media often focus mainly on building a community and user engagement. It is also worth remembering that SEO leads to direct sales and additionally supports it. All because high positions in the search results contribute to the increase in traffic on the website and greater user interest.
It is impossible to judge whether paid ads are more profitable than SEO because they have a different purpose. Paid advertising is very profitable in the beginning, but it is associated with the need to incur fixed costs – if you stop paying, your ad will stop appearing in search results or on the Google Display Network or YouTube platform. Moreover, some users use ad-blocking programs, and the costs per click are and will continue to rise. The best solution is to combine advertising in Google Ads and positioning, because research shows that online advertising is more effective when a given page appears in both paid ads and free results for a search term. While SEO brings long-term effects, paid search campaigns work well at the beginning of the business, giving faster, but also short-term results.
# 2 SEO doesn’t pay off because there are more and more ads in the search results.
It’s hard to disagree that Google actually wants to increase its market share and undertakes many activities to make the user stay on the search results page without going to a specific site, or to click on paid advertising results. However, this does not mean that positioning does not make sense and is unprofitable. Why is this SEO belief untrue? Because:
– our research confirms that 60% of users do not distinguish between paid and organic search results,
– statistics show that clicks on paid ads account for only 2-3% of all clicks in search results.
# 3 You have to wait too long for SEO results.
The belief that SEO does not make sense due to the waiting time for results is not true, because SEO campaigns are long-term by design. They are similar to building a physical form – exercises, like SEO, do not bring results overnight – you have to wait patiently for them and work hard all the time. In this way, positioning is the foundation of the future success of your website or online store – if you set it up today, you will be profitable tomorrow. Nobody is surprised that the house is not ready after a month – and you cannot complain that positioning does not give immediate results. There are ways that can speed up your results, but they usually do not follow Google’s Webmaster Guidelines and come with the risk of penalties or even removal of your page from search results. How long you have to wait for positioning results depends on many factors – the starting position of the website or store, the industry and its popularity, and the actions of the competition.
SEO should be a permanent element of the website’s marketing strategy and should be borne in mind in various activities, for example, running profiles on social media or creating content for a blog.
# 4 It’s impossible to measure SEO ROI.
Some entrepreneurs invest in PPC campaigns because you can keep track of generated sales, revenues and price per click. Do you think that SEO results are unreliable and impossible to measure? This is one of the false beliefs about SEO. There are a number of tools you can use to verify which channel your conversions are coming from. First, you need to run conversion tracking in Google Analytics. All conversions can be found in the tool in the tab: Conversions> e-commerce> overview. In the report available in the tab: Conversions> goals> overview, owners of websites that do not focus on direct sales can also track their goals. For example, you can set the conversion as:
– contact via the form,
– subscription to the newsletter,
– online webinar registration.
What SEO effects should you follow? Primarily:
– free traffic on the website verified in the Google Analytics tool (Acquisition> All traffic> Channels> Organic Search),
– the number of views and clicks that can be checked in the Google Search Console tool,
– website visibility, i.e. the number of phrases in Google’s top10 and top3 (to be checked in paid tools),
– type of phrases on which the page is displayed (for verification in Google Search Console),
– the number of conversions that can be found in the Conversions> Goals> Overview report in Google Analytics.
The data from the above-mentioned tools make it possible to verify whether the work on optimizing the website for search engines brings the expected results in the form of increased traffic and then revenues. It should not be forgotten that the effects will not come immediately – the first to appear is the increase in visibility, which in the later perspective will bring higher sales and revenues.
# 5 SEO activities should only focus on getting to the first position.
One of the misconceptions about SEO is that only the first position in search results generates sales. In practice, the most people enter the top3 pages, but one phrase in the first place does not have to result in high sales. SEO activities should focus on improving the position of as many popular phrases as possible related to the activities of a given service company or online store. Without analyzing a specific website or store, it cannot be concluded that visibility in positions lower than the top3 will not give the expected results. Users do not always enter the first link in the search results – perhaps in the case of your website or store, conversions generate phrases in further positions, for example 7-10. Then you don’t have to focus on their further optimization at all costs. However, if the actual conversions mainly come from phrases visible in positions 1-3, it is worth choosing SEO activities focusing on their further optimization.
# 6 Frequent algorithm updates make SEO ineffective.
Google search engine algorithms are constantly changed – that’s a fact. However, this is not without a reason, so the belief that updates negatively affect the results of SEO activities is false. Why? Because the goal of the work of Google’s webmasters is to make the search results reflect the user’s expectations as fully as possible. So, if your SEO strategy is in line with Google’s guidelines for webmasters, and you are also trying to build brand authority and comprehensively conduct online marketing activities, algorithm updates help you, not harm you. To make sure that the SEO strategy of the website or online store is matched to the algorithm update, it is worth entrusting positioning to experts who constantly follow the changes implemented by Google.
# 7 It’s better to do SEO yourself.
Do you think that an investment in SEO agency services generates too much cost and you prefer to optimize your site yourself? Remember that positioning an online store or website requires not only time, but also specialist knowledge. If you don’t have one, you need to spend time getting it. What’s more, by conducting SEO activities on your own, without the help of experts, you can make mistakes that will be counterproductive – as a result of non-compliance with Google’s guidelines, you may expose your site to a penalty (filter), even removing the page from search results. Fixing errors and fixing their consequences can be not only costly but also time consuming. Thanks to the support of experts:
– SEO activities for your website or store are tailored to the industry and implemented in accordance with Google’s guidelines for webmasters,
– you gain access to analytical tools without the need to incur high license costs,
– the effects of works are verified on an ongoing basis, and the strategy is updated and improved.
Therefore, an investment in positioning pays off, and experienced employees of SEO agencies will certainly answer your questions and comprehensively explain the details of positioning and the scope of cooperation. Remember, however, that SEO effects do not come overnight, you have to wait patiently for them, but then they bring a real increase in sales.
Forget about false SEO beliefs, get the facts!
Investing in SEO is associated with many doubts – entrepreneurs who are experts in their industry usually do not have specialist knowledge in the field of internet marketing and often believe in beliefs about positioning repeated by others. Before making a decision about online advertising, it is worth getting acquainted with real data and talking to experts in the field of SEO who will answer the questions that bother you as an investor, in addition, they will present you with research-confirmed facts about SEO and the effects of actions on your clients in the form of measurable data.
Remember that no SEO agency can guarantee you the first position in search results because too many factors determine it. Nevertheless, it is worth investing in positioning, because you should be wherever your potential customers are and there are plenty of them on the Internet.